Eight to Late

Introduction

Conventional wisdom deems that any organizational activity involving  several people has to be closely supervised to prevent it from dissolving into chaos and anarchy. The assumption underlying this view is that individuals involved in the activity will,  if left unsupervised,  make decisions based on self interest rather than the common good, and hence will invariably make the wrong decision as far as the collective enterprise is concerned. This assumption finds justification in rational choice theory, which predicts that individuals will act in ways that maximize their personal benefit without any regard to the common good. This view is exemplified in the so-called Tragedy of the Commons, where individuals who have access to a common resource over-exploit it in their pursuit of personal gain, and thus end up depleting the resource completely.  Fortunately, this view is demonstrably incorrect: the work of Elinor Ostrom, one of the 2009 Nobel prize winners for Economics, shows that, given the right conditions, groups can work towards the common good even if it means forgoing personal gains. This post is a brief look into Ostrom’s work and the insights it offers into the theory and practice of project management.

Background: rationality, bounded rationality and theories of choice

Classical economics assumes that individuals’ actions are driven by rational self-interest – i.e. the well-known “what’s in it for me” factor (this is one of the assumptions of rational choice theory).  So, in a situation where an individual has access to a resource that is also available to others, classical economics predicts that the individual will aim to maximize his or her benefit without any regard to the common good. Clearly, the group will achieve much better results as a whole if it were to exploit the resource in a cooperative way. There are several real-world examples where such cooperative behaviour has been successful in achieving outcomes for the common good (see this paper for some). However, according to classical economic theory, such cooperative behaviour is simply not possible.

So, what’s wrong with rational choice theory?

A couple of things, at least:

Firstly, implicit in rational choice theory is the assumption that individuals can figure out the best choice in any given situation.  This is obviously incorrect. As Ostrom has stated in one of her papers:

Because individuals are boundedly rational, they do not calculate a complete set of strategies for every situation they face. Few situations in life generate information about all potential actions that one can take, all outcomes that can be obtained, and all strategies that others can take.

Instead, they use heuristics (experienced-based methods), norms (value-based techniques) and rules (mutually agreed regulations) to arrive at “good enough” decisions.  Note that Ostrom makes a distinction between norms and rules, the former being implicit (unstated) rules, which are determined by the cultural attitudes and values)

Secondly, rational choice theory assumes that humans behave as self-centered, short-term maximisers. Such theories – which assume that humans act solely out of self interest – work in competitive situations (such as the stock-market) but do not work in situations in which collective action is called for.

Ostrom’s work essentially addresses the shortcomings of rational choice theory.

A behavioural approach

Ostrom’s work looks at how groups act collectively to solve social dilemmas such as the one implicit in the tragedy of the commons. To quote from this post by Umair Haque:

…Ostrom’s work is concerned, fundamentally, with challenging Garret Hardin’s famous, Tragedy of the Commons [Note: Hardin’s article can be accessed here], itself a living expression of neoclassical thinking. Ostrom suggests that far from a tragedy, the commons can be managed from the bottom-up for a shared prosperity — given the right institutions….

In a paper entitled, A Behavioral Approach to the Rational Choice Theory of Collective Action, published in 1998, Ostrom states that:

…much of our current public policy analysis is based on an assumption that rational individuals are helplessly trapped in social dilemmas from which they cannot extract themselves without inducement or sanctions applied from the outside. Many policies based on this assumption have been subject to major failure and have exacerbated the very problems they were in-tended to ameliorate. Policies based on the assumptions that individuals can learn how to devise well-tailored rules and cooperate conditionally when they participate in the design of institutions affecting them are more successful in the field…[Note:  see this book by Baland and Platteau, for example]

Rational choice works well in highly competitive situations such as the stock market, where personal gain is the whole aim of the game. However, it does not work in situations that demand collective action – and Ostrom presents some very general evidence to back this claim.

More interesting than the refutation of rational choice theory, though, is Ostrom’s discussion of the ways in which individuals “trapped” in social dilemmas end up making the right choices. In particular she singles out two empirically grounded ways in which individuals work towards outcomes that are much better than those offered by rational choice theory. These are:

Communication: In the rational view, communication makes no difference to the outcome.  That is, even if individuals make promises and commitments to each other (through communication), they will invariably break these for the sake of personal gain …or so the theory goes. In real life, however, it has been found that opportunities for communication significantly raise the cooperation rate in collective efforts (see this paper abstract or this one, for example). Moreover, research shows that face-to-face is far superior to any other form of communication, and that the main benefit achieved through communication is exchanging mutual commitment (“I promise to do this if you’ll promise to do that”) and increasing trust between individuals. It is interesting that the main role of communication is to enhance the relationship between individuals rather than to transfer information.

