Critical Thinking in Ethical Corporate Decision Making: From Questioning to Responsible Action

 

Maya Bay, Thailand*

Ethical corporate decision making is frequently portrayed as the ability to choose the right course of action when confronted with competing stakeholder demands, regulatory obligations, financial pressures, and organisational objectives. Yet, ethical decision-making involves far more than selecting an option that is legally compliant or economically advantageous. The quality of any ethical decision depends fundamentally on the quality of understanding that precedes it. A decision may appear rational, efficient, and even well intentioned, yet still produce unintended harm if it is grounded in an incomplete understanding of the problem, its underlying causes, and its potential consequences. Consequently, critical thinking occupies a central role in ethical corporate governance because it enables decision makers to question assumptions, examine evidence, consider alternative perspectives, and evaluate the broader impact of their actions.

At its foundation, critical thinking begins with inquiry. Rather than immediately seeking a solution, ethical leaders first seek to understand the nature of the issue before them. They ask, What is actually happening? Why is it happening? Who will be affected by this decision? What assumptions are shaping our understanding of the situation? Whose interests are being prioritised, and whose voices remain unheard? What consequences, intended or unintended, might emerge from the actions being considered? These questions move decision-making beyond superficial analysis and encourage a deeper engagement with the complexities of organisational life.

The importance of deliberate reflection before action has been recognised across philosophical traditions. In the Thirukkural, the Tamil philosopher and poet Thiruvalluvar advises,

“Think before you launch. To launch and then think is disgrace.”

Thirukkural, Kural 467

The original Tamil verse, “எண்ணித் துணிக கருமம்; துணிந்தபின் எண்ணுவம் என்பது இழுக்கு,” emphasises that thoughtful deliberation should precede action rather than follow it. This principle is particularly relevant to contemporary corporate decision making. Organisations routinely make decisions that affect employees, customers, communities, investors, and the environment. Whether introducing new technologies, restructuring operations, entering emerging markets, or pursuing sustainability initiatives, corporations have an ethical responsibility to examine the implications of their actions before implementation. When ethical reflection occurs only after negative consequences emerge, the costs can be considerable, not merely in financial terms but also in the erosion of trust, legitimacy, and stakeholder confidence.

Critical thinking, however, should not be understood merely as prolonged analysis. Rather, it is the disciplined practice of examining a situation carefully and critically. One of the greatest obstacles to ethical decision making lies in the assumption that leaders already understand the problem they seek to solve. When decision makers become convinced that they possess the correct answer, they often stop asking questions. Evidence is then interpreted in ways that reinforce existing beliefs, while contradictory information is discounted or overlooked.

This challenge is captured in the philosophy of Lao Tzu. In Chapter 71 of the Tao Te Ching, he writes:

“To know that you do not know is best; not to know that you do not know is a disease.”

This insight highlights an important ethical requirement for leadership, intellectual humility. Ethical failures frequently arise not from malicious intent but from overconfidence. Leaders who recognise the limitations of their knowledge remain open to alternative viewpoints, contradictory evidence, and constructive criticism. Such openness enables organisations to identify ethical risks and unintended consequences before they develop into larger crises. By contrast, leaders who assume complete understanding may become resistant to information that challenges their preferred narratives and strategic priorities.

The need for intellectual humility becomes even more apparent when dealing with complex organisational challenges. Corporate ethical issues rarely arise from a single cause. They often emerge from an intricate interaction of economic pressures, organisational culture, technological developments, stakeholder expectations, regulatory requirements, and societal values. As a result, solutions that address only the most visible aspects of a problem may fail to resolve its underlying causes.

Consider the example of workforce downsizing in response to declining profitability. From a financial perspective, reducing labour costs may appear to be a logical and efficient response. Yet critical thinking requires decision makers to examine the issue more comprehensively. How will the decision affect employees and their families? What impact will it have on organisational morale, productivity, and trust? How might it influence customer satisfaction, corporate reputation, and long-term competitiveness? Could alternative approaches such as retraining, redeployment, process innovation, or phased restructuring achieve similar financial objectives while mitigating harm?

