I am always on the lookout for studies or papers that validate what we already suspect about the importance of Jestership in organizations. Although many of you have heard about the concept of the "Iceberg of Ignorance", I ran across more information about its source and wanted to share it with you.

The phrase "Iceberg of Ignorance" has been used to give a visual metaphor for the phenomena that predicts the level of awareness a person in an organization may have of the issues customers have with that organization. The iceberg concept states that in any given organization the group of employees that deal directly with customers will likely be aware of 100% of the problems faced by those customers, but as one moves up towards the top layers of management, the awareness level decreases sharply (about 74% of all problems identified by supervisors, about 9% identified by general supervisors). At the very top, at the leadership level, the awareness rate drops to only 4-5%!

The iceberg concept originally surfaced when a group in Japan studying quality under Sidney Yoshida, researched awareness of customer issue awareness in a cross-section of people in factory environments. Out of this research came an internationally acclaimed study which was initially presented at the International Quality Symposium, Mexico City in 1989. It not only documented the surprising results mentioned above but also noted that management's failure to understand its processes and practices from the perspective of its customers, suppressed the company's profits by as much as 40%!

Since that time the "Iceberg of Ignorance" has been found to be alive and well in many types and sizes of organizations. The original research has been repeated and the results verified and referenced in books and papers focused on leadership, organizational dynamics and communication.

Ultimately, the core issue remains the same - managers and leaders, entrusted with running an organization, making good decisions and fulfilling the promises made to customers and shareholders are unable see the issues clearly that they most need to address. They have blind spots that others in their own organization don't or can't illuminate.

Why does this happen? I believe that many organizations have not created a culture of jestership - a culture in which uncovering and illuminating blind spots is celebrated, encouraged and rewarded at all levels. Until organizations create and support that kind of behavior, the "Iceberg of Ignorance" will continue to reign.

As always, we would like to hear you weigh in on this topic. Do you see the Iceberg of Ignorance in your organization? Feel free to send us an email!