If “you can’t fix stupid”, what do you do with smart?
I don’t know who coined the phrase about fixing stupid, and while it’s perhaps not the most respectful assessment, like a lot of things that might be delivered tongue-in-cheek, there can be some truth to it. My EOS colleagues would point to “GWC” that stands for a person’s ability to:
Get it
Want it
Capacity to do it
Just as we all have encountered people who may be in a situation that exceeds their “G” and their “C”, I want to press in a little in the other direction.
I’ve now been in consulting for 18 years and one of the more bewildering things I come across is the person or the company that is too smart for its own good. In the GWC rubric, Capacity might be extremely high. So high, in fact, that it inhibits their ability to Get it or Want it. Here are a few generic examples:
Nah, we’re good. This is about a misplaced confidence in their current state, an inability to recognize what’s at risk, at times, coupled with the lack of appetite for what someone else knows that could be helpful.
Skepticism in the face of data. Despite what empirical research or applied practice would suggest, this is about “knowing better” because of the flaws in the data and/or why the data doesn’t apply in their case.
Blindness to what they’re missing. This is about not being aware of the opportunities surrounding them. This can be a function of not recognizing, not putting two and two together (Get it). More problematic, this can be a function of not caring enough to pay attention to what’s happening and wanting to be on the leading edge of ideas and ways to improve (Want it).
Several years go, I was in a meeting with a prospective client in the medical field, where the leadership team collectively demonstrated all three of the above behaviors. It’s the first time I recall thinking, “I can’t care about you more than you care about you.” The firm opted to do nothing and watched its share and competitive position slowly erode over time.
In another example, I had a leader in the CPG industry tell me that had they simply maintained share over the last several years, they’d have had a billion dollars more in sales in a given segment of the business. (Yes, billion with a “b”.) We’d discussed intervening process that would have cost less than $30K and take less than 3 days of contact time. The outcome, “Nah. We’re good.”
One final anecdote: We’d pitched a strategic planning process to a multi-national firm in the entertainment industry. Their board wanted to get proposals from some of the biggest consulting groups on the planet. One of the proposals under serious consideration was $2 million. Ours was $100K. I told one of the officers of the company and a board member, “Give us a shot. At 5% of the other, it’s nothing more than a contingency factor.” They did and it was a terrific success.
All this to say, sometimes being “smart” can get in our own way. I haven’t yet found a way to “fix” it just yet other than with patience and politeness (and eventually) a graceful end to the conversation.
Besides, there are plenty of strong leaders and companies out there with the humility and appetite to increase their GWC, find out what they don’t yet know, and in turn, find out what they could do next.