Innovative Governance:  Communication by itself may not be enough; there must be consequences for those who break promises and commitments. Accordingly, cooperation can be encouraged by implementing mutually accepted rules for individual conduct, and imposing sanctions on those who violate them. This effectively amounts to designing and implementing novel governance structures for the activity. Note that this must be done by the group; rules thrust upon the group by an external authority are unlikely to work.

Ostrom also identifies three core relationships that promote cooperation. These are:

Reciprocity: this refers to a family of strategies that are based on the expectation that people will respond to each other in kind – i.e. that they will do unto others as others do unto them.  In group situations, reciprocity can be a very effective means to promote and sustain cooperative behaviour.

Reputation: This refers to the general view of others towards a person. As such, reputation is a part of how others perceive a person, so it forms a part of the identity of the person in question. In situations demanding collective action, people might make judgements on a person’s reliability and trustworthiness based on his or her reputation.

Trust: Trust refers to expectations regarding others’ responses in situations where one has to act before others. Clearly, trust is an important factor in situations where others have to rely on others to do the right thing.

She describes reciprocity, reputation and trust as being central to a behavioural explanation of collective action:

…Thus, at the core of a behavioral explanation (of cooperative action) are the links between the trust that individuals have in others, the investment others make in trustworthy reputations, and the probability that participants will use reciprocity norms…

According to Ostrom, face-to-face communication and innovative governance can change the structure of dysfunctional collective situations by providing those involved with opportunities to enhance these core relationships. On the flip side, heavy-handed interventions and increased competition between individuals will to reduce them.

Implications for the practice of project management

Projects are temporary organisations set up in order to achieve specified objectives. Achieving these objectives typically requires collective and coordinated action.  Although project team members work within more or less structured (and often rigid) environments, how individuals work and interact with others on the team is still largely a matter of personal choice.  It is thus reasonable to expect that some aspects of theories of choice will be relevant to project situations.

The importance of communication in projects cannot be overstated. Many project failures can be attributed to a breakdown of communication, particularly at project interfaces (see my post on obstacles to project communication for more on this), Ostrom’s work reiterates the importance of communication, specifically emphasizing the need for face-to-face interactions. From experience I can vouch for the efficacy of face-to-face communication in defusing crises and clearing up misunderstandings.

In most project environments, governance is imposed by management. Most organisations have follow methodologies which have excruciatingly detailed prescriptions on how projects should be controlled and managed. Ostrom’s work suggests that a “light hand on the tiller” may work better. Such a view is supported by research in organisational theory (see my post on project management in post-bureaucratic organisations for example).  If a particular project control doesn’t work well or is too intrusive, change it. Better yet, seek the team’s input on what changes should be made. In fact, most methodologies give practitioners the latitude to customize processes to suit their environments. Unfortunately many organisations fail to take advantage of this flexibility, and consequently many project managers come to believe that control-oriented governance is the be all and end all of their job descriptions. Is it any wonder that project teams often complain about unnecessary bureaucracy getting in the way of work?

Finally, it isn’t hard to argue that the core relationships of reciprocity, reputation and trust would serve project teams just as well as they do other collectives. Teams in which individuals help each other (reciprocity), are aware of each others’ strengths (reputation) and know that they can rely on others if they need to (trust), not only have a better chance of success, but also make for a less stressful work environment. Unfortunately these relationships have long been dismissed by project rationalists as “warm and fuzzy” fluff, but perhaps the recognition of these in mainstream economic thought will  change that.

Concluding remarks

Classical theories of choice are based on the assumption that those making choices are rational and that they make decisions based on narrow self interest. These theories, which assume the best (rationality) and worst (self-interest) in humans, invariably yield pessimistic predictions when applied to situations that demand collective action. This is often used to justify external interventions aimed at imposing rules and enforcing cooperation, thus perpetuating a pessimistic view of the rational but selfish individual.  Ostrom’s work – which uses a mix of fieldwork, experiment, model building and theorizing –  highlights the flaws in theory of rational choice,  and shows how cooperative action is indeed possible, providing certain important relationships are fostered through internal communication and governance. Externally imposed edicts, rules and structures are largely unnecessary, and may even be counterproductive.