The apparent problem may be declining profits, yet the underlying causes may involve strategic misalignment, technological disruption, ineffective leadership, operational inefficiencies, or changing customer expectations. If organisations respond only to the visible symptom, they risk neglecting the deeper issues that require attention.

This distinction between symptoms and root causes is one of the most important contributions of critical thinking to ethical decision making. Similar patterns can be observed in many corporate contexts. A company experiencing public criticism may view its challenge as a reputational problem and respond through communication campaigns or brand management initiatives. However, if the underlying issue involves unsafe products, environmental damage, exploitative labour practices, or a lack of transparency, then managing public perception does little to address the ethical concern. Sustainable solutions require organisations to confront causes rather than merely manage appearances.

At this point, critical thinking intersects with empathy. Ethical corporate decisions cannot be evaluated solely through the lens of organisational performance or shareholder value. They must also be examined from the perspective of those affected by them. Stakeholders frequently experience the consequences of decisions very differently from those who make them.

For example, executives may regard automation as a strategic necessity that enhances efficiency and competitiveness. Employees, however, may experience the same decision as a source of anxiety and uncertainty regarding their future livelihoods. Local communities may perceive economic risks associated with job displacement, while customers may have concerns about service quality and human interaction. An ethically informed decision therefore requires leaders to move beyond asking whether a decision benefits the organisation and instead consider how that decision will be experienced by different stakeholder groups.

Empathy strengthens critical thinking because it broadens the range of perspectives considered during the decision making process. It challenges leaders to acknowledge realities that may lie outside their immediate experience and encourages a more holistic understanding of organisational impact. By incorporating diverse stakeholder perspectives, organisations are more likely to develop decisions that are both ethically responsible and strategically sustainable.

The value of questioning assumptions is also central to the philosophy of Socrates. In Plato’s Apology, Socrates declares,

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”

Although this statement addresses personal reflection, its implications for organisations are equally significant. Ethical corporations must be willing to examine their values, assumptions, policies, and practices. They must continually ask whether established systems remain aligned with their stated principles and whether their actions genuinely reflect their commitments to stakeholders.

The Socratic method offers a useful framework for ethical corporate decision making because it discourages premature conclusions. Rather than accepting the first available explanation or solution, decision makers continue to probe more deeply. Why does this issue exist? Why has it persisted? Why have previous interventions failed? Who benefits from the current arrangement? Who bears its costs? What evidence supports the proposed solution? What alternative interpretations might exist? Through such questioning, organisations often discover that what initially appeared to be a straightforward problem is in fact a complex network of interrelated ethical, social, and strategic concerns.

Critical thinking also requires organisations to resist preconceived judgments. In many business contexts, leaders may be tempted to attribute problems to individual failures, stakeholder resistance, or external circumstances without adequately investigating underlying realities. For example, employees may be labelled as resistant to change when their concerns reflect legitimate fears about fairness, transparency, or job security. Customers may be perceived as demanding when they are simply seeking accountability and quality. Investors may be viewed as focused solely on financial returns despite increasing evidence of interest in environmental, social, and governance performance.

A nonjudgmental approach does not imply the absence of evaluation or accountability. Rather, it involves postponing judgment until sufficient understanding has been developed. Ethical leaders gather evidence, listen to stakeholders, examine competing perspectives, and evaluate potential consequences before reaching conclusions. In this sense, critical thinking is not the rejection of judgment but the discipline of making judgments responsibly.

The philosophical insights of Thiruvalluvar, Lao Tzu, and Socrates collectively provide a powerful framework for ethical corporate leadership. Thiruvalluvar reminds decision makers that thoughtful reflection must precede action. Lao Tzu emphasises the importance of recognising the limits of one's knowledge. Socrates demonstrates the value of questioning assumptions and examining beliefs. Together, they suggest that ethical decision-making begins not with finding immediate answers but with developing a deeper understanding of the questions themselves.

These insights have profound implications for corporate governance. Modern corporations operate within increasingly complex environments where decisions affect multiple stakeholder groups across social, economic, and environmental dimensions. Consequently, effective governance requires more than technical expertise and managerial competence. It requires intellectual humility, ethical reflection, empathy, and a willingness to consider unintended consequences.

