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The Abilene Paradox and Other Meditations on Management
Faulty decision-making can have dire consequences, and when it comes to group decisions, the challenges are even greater. Join Dr. Jerry B. Harvey as he clearly illustrates why no organization wants to find themselves goin' to Abilene.
See how group dynamics can keep individuals from stating their true beliefs for fear of isolation and separation, and how that often leads to mismanaged agreement.
You'll learn to recognize the warning signs of risky group dynamics and improve decision-making processes throughout your organization.
See how group dynamics can keep individuals from stating their true beliefs for fear of isolation and separation, and how that often leads to mismanaged agreement.
You'll learn to recognize the warning signs of risky group dynamics and improve decision-making processes throughout your organization.
160 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1988
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269 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
July 24, 2012
Jerry Harvey's brilliant, funny and subversive book on management explains how it's not so much how effectively we manage disagreement that matters. W hat managers too often struggle with is the fact that we all agree on what needs to be done, but no one will speak up when everyone's loading up the Buick to drive to Abilene in 105 degree heat and everyone thinks it's a stupid idea.
The book is truly enlightening and I don't say that about many books on management. If you ever have to lead anything, chair a committee, manage a business or organize a group, you need to read this book, if only to find out how not to be turned into a phrog.
The book is truly enlightening and I don't say that about many books on management. If you ever have to lead anything, chair a committee, manage a business or organize a group, you need to read this book, if only to find out how not to be turned into a phrog.
August 26, 2011
When I first read The Abilene Paradox, I hadn't read many business/management books--I preferred fiction. In one of my early jobs, I had the opportunity to read dozens of business titles, and I have to say few compare in content or writing style to Dr. Harvey's classic. None have the sense of humor, the appreciation of the absurd, that Harvey has. And none have the soul, compassion, and wisdom of Harvey.
March 11, 2014
A different way to meditate on management, the book is short yet full of insights on how our minds trick ourselves in doing things completely wrong, fearing conflict when there's agreement or rewarding selfishness when altruism is all people ask for. The questions to ask ourselves when faced with a choice: 1) what would we rather do? 2) what stops us from doing it? Reading this book gives some kind of spiritual force that makes one feels stronger standing by one's point of view and principles.
July 3, 2015
This is a very personalized view based on a fairly large amount of research covering the topics of management, management systems, groups, and human nature within those groups. The writer covers how our institutions are destroying our humanity, and he personal efforts to change his involvement using thoughtfulness and facts. Simply, I'd say these are some strong ideas, read carefully.
October 13, 2017
A very unique take on management. Harvey applies obscure stories to obscure management theory. Interesting, honest, and important are the books characteristics. His story about Asoh, Phrogs, and Abilene all have relevance in everyday life. I would recommend this book to casual readers interested in philosophy.
February 2, 2011
My brother gave me this book, so that makes it a very special book. As our family is discussing a topic, all I have to do is ask "Are we going to Abilene?" to get everyone to reexamine their true beliefs.
December 19, 2008
A management book for people with short attention spans (that would be all of them) and for people who like parables. Who doesn't?
January 9, 2009
This is the best book on group-think I've read.
December 22, 2009
Short volume of essays espousing Harvey's view of business management. Great read, thought provoking ideas.
October 15, 2012
Great book about decision making in life and in the business world; and how bad decisions impact our life and daily work.
December 31, 2014
What a fantastic paradigm for analyzing organization dysfunction!
February 26, 2018
2018 Read Harder Challenge - an essay anthology
September 29, 2019
This is a book of sermons (not literally) exploring the origins and ethical implications of the moral dilemmas confronting managers. McGraw-Hill made The Abilene Paradox into a management movie.
This is a great joke!:
A young man was graduated from Harvard Law School and went to Washington to make his mark on Washington society. He joined a prestigious law firm and began to work twenty hours a day, seven days a week, in the hope of being made a senior partner. After about six months of working under intense pressure at such a pace, he was approached by one of the senior partners, who said, “We have noticed your work. If you continue at the same pace and produce the same quality of work, we are going to consider making you a partner.” So for six months, twenty hours a day, seven days a week, the young man labored in the vineyard of law, in anticipation of his just reward.