Projects are essentially cooperative endeavours. Given this, it is reasonable to expect that many of Ostrom’s insights into the conditions required for individuals to cooperate should apply to project environments.  My main aim in this post was to describe some elements of Ostrom’s prize-winning work and how they apply to project management. I hope that the points I’ve made are plausible, if not wholly convincing. And even if they aren’t, I hope this post has got you thinking about ways to increase cooperation within your project team.

Introduction

Users should be the centre of focus on projects as they are the ultimate beneficiaries (or sufferers) of the end-product. Given this, there should be frequent dialogue between the designers/creators of a product and those who will use it. Most project managers would accept the foregoing as an uncontroversial, even obvious, statement of the way things should be done. However, there is a potentially a gap between this and reality. In a fascinating case-study-based paper entitled, The imagined user in projects: Articulating competing discourses of space and knowledge work, Chris Ivory and Neil Alderman look at how, in project work, knowledge about users is often constructed without direct user input – i.e. is inferred, or even attributed without justification. This post is an annotated summary of their paper.

The paper is based on a case-study of a project that was aimed at redesigning office space for employees in a higher education environment. The contentious choice here – as one might imagine – is the one between an open-plan and cellular (individual office-based) design. In the paper Ivory and Alderman discuss how the notion of the imagined user is used (by designers, or even by management) to justify particular design choices.  To quote:

The paper builds a case for the role of the imagined user as a rhetorical device in the expression and enactment of discourses within projects. Our position stems from observations that, despite the rise and rise of user-centered and participative design, the user is most notable for his or her physical absence from the design process and that interaction with users is not one of simple knowledge-transfer, but one in which knowledge about users is constructed both with and without input from users. The creation and referencing of ‘imagined users’ is part of a persuasive process – imagined users are simplified caricatures that conveniently fit (or do not fit) the sorts of design solutions (in this case particular configurations of space) under discussion. This suggests the need to go beyond knowledge-transfer accounts of the role of the user in the design and project process and to acknowledge the social construction of imagined users in project interactions.

Users and the problem of knowledge transfer

Project management theory and practice emphasise the importance of users in projects. Users typically have a dual role: firstly, they provide input into design (through requirements) and improve the quality of design decisions; second, they test the product and validate that the project objectives have been met. It is the former process that Ivory and Alderman focus on:

Interest in user input as a corrective to poor design has led to a research focus on how best to expedite the interaction between users and designers; what might be termed a ‘knowledge transfer’ focus. This emphasises finding better ways of getting to know users’ contexts and encouraging users to maximise their understanding of what is technically and financially possible. Mechanisms identified for doing this include: user groups, usability trials, user surveys, direct user observation and, latterly, various web-based forums.

The authors contend that there are two problems with this “knowledge transfer based” approach:

1. Those involved in seeking user input may view certain suggestions as being unnecessary or even undesirable. This could happen for a variety of reasons ranging from expediency to politics.
2. The difficulty of capturing what the user really means is often underestimated.  In particular,  the difficulty of translating experience to words and the possibility of misinterpretation implies that it is difficult, if not impossible, to capture user requirements in a complete and objective manner. This is particularly true of implicit knowledge, and hence the vast literature on the problem of knowledge capture.

As a consequence, it is often easier for designers to make decisions based on their own knowledge and their perceptions of user needs. Ergo, the imagined user…

Imagined users

To understand the concept of the imagined user, let’s begin by looking at what the authors’ have to say:

The imagined user is a discursive construct, depending for its existence on the dialogue of those involved in the design process. Imagined users are conjured up in the form of vignettes and anecdotes based on personal and second-hand experience, assumptions and more or less reliable research data. The key role of the imagined user in design dialogue is to give substance and rhetorical force to competing discourses relevant to the design issues in question. Creating and drawing on imagined users effectively translates broader discourses into persuasive context-specific accounts of users and use. The design process is not just an exercise in trying to ‘get it right’; it is a forum for the expression of potentially conflicting cultural, economic, political, ideological and professional preferences.

