Anthro Vision: What Consultants Can Learn from Anthropology
Gillian Tett trained as an anthropologist and conducted field work in Tajikistan before becoming a journalist with the Financial Times and ultimately chairing its editorial board. As a journalist, her application of principles from anthropology led her to some important insights. She saw that capital markets underestimated the risks inherent in complex mortgage derivatives and predicted the 2008 financial crash. She also highlighted the economic implications of the exchange of “free” social media services such as Facebook for personal data subsequently used for advertising and marketing purposes.
In 2021 she published the book ‘Anthro Vision: How Anthropology Can Explain Business and Life’. In it, she argues that anthropology provides an intellectual framework that is very helpful in addressing twenty-first century problems. Some of the approaches used in anthropology and lessons derived from it can be particularly useful for management consultants.
Observation is a critical skill
Observation is a critical skill, for anthropologists and management consultants alike. Tett argues that anthropologists need to observe initially with as few preconceptions about what is important or normal as possible; she compares it to a state of child-like wonder. Subsequently anthropologists interpret what they see, frame theories and hunt for patterns, but deep, open-ended observation is the important starting point. ‘Participant observation’, which consists of immersing oneself in the culture that one is studying, has become the approach favoured by most anthropologists as a way of providing material for a ‘bottom-up’ approach to issues of interest.
Management consultants typically do not have the luxury of time enjoyed by anthropologists, and not all consultancy projects require an all-round, in-depth understanding of client organisations. Nevertheless, an appreciation of the culture of a client organisation, “the way we do things round here”, is often important for the successful implementation of a project or the take-up of recommendations, and sharp observation may provide other clues as to the issues an organisation is facing. Bottom-up approaches, for example, carrying out some interviews with shop floor staff likely to be affected by proposed changes, may serve as a useful corrective for top-down initiatives.
Pay attention to what people do not say
One of Tett’s most important insights is to pay attention to what people do not say. When in the early 2000s she started taking an interest in the investment banking community trading complex financial instruments such as derivatives linked to mortgages and corporate loans, she realised that they were a small, close-knit group who shared a common identity, despite working for different institutions in widely scattered locations. They shared a belief that their activities made it cheaper to borrow money and were therefore beneficial to their employers and the world at large.
Tett noticed that, as a consequence, there was little or no discussion of risks. She also noticed that, among the bankers trading these instruments, there was little awareness or discussion of the impacts of cheap mortgages in the markets where they were offered to consumers. These and other factors led her to become increasingly concerned about the health of financial markets before the 2008 crash.
It is equally important for management consultants to pay attention to the potentially-significant topics that are not being talked about. Are risks being ignored? Important stakeholders being overlooked? Competitors not being taken seriously? Key environmental factors not being taken into consideration?
Do not assume that most people are like management consultants
Studies by anthropologists and cross-cultural psychologists have shown that there are important differences between countries and cultures in the way that people think. For example, people with a Western education tend to solve problems through an analytical approach, whereas people from other cultures often look at an entire situation in a holistic way. Americans and Europeans tend to define their identity in personal terms, for example their job, while non-Western people often define their identity in relation to family or community roles. These and other distinctions led the anthropologist Joseph Henrich to conclude that Western societies are outliers characterised by a set of traits he has described as WEIRD: Western, Educated, Individualistic, Rich and Democratic.
Consumer research has shown that even in Western societies people do not necessarily take a logical, analytic approach to their purchasing decisions. Tett quotes a study carried out for an organisation running nursery schools in the United States. The client company offered an early learning programme based on developmental research and the best contemporary thinking on learning design and used Big Data to analyse trends and audience profiles but found that, while parents interacted with their promotional content, conversion rates were low. Anthropologically-informed consumer research revealed that the parents trusted advice from their peers more than from “experts” and were looking to join a community when choosing a school for their children.
Many, if not most, management consultants have a strongly analytic approach. The history of our profession is rooted in analysis, with Frederick Taylor’s approach to ‘scientific management’ and McKinsey’s application of accounting principles to management, and the leading strategy and professional services firms emphasise analytic methodologies. It is important to remember that much of the world does not think like that, and even in our own Western societies people do not think along strictly analytic lines when making personal decisions.
Dr Karol Szlichcinski FIC is a member of the CMCE Leadership Team, a Chartered Psychologist and a Certified Principal Business Psychologist.