A decision that maximises short term financial returns may undermine long-term trust. A legally permissible action may still be ethically problematic. A strategy that satisfies one stakeholder group may impose significant costs on another. Critical thinking enables organisations to recognise these tensions and address them before they become embedded in corporate practice.

The purpose of critical thinking is not to encourage endless analysis that paralyses action. Rather, its purpose is to improve the quality of action through deeper understanding. Questioning leads to better diagnosis, better diagnosis leads to sounder judgment, and sounder judgment leads to more responsible decisions. Importantly, the process does not end once a decision has been implemented. Ethical leaders must continuously evaluate outcomes, reflect upon unintended consequences, and remain willing to revise assumptions when evidence suggests that change is necessary.

Ethical corporate decision making can therefore be understood as a continuous cycle of inquiry, understanding, evaluation, action, and reflection. Each decision generates new information, and each outcome becomes an opportunity for further learning.

Ultimately, critical thinking is not merely a managerial competence but an ethical responsibility. Whenever corporate decisions affect the lives and wellbeing of others, decision makers have an obligation to understand before they act. They must resist the temptation to reduce complex challenges to simplistic solutions and instead pursue decisions that are informed by evidence, guided by empathy, and grounded in ethical reflection.

The central lesson is both simple and profound, responsible corporate action begins with responsible questioning. Thiruvalluvar's call for thoughtful deliberation, Lao Tzu's advocacy of intellectual humility, and Socrates' commitment to examination all point towards a common principle, meaningful ethical decisions require meaningful reflection. Organisations that cultivate this discipline are better positioned not only to make effective decisions but also to fulfil their broader responsibilities to stakeholders and society. Ethical corporate leadership, therefore, is not defined merely by the ability to achieve organisational goals. It is defined by the capacity to question assumptions, understand diverse realities, anticipate consequences, and ensure that corporate actions remain aligned with both organisational objectives and ethical obligations. Through such a process, decision making becomes not only more effective and sustainable, but also more just, responsible, and humane.

Cheers,

ravivarmmankkanniappan@124609102026 3.0644° N, 101.5936° E

*Massive overtourism at Maya Bay in Thailand destroyed over 80% of its coral reefs and severely harmed local marine life before authorities closed the area in 2018. This happened just after the movie The Beach (2000) was released. The above photo was taken during my recent visit in 2026. Thai government has eased access but tourist are not allowed beyond ankle length water from the beach. Boat access is also limited to another side of the island. 

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BEYOND THE WHITE MAN'S BURDEN

 

KL Railway Station Corridor Ceiling

(A Colonial Architecture)

Kipling cast it as the "White Man's Burden", a moral obligation supposedly borne by European powers to civilize the non-Western world. For Britain and other colonial powers, this language provided moral legitimacy for imperial rule and economic extraction. Yet the "burden" did not disappear after the Second World War. Rather, it was secularized and Americanized.

The post-1945 international order replaced overt colonial administration with a system centred on markets, development, consumer culture, and strategic alliances. The imperial burden once claimed by Britain became, under American leadership, a mission of modernization, democracy, development, security, and ultimately the freedom to consume. Historians such as Victoria de Grazia argue that American power expanded not primarily through formal empire, but through what she calls a "market empire", in which consumer capitalism, advertising, branding, distribution networks, and cultural products internationalized an American standard of living and reshaped social aspirations across Europe and beyond. She describes the twentieth century as witnessing the triumph of American consumer society and its achievement of global cultural hegemony through market-driven expansion rather than direct colonial rule.

Where classical empire extracted wealth through the direct appropriation of land, labour, and resources, the post-war American order increasingly extracted value through financial institutions, debt systems, open markets, intellectual property regimes, and global consumption. This does not mean exploitation disappeared, rather, its mechanisms evolved. David Harvey's concept of "accumulation by dispossession" provides a useful framework here. Harvey argues that contemporary capitalism increasingly generates wealth through privatization, financialization, debt structures, and the transfer of public assets into private hands, extending older imperial logics into new economic forms.

