Groupthink: How teamwork might churn out worse results

Picture this. A tech company is planning to launch a new social media app. During meetings, the main team supports the CEO’s vision for the app, despite some members suspecting some security issues and bugs. However, they feel they cannot say it out loud and instead agree to the CEO’s plans. As a result, when the product is brought to the market, shortly after launch, the app experiences significant security breaches and server crashes. This damages the company’s reputation and leads to backlash from users. Now, my question is, was the problem an autocratic leader? In most cases, psychology says, no. This problem arose because of a phenomenon called groupthink.

Groupthink was first introduced by Irving Janis in 1972, when he was studying group decision-making processes, particularly in high-stakes scenarios like political and military contexts. He found that, in situations where decisions have to be made, teams preferred harmony over analysis of the alternative ideas, despite the main idea being flawed. In this case, by revealing bugs and security issues, the members feel they will lose the CEO’s confidence in the team, so they conform to his ideas. Natural instinct leads us to think that by showing some hesitation towards a team decision, we will be seen as disloyal to the team. Over time, this can result in poor decisions with significant consequences, as the group fails to thoroughly consider alternatives or anticipate potential problems.