"Circle the Wagons" Culture

Everywhere one looks these days there are examples of individuals and organizations taking extraordinary measures to keep secrets. Otherwise honest individuals, when confronted with a choice between making the "right" choice and making the choice that will best protect themselves and their organization are choosing the latter. When the two options follow the same path, there is no problem. All too often, however, the options which present themselves are at opposite ends of the ethical spectrum.

Take, for example, the executive branch of our government. It should come as no surprise that an administration headed by our first MBA President and a former Fortune 500 Vice President would be reluctant to share information with the public. The number one concern among private sector actors from large corporations to LLC's is the avoidance of "legal trouble." Whether the trouble is justified or, as so-called conservatives like to call it "frivolous" is immaterial. Being under the gun from an outside entity is time and revenue negative. The safe course of action is to play one's cards close to the vest and keep as much potentially damaging information in-house. Obviously, this business model should not be applied (as it has been for the past seven years) to the activities of public sector institutions -- as they are, by definition, public. There is no excuse for our secretive administration hidden in these lines, but there is a kernel of understanding for their motivation perhaps.

How did we get to this point? It's quite simple, really. We sued our way here. The litigious nature of our culture has spawned a culture in which every negative event calls for multiple lawsuits. We are engaged in the pointless pursuit of risk-free living. As part of our efforts to improve our chances for success in this doomed endeavor, we make anyone who has in any way, no matter how inadvertantly or marginally, contributed to our misfortune pay a price. A steep one, too. If every mistake and oversight is grounds for large penalties, it is small wonder we have all started to be more secretive than we used to be.

It's not just the big organizations whose share prices rise and fall on the dreaded news of legal trouble either. In schools across the country, administrators do daily battle with parents and the press who, it seems, spend a great deal of their time watching for even the smallest misstep by a coach or a teacher. An inadvertant remark to a student that is interpreted as negative or a reading assignment that is viewed as biased can open the school to all sorts of negative consequences. Most times, the reaction to the transgression is all out of proportion to the infraction. In an independent school, there can also be devastating financial repurcussions. It's small wonder then, that our school leaders are reluctant to share publicly (or even internally) when something goes awry. The unfortunate result of that "circle the wagons" mentality is that when an event occurs that ought to be brought into the light, those same able, well-intentioned administrators who are conditioned to keep quiet for fear of litigation and the consequences it inevitably brings, fail to speak up. That's when serious problems occur.

How, then, can the problem be fixed? It has to be cultural. It can't be a forced change. There's no law that can make people allow for each other's imperfections. Neither is "tort reform" the answer. Taking away legal recourse will only protect those who are truly at fault in a given situation. Each of us, one by one, must look in the mirror and see another person. That other person must have faults like ours. Bad days, occasionally poor judgement, misstatements and all the other warts that we so earnestly wish for others to accept in ourselves. Then, and only then, can safety and sanity determine the options we choose rather than avoidance and secrecy. Then and only then will we empower our leaders in business, government and education to speak up when something goes wrong. Only then will those about whom we care the most, our children, be safe. I'm game, are you?