However, one Sunday evening at midnight, he decided he would leave the office early and surprise his long-suffering wife. As he drove into the driveway of his split-level suburban home, he noticed a Cadillac in the driveway. He parked his car quietly, turned off the motor, and headed toward his house. He went through the back door, found no one in the kitchen, dining room, or family area, but noticed a light shining beneath the door of the upstairs bedroom. He took off his shoes so as to reduce the noise, crept up the stairs, slowly opened the bedroom door, and peeked through the unobtrusive crack, only to see his wife and the senior partner engaged in what one might euphemistically term “amorous activities of the first magnitude.”
He quietly closed the door, tiptoed down the stairs, silently slipped out the back door, pushed his car into the street so it would make little noise when he started it, carefully cranked the motor, slowly drove to the corner, “floor-boarded” the foot-pedal, and raced at sixty miles an hour through the deserted streets toward his law office.
He reached his office building, brought the car to a sliding halt, and forgetting to turn off the headlights, rushed to the elevator. The elevator was locked for the night, so he darted for the stairway, sped up eight flights of stairs two at a time, burst into his office, rushed to his desk, collapsed in the security of his leather-backed chair, cradled his head in his hands, and gasped, “My God! I nearly got caught.”
The Abilene Paradox: A group will do together what no one wanted to do individually. The author writes: “When organizations blunder into the Abilene Paradox, they take actions in contradiction to what they really want to do and therefore defeat the very purposes they are trying to achieve. The inability to management agreement may be the major source of organization dysfunction.”
This is somewhat similar to the book, In Defense of the Troublemaker, about how dissent would improve our decision making and judgment. The author contends that inability to cope with agreement, rather than the inability to cope with conflict, is the single most pressing issue of modern organizations.
The fear of taking risks that may result in our separation from others is at the core of the paradox. Perhaps following the herd allows us to escape individual responsibility. It’s a good thought.
I enjoyed the chapter on organizations as phrog farms…lol. The Asoh defense in another chapter is excellent (Asoh f^&k up!). I didn’t quite agree with the author’s equating firing people, or having a reduction in force, with the Holocaust. That’s a stretch, to say the least. The purpose of an economy is not to produce jobs, but wealth. Jobs are merely an means to that end, not the end in and of themselves. This would require the government to ensure the survival of every single business, which is absurd. We lose jobs all the time, so what? He admires Japan’s job security for life, but even they’ve moved away from that because it’s not sustainable.
He uses sociobiologist Edmund Wilson’s definition of altruism, “generosity without hope of reciprocation.” It distinguishes human beings from animals. It’s genetic and a necessary condition for the survival of the species. Certainly parents are altruistic in raising children, but I believe businesspeople are, too, even though they do have hope of reciprocation (money), but they still have to put others first, and be other directed. See George Gilder’s Wealth and Poverty for more on this.
I also enjoyed his discussion of cheating. Business schools teach students to collaborate, work in teams, help one another, except on tests! I’m more optimistic that the future leaders of organizations can make a distinction between these situations, but he has a point.
This is a great joke!:
A young man was graduated from Harvard Law School and went to Washington to make his mark on Washington society. He joined a prestigious law firm and began to work twenty hours a day, seven days a week, in the hope of being made a senior partner. After about six months of working under intense pressure at such a pace, he was approached by one of the senior partners, who said, “We have noticed your work. If you continue at the same pace and produce the same quality of work, we are going to consider making you a partner.” So for six months, twenty hours a day, seven days a week, the young man labored in the vineyard of law, in anticipation of his just reward.
However, one Sunday evening at midnight, he decided he would leave the office early and surprise his long-suffering wife. As he drove into the driveway of his split-level suburban home, he noticed a Cadillac in the driveway. He parked his car quietly, turned off the motor, and headed toward his house. He went through the back door, found no one in the kitchen, dining room, or family area, but noticed a light shining beneath the door of the upstairs bedroom. He took off his shoes so as to reduce the noise, crept up the stairs, slowly opened the bedroom door, and peeked through the unobtrusive crack, only to see his wife and the senior partner engaged in what one might euphemistically term “amorous activities of the first magnitude.”
He quietly closed the door, tiptoed down the stairs, silently slipped out the back door, pushed his car into the street so it would make little noise when he started it, carefully cranked the motor, slowly drove to the corner, “floor-boarded” the foot-pedal, and raced at sixty miles an hour through the deserted streets toward his law office.