Cultural influence became equally important. Reinhold Wagnleitner's influential study Coca-Colonization and the Cold War demonstrates how American influence spread through films, popular music, consumer goods, advertising, educational exchanges, and cultural diplomacy. He argues that "Americanization" was not merely the spontaneous spread of consumer preferences but was facilitated by deliberate political and cultural strategies that integrated societies into an American-centred economic and ideological sphere. Coca-Cola, Hollywood, rock-and-roll, and consumer brands became instruments of influence that often proved more effective than colonial governors or military administrators.

In this sense, the post-war order can be understood as a transition from a colonialism of possession to a hegemony of consumption. The subject is no longer compelled merely to surrender resources to the imperial centre, instead, they are encouraged to participate willingly in economic and cultural systems that reproduce the centre's power. The colonial subject is recast as the consumer-citizen. Citizenship itself increasingly becomes linked to consumption, choice, lifestyle, and market participation rather than solely to political rights. As de Grazia notes, consumer culture became intertwined with ideas of freedom, prosperity, and democracy, allowing market participation to appear as liberation rather than dependence.

This interpretation also aligns with Antonio Gramsci's notion of hegemony, where domination is sustained not primarily by coercion but by consent. The success of American power after 1945 lay not simply in its military strength but in its ability to universalize its preferences and persuade others to embrace them voluntarily. The Marshall Plan, Bretton Woods institutions, Hollywood, global brands, and the dollar-based financial system collectively created a framework within which participation seemed beneficial and natural, even while reinforcing American centrality.

Today, however, that system appears increasingly unsettled. We may be entering the next great reordering of global power, no longer characterized by a relatively coherent American consumerist hegemony but by a fragmented competition among multiple centres of influence. China's Belt and Road Initiative, its digital platforms, manufacturing ecosystems, and development financing suggest an alternative model of influence. India increasingly projects demographic, technological, and economic weight. Regional powers such as Turkey, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, and others seek greater autonomy. The result is not the clear succession of one empire by another but a more complex and contested multipolar landscape.

The old imperial script was relatively straightforward, a civilizing mission, a strategic interest, and a clear economic structure. The emerging order lacks such clarity. Multiple actors advance competing visions of development, sovereignty, technology, and consumption. The empires are changing, the rules are being rewritten, and the eventual winners remain uncertain. One thing, however, remains reassuringly consistent, that the man on the street still gets a vote, provided it does not interfere too greatly with the broader arithmetic of power, markets, and geopolitics.

The argument that the "White Man's Burden" evolved into a post-war American "market empire" remains a compelling interpretation of how power adapted rather than disappeared after decolonization. Yet the analogy should not be pressed too far. Unlike classical colonialism, the American-led order combined elements of consent, mutual benefit, economic opportunity, cultural attraction, and strategic coercion in ways that resist simple classification.

Consumer capitalism undoubtedly extended American influence, but it also created opportunities for other societies to accumulate wealth, negotiate autonomy, and eventually challenge American predominance itself.

The emerging multipolar world suggests that hegemony is neither permanent nor uncontested. If the British justified empire through civilization and the Americans through prosperity and consumption, the question facing the twenty-first century is whether future powers will offer a genuinely new script or merely repackage older forms of influence under new rhetoric.

Cheers.

ravivarmmankkanniappan@1036071020263°09′16″N 101°39′31″E

©All Rights Reserved

The Tyranny of Becoming

 

 

“Become the best version of yourself.”

It sounds profound. It sounds liberating. It sounds like wisdom.

It is also one of the most perfectly marketable ideas of our age.

The modern self-help industry has taken an ancient human anxiety,  “Am I enough?” and turned it into an economic model.

You are not enough.

Not productive enough.
Not disciplined enough.
Not wealthy enough.
Not charismatic enough.
Not resilient enough.
Not fit enough.
Not emotionally intelligent enough.
Not successful enough.

But don't worry.

There is a solution.

Buy the book. Attend the seminar. Download the course. Hire the coach. Wake up at 5 a.m. Optimise your habits. Reprogram your mindset. Build your personal brand. Become the “best version of yourself.”

