Familiarity is attractive but it can become a hurdle in ushering in Transformative Changes. Are organisations suffering from Status Quo Bias: the preference for maintaining one’s current situation?
People tend to avoid change. In a disruptive post-pandemic environment, this inertia for change can easily set an organisation back on harnessing the many opportunities of the new economy.

What can be done to change this mindset?

Consider this:

• An employee is allowed to join a different department at her organisation. She is worried about transitioning to the new role and perhaps not succeeding, so she rejects the opportunity.
• The contract with one of your vendors is about to end, and you renew the deal as usual without considering other competitors who could be a better fit for your organisation.
• Your organisation puts out a poll to transition to new software and a majority of employees vote for the current software to avoid the pain of transition.

Status Quo Bias is a Cognitive Bias based on emotions. In the current environment, many organisations have at least five or six identified areas for change where this bias needs to be navigated. This change agenda is being driven across the Business Value Chain including Talent where the impact can deliver sustainable High Performance.

Status Quo Bias in hiring –

• Are you using the same job descriptions you used in the pre-pandemic world? There is a high sense of familiarity with old paradigms, while a job may require to be redefined in the new economy.
• Hiring for skills and not qualifications is a major shift to manifest the future of work and redefine who your talent is. Executing this requires challenging many assumptions and the status quo on the traits of potential ideal candidates.
• Hiring for socio-cognitive diversity is not an experiment. It’s the need of the hour to bring new perspectives and to have the courage to be challenged into new thinking. Hiring from other industries and disciplines is a great way to begin reinventing the workplace with fresh perspectives.
• Grasping your organisation’s performance dynamics and guiding hiring managers to integrate young talent effectively demands challenging existing paradigms to increase retention.
• Persona-based hiring — bringing in talent from alternate pools — too requires challenging the status quo. This means a shift in how access to these pools is created, mentoring recruiters to go the extra mile in integrating data and talent analytics to make informed decisions rather than rely on gut and experience.

_{This article was featured on Times Ascent on September 4th, 2024}