Swarthmore professor Barry Schwartz claims that the rules and procedures of contemporary society retard a person's "practical wisdom" (which, according to Aristotle, is nothing more than a person's moral skill and moral will).
A wise person:
1. knows when and how to make the "exception to every rule."
2. knows when and how to improvise.
3. uses these moral skills in pursuit of the right aims.
4. is made not born.
Schwartz observes that society generally use two tools when things go wrong, rules and incentives. Unfortunately, neither rules nor incentives fix problems on their own; in fact, they tend to make situations far worse in the long run. "Moral skill is chipped away by an over-reliance on rules that deprives us of the opportunity to improvise and to learn from our improvisation. And moral will is deprived by an incessant appeal to incentives that destroy our desire to do the right thing. And without intending it, by appealing to rules and incentives, we are engaging a war on wisdom."
Every person, let alone every head of an organization, should view this talk.
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