And then, having finally become that person, discover that the market has already moved the goalposts.

So, you optimise again.

The genius of contemporary capitalism is not merely that it sells us things we want.

It teaches us to experience ourselves as unfinished products.

Marx would have recognised the mechanism immediately. The commodity no longer needs to exist outside us. The commodity can be our identity, our confidence, our productivity, our relationships, our bodies, even our sense of purpose.

The self becomes a project.

And once the self becomes a project, there is an endless market for improvement.

You are simultaneously the consumer and the product.

You consume systems designed to improve yourself while transforming yourself into something increasingly legible, productive and valuable to the market.

And here Nietzsche becomes useful, although perhaps not in the way the motivational speakers imagine.

Nietzsche's idea of “self overcoming” was not a corporate productivity hack. It was not “wake up early, set goals and crush your potential.”

Self overcoming was something far more dangerous.

It meant questioning the values you had inherited.

Who told you what a successful life looks like?

Who decided that productivity is virtue?

Who decided that ambition is good?

Who decided that perpetual growth is desirable?

Who benefits when you believe that your worth must constantly be demonstrated?

The self-help guru rarely asks these questions.

Because questioning the game is commercially inconvenient when your business depends upon teaching people to play it better.

Instead, the modern guru often tells you:

Don't challenge the system. Optimise yourself for it.

If you're exhausted, become more resilient.

If you're anxious, become more disciplined.

If you're financially insecure, develop a better mindset.

If your job is meaningless, find your purpose.

If you are exploited, improve your productivity.

The structural problem becomes an individual psychological defect.

And this is where the modern language of “personal responsibility” becomes particularly seductive.

Responsibility is undoubtedly important. But taken to its extreme, it produces an extraordinarily convenient ideology:

If you are failing, you have failed to optimise yourself sufficiently.

The system disappears.

The corporation disappears.

The economic structure disappears.

Class disappears.

Power disappears.

What remains is you, staring into a mirror, wondering what is wrong with you.

And the market is standing behind you, selling you the answer.

Even leadership becomes a commodity

This is where the sentimental idea of leadership becomes interesting.

“Leadership is seeing the best in people and helping them become the best versions of themselves.”

Beautiful.

But why should an organisation do this?

Not morally. Economically.

If the answer is that developing human beings is intrinsically valuable, then we have already stepped outside the narrow logic of capitalism.

But if the answer is that developing people eventually produces higher performance, greater retention, better innovation and higher returns, then something rather different is happening.

Human development has become “instrumentalised”.

We do not necessarily develop the person because the person matters.

We develop the person because the person produces.

The language remains humanistic.

The underlying calculation remains economic.

And this is perhaps the most sophisticated form of commodification  where, even our compassion becomes productive.

Empathy becomes a leadership competency.

Purpose becomes an employee-engagement strategy.

Psychological safety becomes an organisational-performance tool.

Wellbeing becomes a retention mechanism.

Authenticity becomes a branding strategy.

Even “being human” can become a corporate capability.

And then comes the gig economy

The traditional employment relationship at least contained an implicit bargain,

“I will invest in you, and in return you will invest yourself in this organisation.”

The gig economy increasingly asks a different question:

“Why should I invest in developing you when I can simply find someone who already possesses the capability I require?”

The distinction is brutal.

The old model asks,

“What could this person become?”

The new model increasingly asks,

“What can this person already do?”

Potential becomes a liability when development takes time.

Loyalty becomes inefficient when labour can be purchased on demand.

Training becomes an unnecessary expense when expertise can be rented.

And the worker becomes less an apprentice to an institution and more an independent commodity competing in a global marketplace.

The individual is therefore told to become entrepreneurial, adaptable and endlessly employable.

In other words:

Become your own corporation.

Manage yourself.

Market yourself.

Optimise yourself.

Upskill yourself.

Brand yourself.

Monetise yourself.

And if you fail?

Improve yourself.

The capitalist corporation has moved inside the human being.