The word ‘discursive’ refers to the idea that the imagined user emerges as a consequence of the dialogue between designers and users and designers and others. Through the course of the design discussions, a certain view of what was said  (or intended to be said) by users  is built-up by designers and managers,  regardless of whether or not it was actually said or intended. This view is the imagined user.

In introducing the idea of the imagined user, the authors highlight the role of discourse (dialogue, discussion and conversation) in shaping the direction that a project takes. In this connection it is important to note that discourse is often used as a means to exercise power – which could be hard power (as by management decree) or soft power  (as by convincing or persuading others through logic and/or rhetoric).

The role of politics

Project management research generally tends to disregard the activities and work  that occurs before “a project becomes a project.”  In contrast, Ivory and Alderman focus on :

“…interactions that occurred in the early planning and design phases of the project studied; the period when there was a commitment within the organisation to begin a capital project, but no firm or detailed decisions as to the precise form the project should take.”

Their point is that decisions made in these early stages can have a crucial effect on determining the subsequent course of the project. Many of these decisions are driven by politics rather than “real user” requirements. So one could even say that:

…the outcomes of projects reflect political processes and power struggles between stakeholders as much as the physical design decisions and actions of project manager.

This, I think, is a very insightful observation that may chime with the experience of project managers who have worked in politically charged environments.

The case study

The case study is based on interviews with senior management in a university department that was engaged in renovating office space for its staff. The contentious aspect of the design was the choice between an open-plan and cellular model. The initial idea was to go with an open-plan – justified on the basis of open communication being important in an academic environment – but this was later modified in the course of discussions with users. In the interviews, the authors elicited information on why the open-plan model was chosen first and then subsequently modified.

The authors analysed the interviews by grouping the points made for and against a particular design choice, and then linking these to the broader social and organisational context.

The history of the project is a bit involved so, to ensure that I get it right, I’ll quote directly from the paper:

The history of the project was long and convoluted, but centred around the perceived need to bring a split site department onto a single site, whilst improving the facilities for the teaching of its students. At an early stage, a key objective imposed by senior management of the University was for a substantial amount of open plan space to form the core of the design. Negative reaction and lobbying by user groups within the department led to an agreement for a limited number of cellular offices to be included, but nowhere near enough to guarantee each academic their own office.

The initial project proposal failed on planning grounds and the project was reconstituted through a proposal to lease commercial office space, with some re-configuration to suit educational use. This was attractive to senior management in that it enabled the project to be funded primarily out of fee revenue rather than appearing on the balance sheet as a capital expenditure.

The project sponsor drove the choice of a commercial lease and insisted on increasing the use of open plan space. He was supported by other members of the senior management team and the Estates department, which viewed the high cost of existing space as a major problem for the University. These actors had positive views of previous projects to create open plan working spaces, both for administrative functions and for research units. The case study project was the first to propose the same solution for a conventional teaching department.

The solution being pursued by the project sponsor was not universally supported amongst senior management and neither was their insistence on an open plan design. When they left the institution, just prior to the signing of contracts, the new project sponsor successfully sought additional funding to allow for an increase in the provision of cellular offices. The to-ing and fro-ing of the project process and the shifts in power within the project form the backdrop to our investigation of the discourses about academics as space users and knowledge workers.

With the description of the case study done, I now move on to the authors’ analysis of the competing positions based on their interviews.

Analysis of arguments

The arguments for open-plan

The arguments for an open-plan design can be summarised as follows:

1. The rational economic choice: This argument was based on minimising cost and optimising space usage.  The interesting thing about this argument is that it is framed solely in terms of an organisational view –  user input, being considered irrelevant, is simply not solicited . As the authors put it:  “This discourse frames the issue of space solely in organisational terms. In effect the organisation assumes a priority over, and becomes a proxy for, all users. Consequently, any need for further discussion about the user is negated – the user effectively disappears (is unimagined)..”
2. The inevitability of progress argument: This argument hinges on the premise that change is inevitable.  Managers who advocated this position drew upon other examples where open-plan offices were implemented, and were (presumably) successful.  Such arguments deem any concerns regarding the change as irrelevant, even pointless (after all, progress is good; change is inevitable).  In this case too, users are dealt with indirectly, by appealing to users in other environment who have, presumably, accepted the inevitability of progress.
3. Constructing a fit between users and space: This argument focuses on presenting actual examples of situations where having an open plan was a benefit. For example, one user articulated his experience thus: “You could talk to people and my PA was sitting next to me more or less. And for the first time I could see there was an incredibly efficient way of getting things done. You can see people, you can walk over, you can get access to people, you get a lot more  communication…” Typically, though, most of these descriptions referred to administrative rather than academic work. The authors suggest that such “blurring of categories of work”  is sometimes used by designers to ignore input by real users – creating imagined users in the bargain.  Another project sponsor mentioned how an open plan would break academic silos and encourage people to talk to each other. Again, we see a recourse to an imagined user  who conforms to the stereotypical, uncommunicative academic.

