Be a Better Leader: Overcome Status Quo Bias.
Don’t be subject to inertia.
“The riskiest thing we can do is just maintain the status quo,” wrote Bob Iger. And yet, we’re disposed to do this very thing. How often do we drift through the same motions, simply because it’s what we’ve done so far? Whether it’s doomed projects, dead-end jobs, or poor relationships, provided the pain isn’t too bad, we rationalize inaction rather than make a change. The U.S. founding fathers recognized this in the Declaration of Independence, “all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.”
Newton’s first law of motion states that a body continues in its state of rest, or in uniform motion, unless acted upon by a force. Also called the law of inertia, it applies to people just as it does to objects. Absent an external force, we’ll keep doing whatever we’re doing. It’s true whether what we’re doing is intelligent and leading to success or nonsensical and doomed for failure.
This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. We only have so much energy to go around. It avoids distractions and decision fatigue. Yet it becomes a problem when the status quo stops being the optimal choice. If it’s our default position for everything, we’re missing new opportunities. The nature of…