This is where Nietzsche would probably become suspicious

Because the language of self improvement can conceal a deeper question,

“Whose ideal are you trying to become?”

The “best version of yourself” sounds liberating until you ask who defines best.

More productive?

More wealthy?

More attractive?

More influential?

More employable?

More disciplined?

More socially desirable?

More commercially valuable?

If those are the criteria, then perhaps we haven't liberated the individual at all.

We have simply trained the individual to become a more efficient servant of values they never stopped to examine.

Nietzsche's challenge would therefore be much more radical than,

“Become better.”

It would be,

“Decide what ‘better’ means.”

And that is a far more dangerous question.

Because once you begin questioning the values themselves, you are no longer merely optimising the self.

You are potentially rejecting the scoreboard.

Perhaps that is the real seduction of self help

Self help promises freedom without requiring rebellion.

It tells you that you can transcend your circumstances without confronting the structures that created them.

You don't have to overthrow anything.

You just must improve yourself.

You don't have to change the system.

You just must become better at surviving it.

And perhaps that is why the industry is so enormous.

It converts dissatisfaction into consumption, insecurity into aspiration, failure into self improvement and existential anxiety into a subscription.

It gives us an endlessly renewable problem,

You are not yet who you could be.

And an endlessly renewable solution,

Buy the next thing that will help you become that person.

Marx might call this commodification.

Nietzsche might ask whether the values driving the process were ever truly yours.

And the modern self-help guru might simply call it your next growth opportunity.

That may be the most unsettling joke of all.

Perhaps the ultimate act of self overcoming is not becoming the best version of the self the market wants.

Perhaps it is having the courage to ask whether “that self is worth becoming at all”.

 

ravivarmmankkanniappan@09372209202603°09′15.69″N 101°39′30.93″E

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But Why Should It Be? Playing The Devil's Advocate

 

A Message on Leadership Which We See Often

The idea that leadership is about “seeing the best in people,” giving them opportunities, and helping them become the best versions of themselves sounds noble. It is also remarkably comfortable, perhaps too comfortable. It assumes a world in which organisations have the time, resources, and incentives to nurture human potential for its own sake.

In that environment, leadership is not necessarily about discovering diamonds in the rough and patiently polishing them. Increasingly, it is about finding the diamond that already fits the job.

The emerging gig economy makes this even more obvious. Why spend years developing someone when the market allows you to search globally for precisely the skill you need, purchase it for precisely the duration you need it, and move on when the transaction is over? The economic logic is brutally simple, fit beats potential, speed beats development, and replaceability beats loyalty.

So perhaps the romantic conception of leadership, “I see something extraordinary in you, and I will help you become it”, belongs to a different economic era.

The harder question is whether leadership should even be expected to serve such an existential purpose.

Capitalism does not inherently exist to make people better versions of themselves. It exists to allocate resources, generate exchange, accumulate capital, and reproduce the system through further production and consumption. Whatever human development occurs within that machinery may be valuable, but it is not necessarily the machinery's primary objective.

And that is where the old philosophers become uncomfortable again.

Perhaps Hobbes understood something we prefer not to acknowledge, beneath our civilised institutions lies competition, insecurity, self-interest, and the struggle for survival.

And perhaps Marx understood something equally uncomfortable, that economic structures don't merely determine what we produce but they profoundly shape how we understand ourselves, our relationships, our labour, and even what we consider a meaningful life.

“Be the best version of yourself” can therefore sound less like liberation and more like another product being sold to us, one more individualised solution to problems produced by the system itself.

The brutal reality may be that modern commerce does not always need leaders who cultivate people. It needs people who can perform.

And when performance becomes the organising principle, the question changes from,

“How do I help this person become extraordinary?”

To,

“Who is already capable of doing what I need, and how quickly can I find them?”

That is not necessarily cynical. It is simply the logic of a system that has learned to optimise.

The uncomfortable question, then, is not whether this version of leadership sounds inspiring.

It is whether human beings can still afford to expect leadership to be inspiring when the economic system increasingly rewards it for being efficient.