He reached his office building, brought the car to a sliding halt, and forgetting to turn off the headlights, rushed to the elevator. The elevator was locked for the night, so he darted for the stairway, sped up eight flights of stairs two at a time, burst into his office, rushed to his desk, collapsed in the security of his leather-backed chair, cradled his head in his hands, and gasped, “My God! I nearly got caught.”
The Abilene Paradox: A group will do together what no one wanted to do individually. The author writes: “When organizations blunder into the Abilene Paradox, they take actions in contradiction to what they really want to do and therefore defeat the very purposes they are trying to achieve. The inability to management agreement may be the major source of organization dysfunction.”
This is somewhat similar to the book, In Defense of the Troublemaker, about how dissent would improve our decision making and judgment. The author contends that inability to cope with agreement, rather than the inability to cope with conflict, is the single most pressing issue of modern organizations.
The fear of taking risks that may result in our separation from others is at the core of the paradox. Perhaps following the herd allows us to escape individual responsibility. It’s a good thought.
I enjoyed the chapter on organizations as phrog farms…lol. The Asoh defense in another chapter is excellent (Asoh f^&k up!). I didn’t quite agree with the author’s equating firing people, or having a reduction in force, with the Holocaust. That’s a stretch, to say the least. The purpose of an economy is not to produce jobs, but wealth. Jobs are merely an means to that end, not the end in and of themselves. This would require the government to ensure the survival of every single business, which is absurd. We lose jobs all the time, so what? He admires Japan’s job security for life, but even they’ve moved away from that because it’s not sustainable.
He uses sociobiologist Edmund Wilson’s definition of altruism, “generosity without hope of reciprocation.” It distinguishes human beings from animals. It’s genetic and a necessary condition for the survival of the species. Certainly parents are altruistic in raising children, but I believe businesspeople are, too, even though they do have hope of reciprocation (money), but they still have to put others first, and be other directed. See George Gilder’s Wealth and Poverty for more on this.
I also enjoyed his discussion of cheating. Business schools teach students to collaborate, work in teams, help one another, except on tests! I’m more optimistic that the future leaders of organizations can make a distinction between these situations, but he has a point.
May 13, 2021
Very interesting.
February 15, 2025
Best book I've read in a while. The author has a sense of humor. His topic is age old, but very relevant in our current political environment. Read it for yourself, give it to your employees.
December 1, 2020
A short collection of essays intended as an introspection on management and other aspects of business, the Abilene Paradox isn’t much more than a quick read of parables of sorts. Structurally, easy to follow and read. Perhaps it could be perceived useful to some, largely due to its brevity and lack of actual data.
My one takeaway quote:
“... the myth involves the heroic sheriff in the classic western movie who stands alone in the jail-house door and single handedly protects a suspected (and usually innocent) horse their of murderer from the irrational, tyrannical forces of group behavior- that is, an armed lynch mob. Generally, as a part of the ritual, he threatens to blow off the head of anyone who takes a step towards the door. Few ever take the challenge, and the reason is not the sheriffs six shooter… the gun, in fact, serves as a face-saving measure for people who don’t want to participate in a hanging anyways. (“We had to back off. The sheriff threatened to blow our heads off!”)”
-J. Harvey
My one takeaway quote:
“... the myth involves the heroic sheriff in the classic western movie who stands alone in the jail-house door and single handedly protects a suspected (and usually innocent) horse their of murderer from the irrational, tyrannical forces of group behavior- that is, an armed lynch mob. Generally, as a part of the ritual, he threatens to blow off the head of anyone who takes a step towards the door. Few ever take the challenge, and the reason is not the sheriffs six shooter… the gun, in fact, serves as a face-saving measure for people who don’t want to participate in a hanging anyways. (“We had to back off. The sheriff threatened to blow our heads off!”)”
-J. Harvey
August 15, 2014
Witty essays pointing to group conformity being a strong motivation force for decision making. Made me ponder how weak we are if we cling to virtues of individualism and freedom, but at the same time subconsciously invoke group tyranny to absolve ourselves of responsibility. Writing style is a little long winded but I would love to meet this guy.
September 16, 2009
Very odd business book, does get you thinking bout the workplace and social organizations. Read it with heavy grain of salt
August 18, 2012
Interesting ideas, but full of loose, kitschy metaphors and sensational imagery.
April 12, 2013
Non-fiction management book. Thought provoking, but definitely "sermon-y" - which the author admits is his drawback in the intro.
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews