Moreover, without first establishing what you don’t control, you will not achieve a firm understanding of what you do control. And you may be surprised by how much you do control. For the most inspiring examples of this principle, you only have to look at invalids who lead normal lives under the harshest of circumstances. They are not restricted. On the other hand, action programmes without rules of the game preceding them are merely “wish lists” where nothing ever gets done. Often lack of money is the reason, because no-one has worked out beforehand where it is going to come from. How many anti-poverty programmes have failed for this reason? Similarly, the failure of summits, conferences and workshops to follow through on the resolutions passed at the end of the proceedings is often attributable to transgressing one simple rule: people have to go back to their jobs; they have other fish to fry. They don’t have the time – especially the bigwigs. When something doesn’t work or doesn’t happen, the likelihood is that you’re breaking some fundamental rule of human nature. Most revolutionary changes in a business organisation are like that – dreamed up in haste by consultants, only to peter out when human nature reasserts itself.
In science, of course, the laws are such that – at the macro-level – the cone of uncertainty vanishes into a straight line.Scientific equations are hard predictions that if the left-hand side is fulfilled, the right-hand side will follow. Unfortunately, as we have repeatedly stated, this clarity does not extend to the world of human affairs in general and business in particular, where an irreducible element of uncertainty will always be found. After all, we all have free will which allows us occasionally to flout the rules!
The good, the bad and the media
Depending on the outcome of your particular game, you may describe the rules as good, bad or just plain ugly. However, even the legendary Wild West – epitomised by the many “spaghetti” Westerns starring an avenging Clint Eastwood – had rules. They may have been unwritten, but they were understood. They were not drawn up on gleaming mahogany desks by distinguished fellows in an ancient Scottish golf club. The rules were informal and silently agreed upon, enforced by the so-called “code of the cowboy”. For example, you didn’t take another man’s horse. But if a man cheated at poker, you were quite entitled to shoot him because you just didn’t cheat at poker! Nor did you count your money at the table while the cards were being dealt. However, once the cards were in your hand, you had to know when to hold ’em and when to fold ’em – the golden rule of poker.
Most commentators will agree that we have come a long way since the rootin’ tootin’ tumbleweed-strewn saloons of the Wild West. Yet the unwritten rules still apply in another game with an equally lawless frontier: business. The first thing any new recruit should do in a company is suss out its invisible rules – if he or she wants to get on, that is. But witness the showdown between the marshall of satellite TV, Rupert Murdoch, and the football-crazy citizens of Manchester in the late 1990s. In September 1998, news broke that the world’s most famous soccer club, Manchester United, had accepted a bid of £625 million from Murdoch’s BSkyB to acquire the company that controlled the club. To ordinary folk, Murdoch’s power and influence is almost beyond comprehension. His business game is motivated not by money, but by a desire continually to expand his formidable empire. His purchase of the rights to broadcast NFL football in the US has elevated him to the number four position among American broadcasters. It has also given him the leverage and financial clout to own superteams that play football, basketball and ice hockey in the two media capitals of the US – Los Angeles and New York. He also holds the rights to broadcast the Premier League matches in the UK. He now controls the most profitable satellite-TV operator in the world. He is also very well connected politically, numbering among his friends the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair.
You would therefore feel it legitimate to draw the conclusion that if anyone had the means to influence the rules of the game, it was the media mogul Rupert Murdoch. Moreover, he would have the support of the Labour-leaning Manchester United fans. Yet, he was stopped in his bid to add the ultimate jewel to his crown not by the BBC or the British Office of Fair Trade, but by the football supporters themselves. Under the co-ordination of SUAM (Supporters Against Murdoch) – founded within hours of the announcement of the bid – and the Football Supporters Association, a popular revolt was instigated. Fuelled by a growing concern about higher ticket prices and a fear that the transaction would endanger the “soul” of the game, the revolt spread and ultimately led to the deal falling through. In retrospect, Murdoch was obviously unaware of the unstated rule that English soccer clubs are not like American baseball teams which go automatically to the highest bidder. In Chris and Tara Brady’s book Rules of the Game, the authors refer to the “too-fat-cat” rule: while it is permissible to be a fat cat in Britain, you can’t be too fat cat. Likewise, in Murdoch’s Australia, the poppies can’t be too tall. In other words, don’t take too many liberties with the British public: success is okay but excess isn’t. Having said all that, class remains a highly influential unwritten rule governing British society; and Eton still gives you a good start in life. Murdoch didn’t go to Eton.
It’s all about values, stupid
Foxes have a nose for the intangible, informal, unwritten rules of the game and instinctively try to avoid overstepping the mark. In golf, foxes give short putts on the green that might have made their opponents sweat. On the cricket field, foxes will immediately walk if they know they’ve nicked the ball straight off their bat into the hands of a fielder. It is an informal rule of cricket that you don’t wait for the umpire to give you out. Changing the occasional thud of willow against leather for the continuous shout of traders on the floor, the London Stock Exchange operated on the informal rule of “my word is my bond” for centuries. And you won’t get anybody more foxy than a stockbroker. In companies, foxes never break the unwritten rule of merit, which is to choose the best person for the job irrespective of gender or colour.
Hedgehogs are not so sensitive; they have their own agendas. The classic example of a hedgehog-type blunder occurred on 1 February 1981 in a limited-overs cricket match between Australia and New Zealand. The latter required six runs to tie the game with one ball of the game remaining. The batsman facing the delivery was the Kiwi No. 11, Neil McKechnie. He had never hit a six in an international game. Even so, the Australian captain, Greg Chappell, ordered his younger brother, Trevor, to bowl a “sneak” (an underarm ball along the ground) to deprive the opposition of even the slightest chance of a tie. This he did and it was within the written rules. However, it went clean against the spirit of the game and outraged New Zealanders to the extent that they talked of scrapping diplomatic ties. In retrospect, the Chappell brothers mightily regretted the incident, going to show that the unwritten rule rules, OK!
It is for this reason that big business is regulated by statutory anti-trust and anti-monopoly bodies in places like the US and UK. Whilst there is a thicket of explicit regulations governing mergers and acquisitions, the overriding and unwritten rule is whether or not a transaction is in the “public interest” or not. The objective is that no individual or institution should come out a winner at the expense of everybody else.
The latest company to fall foul of this unwritten rule is Microsoft, which undoubtedly was the company of the 1990s. They were asked by the courts in America to break themselves up into two pieces, a ruling which they have managed to overturn. Yet, in the minds of many of the American public, Microsoft has got too big for its own boots and, more importantly, for the good of America. However brilliant their legal defence, they could be digging an even bigger hole for themselves in the perceptions of ordinary middle-class Americans. Bill Gates, the foxy nerd who struck it rich, could become Gates the mighty hedgehog.com. Even the second richest man in the world can have problems with his image.
This would seem an appropriate time for us to introduce the ultimate, invisible system that ought to be controlling human behaviour – the moral rules of the game. These rules can be compared to what surfers describe as “full stop rock” at the famous surfers’