Cheers,

Coming Up Next : The Tyranny of Becoming.

ravivarmmankkanniappan@1004220920263.1319° N, 101.6284° E

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The Mouse, the Manager, and the Great Illusion of Control

 

Let me begin with a confession.

For years I believed the scientist was training the mouse.

Then one day I realised nobody had ever asked the mouse for his version of events.

Imagine a laboratory mouse returning home after another exhausting day at work.

His wife asks:

"How was your day?"

The mouse sighs.

"Productive. The human is finally learning. Every time I press the lever, he brings me food."

At that moment, half of psychology collapses.

Because the scientist thinks he is conditioning the mouse.

The mouse thinks he is conditioning the scientist.

And quite annoyingly, they may both be right.

This sounds like a joke until you look around and realise that modern civilisation is basically one giant operant conditioning experiment where everybody thinks they're holding the remote control while secretly being programmed by everyone else.

The laboratory never disappeared.

We simply renamed it "society."

The Great Human Delusion

Human beings love processes.

We love systems.

We love procedures.

We love flow charts.

In modern organisations, if something cannot be converted into a PowerPoint slide with coloured arrows, people begin to suspect it isn't real.

What we rarely notice is that every system designed to influence behaviour eventually starts influencing its designers.

The manager creates a KPI to control employees.

Employees learn how the KPI works.

The KPI then starts controlling the manager.

The manager responds by creating more KPIs.

Soon everybody is serving the KPI.

The KPI has become the supreme being.

Nobody remembers why it was invented.

Marriage: A Cybernetic Battlefield

Take a husband and wife.

The husband forgets an anniversary.

The emotional consequences are immediate and educational.

By the following year he has learned.

Flowers appear.

Dinner reservations appear.

Apologies appear.

Everything appears.

The wife proudly tells her friends:

"I've trained him well."

Fair enough.

But after twenty years something interesting happens.

Now the husband automatically remembers anniversaries.

Flowers arrive with Swiss precision.

The wife begins expecting them.

If flowers fail to arrive, disappointment appears.

Without realising it, the husband's behaviour has conditioned her expectations.

She conditioned him.

He conditioned her.

Nobody is driving.

The marriage is operating on autopilot.

It's less a relationship and more a sophisticated feedback system running on flowers and passive-aggressive silence.

Friendship and the Free Therapist Problem

Friendships are no different.

One friend constantly calls to complain about life.

The other friend patiently listens.

Initially it seems noble.

One is helping.

The other is being helped.

Then six months later, one person has become emotionally dependent while the other has developed a Messiah complex.

The caller thinks:

"Whenever I am stressed, I'll call him."

The listener thinks:

"Only I can help him."

Both have accidentally trained each other.

The friendship becomes a subscription service nobody remembers signing up for.

Welcome to the KPI Zoo

Nowhere is this more obvious than the workplace.

Suppose management introduces a KPI:

Respond to every customer email within four hours.

Managers celebrate.

Efficiency!

Accountability!

Customer satisfaction!

Employees read the KPI carefully and smile.

Within minutes every customer receives this response:

"Thank you for contacting us. Your issue is important to us."

Problem solved?

No.

Problem acknowledged?

Barely.

KPI achieved?

Magnificently.

The customer is still furious.

The employee gets a good appraisal.

The manager receives a green dashboard.

The director presents a beautiful report to the board.

Everybody congratulates everybody.

The only unhappy person is the customer, who unfortunately is not measured by the KPI.

The employee believes he is giving management what they want.

Management believes it is improving customer service.

The statistics look fantastic.

Reality is quietly weeping in a corner.

When Dashboards Become the Reality

There comes a dangerous moment in every organisation.

A dashboard shows green.

Reality shows red.

Management chooses the dashboard.

This is because dashboards never argue back.

Reality can be terribly rude.

Employees quickly learn:

"Don't solve the problem. Solve the measurement."

Managers learn:

"Don't examine the reality. Examine the metric."

The result is a strange organisational religion where numbers become sacred while actual outcomes become optional.

It is entirely possible to have a perfectly healthy dashboard and a dying company.

Many have.

The Yes Man Appreciation Society

The same phenomenon becomes far more dangerous in politics.

