Overcoming the blame tendency is a defining issue in the corporate world. Ben Dattner, a psychologist and organisational consultant, tells of an experience when he was working at the Republic National Bank of New York. He noticed a piece of paper that a co-worker had stapled to his cubicle wall. It read: ‘The six phases of a project: 1. Enthusiasm 2. Disillusionment 3. Panic 4. Search for the guilty 5. Punishment of the innocent 6. Rewards for the uninvolved.’ Dattner writes: ‘I have yet to come across a more accurate description of how most dramas play out in our working lives.’