Of course, real users who might disagree, present problems to those who wish to impose their own design choices. The authors discuss ways in which designers and managers seek to neutralise the opinions of such users. Some of the arguments presented included

1. Resistant users lack self-knowledge: these arguments were based on the premise that users actually didn’t actually understand that open-plan offered a better working environment, and that once they did they would be fine with it.
2. Resistant users are wrong: this needs no explanation!
3. Resistant users are falsely claiming that they have unique requirements: This is best explained through an example. Academics might justify their claim to cellular offices because they need to concentrate on their work. Management could counter this claim by arguing that everyone, including office staff, need to concentrate, so there’s nothing special about academics.
4. Resistant users are self-interested: These arguments were based on the logic that universities are there to serve students, not teacher; ergo, unreasonable demands (such as those for cellular offices) are immoral.
5. Cellular offices are not used anyway! This argument was based on the observation that offices are unoccupied for 70% of the workday (presumably whilst they were teaching). So their claims to individual offices were unjustified

Basically, if one is going to take recourse to an imagined user, one has to be able to dismiss the opinions of real users!

The arguments against open-plan

The arguments against an open plan design included:

1. Dismissing the claims of open-plan advocates: These hinged on arguments that advocates of open plan had weak arguments (such as “My mother used to work in an open-plan environment and she loved it”) or had personal agendas.
2. Creating alternative views of how academic work is done:   One such view might be that academic work is different from administrative work;  it needs the peace and quiet afforded by a cellular office. Strangely, this  counter-argument was not offered by any of the stakeholders.  Instead, tenured academics (higher up in the hierarchy) offered the argument that contract researchers and administrators could go into open-plan because their work was “non-core”   (a euphemism for “not important”). Again we see an imagined user – one engaged in “unimportant” activities.
3. “People are the organisation”: This is the converse of the rational view presented in the previous section. This argument centred on the premise that the academic staff are the organisation, and that a move to open-plan would destroy employee morale, thereby destroying the organisation in the bargain.  Here too there’s an implicit appeal to an imagined user – the exemplary, indispensable (tenured) academic who would be demoralised by the loss of his office and who may thus be forced to quit. Note that in this argument, other users – contract academics and support staff – are imagined as being dispensable.

The authors note that the third argument won out in the end, as they state:

The idea that morale would be damaged in an organisation dependent upon academic support made the appropriateness of open plan or cellular offices irrelevant – the organisation would cease to function effectively if its staff withdrew their support. In this way we see how resistance to the perceived threat of open plan office accommodation on the part of academic staff was manifested through the threat ‘to take their bat home’. The possibility of staff choosing to work at home, rather than occupy the new open plan space, represented too much of a risk for the project in the eyes of some senior managers…

Wrapping up

So what can we take away from this paper?

The case study highlights the use of imagined users to justify specific design views and/or decisions in a specific project.  Both sides of the argument appealed to such users – stereotypes that seem plausible but might not actually exist. This strategy isn’t new,  soccer moms and Howard’s battlers being two examples from political discourse.

The authors find it surprising that none of the arguments offered (by either party) invoked the example of an academic engaged in research – an imagined user who might actually need the peace and quiet offered by a cellular office! They surmise that this may be because in the present day work is considered as (primarily) interactive and social. Ultimately the case against open plan was made by not talking about academic work, but by “selling out” other staff – i.e. simple politics.

Imagined users are often generalisations or composites based on real users, but can also be convenient fictions. However, as the authors note, “Discourses that imagine the user may well fly in the face of empirical evidence or be based largely on hearsay or anecdote, rather than the results of rigorous research, but are no less effective for all that.”   Those who run projects  need to be aware of the power and possibility of the user who wasn’t there, because arguments that invoke imaginary users can be effective rhetorical devices to get  projects moving in  specific  (but not always desirable!)   directions.