Many leaders claim they want honest feedback.

What they actually want is honest feedback that sounds suspiciously like praise.

Subordinates learn quickly.

Bad news shortens careers.

Good news extends careers.

So everybody supplies good news.

The leader thinks:

"My policies are working brilliantly."

The officials think:

"Our leader is pleased."

Reality thinks:

"This should be entertaining."

History is littered with examples.

Nokia's decline has often been associated with internal cultures where uncomfortable truths about competitors were not always communicated effectively upward.

Political regimes throughout history have suffered similar problems when leaders became surrounded by people whose primary talent was agreement.

The problem is not merely dishonesty.

Often nobody is consciously lying.

Everyone is simply adapting to incentives.

The system manufactures deception automatically.

Like an industrial assembly line.

Tom and Jerry: The Greatest Philosophers of Agency

Oddly enough, perhaps the finest explanation comes from Tom and Jerry.

Tom believes he is chasing Jerry.

Jerry believes he is manipulating Tom.

Every episode follows the same pattern.

Tom develops a clever plan.

Jerry outsmarts him.

Tom adapts.

Jerry adapts.

Tom adapts to Jerry's adaptation.

Jerry adapts to Tom adapting to Jerry's adaptation.

By the end, nobody remembers who started what.

The chase becomes self-sustaining.

It exists because it exists.

If Kierkegaard and Nietzsche had been cartoon writers, they might have created Tom and Jerry.

The International Version

The same loop exists between nations.

The United States pressures Iran.

Iran adapts.

The adaptation prompts a new American response.

The new response generates another Iranian adaptation.

Neither side simply acts.

Each side reacts to reactions which were themselves reactions to previous reactions.

At some point, the relationship becomes a machine that runs itself.

Likewise, India and China continually observe, respond, adapt, and counter-adapt along strategic, economic, and military dimensions.

One development influences the other.

The response influences the original actor.

Control becomes circular rather than linear.

The old notion that one side is purely the actor and the other merely the recipient begins to collapse.

Meta, Google and the Ultimate Lever

And now we arrive at the truly frightening part.

Meta and Google.

Originally technology companies built algorithms to shape user behaviour.

Reasonable enough.

Then users learned the algorithms.

Content creators learned the algorithms.

Advertisers learned the algorithms.

Influencers learned the algorithms.

Everyone began optimising themselves for the machine.

The machine then had to change because people had adapted.

People adapted again.

The machine changed again.

Eventually the algorithm started shaping society while society simultaneously reshaped the algorithm.

Now ask a terrifying question:

Who is actually in control?

Meta?

Google?

The users?

The advertisers?

The influencers?

The algorithms?

The answer appears to be:

"Yes."

And that is precisely the problem.

The Scary Loop

This is why the laboratory mouse is such an important philosopher.

He reveals something unsettling.

Most modern systems are built upon the assumption that one side controls the other.

Manager controls employee.

Parent controls child.

Government controls citizen.

Platform controls user.

Scientist controls mouse.

Yet in reality, both sides are constantly adapting to each other.

The controller becomes controlled.

The controlled becomes controller.

Both gradually become prisoners of a recursive loop.

That is why so many organisations become obsessed with procedures rather than outcomes.

Why governments become trapped in propaganda.

Why friendships become unhealthy.

Why social media becomes addictive.

Why Tom never catches Jerry.

Everyone is responding to everyone else.

Nobody is steering.

The entire system simply keeps going because each participant is busy reacting to the reactions of the other participants.

The mouse presses the lever.

The scientist delivers food.

The mouse presses again.

The scientist delivers again.

Years later both publish memoirs claiming they were the one in charge.

And perhaps that is the ultimate joke of modern life.

We are all mice.

We are all scientists.

And somewhere in the corner, reality is watching this comedy unfold and wondering whether anyone has noticed that the lever is now pressing itself.

Cheers.

Note: 

I must give credit to my dearest friend Raj Kumar who lives in Washington DC, for prompting this dilemma.

ravivarmmankkanniappan@200715082026 3.04384° N, 101.58062° E

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