Leadership and Inclusion

Inclusion is one of the three interpersonal needs identified by Shutz in his FIRO-B® personality inventory. The “Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation – Behaviour” psychometric analysis also references control and affection. The inclusion need focuses on attention, recognition, association, belonging and acceptance. What is perhaps interesting in respect of leadership is the collective interpersonal needs of an organisation.

In Schnell and Hammers’ “Introduction to the FIRO-B® instrument in organisations”, 1997, OPP, their research findings indicate that in particular, the interpersonal needs of the leaders “will affect the climate or culture of the organisation. The organisational culture will reflect how each of the interpersonal needs is manifested in the organisation”. For many large organisations, low inclusion, high control and low affection are particularly prevalent.

Here’s how such collective interpersonal needs affect organisational culture along with further implications (“et alors”).

Leadership and Inclusion

In an organisation where the collective interpersonal needs of the leaders are “low” inclusion, “high” control and “low” affectation, in the culture there might be:

In respect of low inclusion:

·     Barriers to the inner circle

·     Resistance to diversity

·     Formality that may interfere with creativity

·     Limited consideration of others’ ideas and opinions

In respect of high control:

·     Blind obedience

·     Concentration of power

·     Overdependence of staff on managers

·     Win/lose competition between individuals and departments

In respect of low affection:

·     Doing only what is expected

·     General level of pessimism

·     Suppression of conflict

·     Pervasive scepticism and testing of loyalties

Et alors?

How can such an organisation exist and what are the implications both generally and in terms of leadership? In terms of FIRO-B®, it is not just a need per se which is considered but the need in terms of “expressed” (i.e. how much the individual initiates the behaviour) and “wanted” (i.e. how much the individual wants the behaviour to be initiated by others). In a culture with a strong power distance (where there is a general acceptance that power is unequally distributed), there is a tendency for individuals to have both high expressed control and high wanted control. This is different to (say) an entrepreneurial environment where there would be a high expressed control, but low wanted control. Large formal organisations with strong hierarchies tend towards high control as the individuals within both express and want high control. As control becomes the main driver, both inclusion and affection might be neglected. Inclusion is often overlooked and affection can be relegated to third place in such a high control environment!

The general impact of such a culture is that diversity is often overlooked, creativity suffers and innovation becomes virtually non-existent. These are all things which are potentially not beneficial for the long-term survival and prosperity of an organisation. In general, organisations might therefore need to become more inclusive! By coincidence this mirrors the reflections on diversity in the corporate world where the “solution” to the “diversity” challenge is not more diversity per se, but more inclusivity of the diversity already in place. In this context, this seems to make sense and further, if diversity can be leveraged, then so too might creativity and in turn, innovation. It therefore comes back to the leaders of the organisation. The leaders need to become more inclusive and to achieve this, leaders in such an environment might consider having fewer directives, listening more and incorporating everyone’s ideas! This might involve a considerable amount of discomfort on behalf of any leaders whose FIRO-B® profile matches that of such an organisation, but getting out of the comfort zone might be the only successful way forward!