Stupidity in the workplace can produce good results

FUNCTIONAL stupidity can be catastrophic. It can cause organisations to collapse, financial meltdown and technical disaster.

But, says Professor Mats Alvesson, an internationally respected expert on management, stupidity can also produce good short term results through enthusiasm, trust, focus and compliance.

Professor Alvesson of Sweden’s Lund University, describes this as “the stupidity paradox” and his book of the same name has become an international bestseller.

“It’s a tome against mindless conformism,” Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, who included the book on the Christmas reading list, recently told The Guardian.

It explores the dangers of mindless conformity and deference, and how a culture which questions established ways of doing things better enables organisations to innovate and succeed.”

Professor Alvesson is to give an address at the University of Sydney Business School, titled The Stupidity Paradox – the power and the pitfalls of functional stupidity at work.

Previewing the talk, he said it would tackle head-on the pros and cons of functional stupidity.

“You'll discover what makes a workplace mindless, why being stupid might be a good thing in the short term but sometimes very problematic in the longer term, and how to make your workplace a little less stupid by challenging the thoughtless conformity that most organizations cultivate,” Professor Alvesson said.

www.sydney.edu.au

 

Date:               Thursday 9th March 2017

Time:              12:00 noon

Venue:            Room 5050, Abercrombie Building (H70)

                        Cnr Abercrombie and Codrington Streets, Darlington

ENDS