Creating the Innovation Culture: Leveraging Visionaries, Dissenters and Other Useful Troublemakers

Chapter 4. The Nature of Dissent in Organizations

Dissent does not always confine itself to the areas managers find acceptable. It's not possible to have a culture that encourages it only in areas sanctioned by management. Dissent has to flow free.

Introduction

When I was speaking once at a conference, someone told me a story he thought was a great one about managing knowledge workers. It was, but it was an even better story about managing dissent.

He was working at a brokerage firm that traded in Asia. Traders had to get up at the crack of dawn to check opening prices on the Tokyo exchange. Then they would come into work. Because of the long and demanding days, attrition and absenteeism were very high. A manager suggested to the Board of Directors that they install a "crash room"—nothing more than couches and music so traders could sack out for a few hours when fatigue got them. The Board pooh-poohed the suggestion. After all, they had made it through the ranks without mollycoddling. The traders could just tough it out.

But the manager went ahead and installed the room anyway. Sure enough, absenteeism dropped almost to nothing when traders knew they could just take a nap rather than skip a whole day's work. Attrition also dropped. When the Board saw the results, they realized the value of the idea and allowed other rooms to be set up. But they fired the manager. They fired him because he disobeyed a direct order.

In hindsight, the firing seems pretty stupid. First of all, the Board ...