How Willful Blindness Can Affect Professional Performance

If you've ever felt that businesses and their leaders could do well with a bit more humanity and feeling, then you'll probably appreciate the content of this video. In a wide ranging interview for BNET, Eric Schurenberg talks to Margaret Heffernan, the author of the book Willful Blindness. A major aspect of her book has to do with the lack of social concern that's a trait of most businesses, which is in part due to the singular focus on the bottom line. She makes an interesting argument at 2:40, when she dives into how masses of wealth can often lead to decreased social engagement, and then goes on to discuss how this has been institutionalized in the curricula of business schools. If you're wondering how some of these problems may someday be fixed, make sure to stick around for her remarks at 5:15, which offer a small bit of hope about the situation.