We must all have met people who refuse to have a medical check-up lest the results reveal some hidden serious illness. When reality catches up with these kind of people, it is often too late to do anything to protect their health. It is a sad reality that also in business and political life there are many who believe that when ignorance is bliss, it is foolish to be wise.

The Greek economic drama is a good example of how people often prefer to live in a state of denial because the reality that surrounds them is too painful. Greek politicians in the last decade adopted populist measures to curry favour with the electorate. They paid salaries and pensions to public servants that they knew the country could not afford. They closed their eyes to rampant tax evasion and the black economy which deprived the government from financing its lavish and unaffordable promises.

Now they expect those who lent them the money to survive to forgive them at least part of their debts. Their creditors, mainly French and German banks, pretended that they would eventually get paid because the eurozone countries would underwrite the Greek debt despite the fact this type of lending bordered on the abusive because the Greek economy could never service the borrowing commitments.

When facing tough realities, some business and political leaders often become victims of the Titanic syndrome – pretend that there are no dangerous icebergs of the horizon and continue to re-arrange the deckchairs on deck. Boardrooms and other meeting places where business and political decisions are taken are often the theatre where the ‘optimists’ battle it out with the ‘pessimists’.

Some leaders prefer to take action on an evolving crisis before it becomes inevitable. By doing so, they often risk the anger and condemnation of their colleagues and the public. Other leaders prefer to adopt the maxim that, when a potato is too hot to handle, it is best to put it aside and let it cool down before doing anything. No wonder then that some hot potatoes never cool down and have a tendency to become hotter.

When facing tough realities, some business and political leaders often become victims of the Titanic syndrome

We all want our leaders to be brimming with ideas and optimism. But we also want them to be realists. We should want them to tell us the truth and not treat us like children that need to be protected from pain. Some decisions in public and business life are painful but they need to be taken to avoid us crushing to the ground when solutions to problems that have been evolving for so long can no longer be avoided.

Good leaders also need to surround themselves with advisers with their feet firmly on the ground, who are not prepared to mince their words when they see the metaphoric icebergs on the horizon. These type of advisers are often denigrated by the happy-talk brigade by being labelled as ‘pessimists’ or ‘wet blankets’ or ‘alarmists’. It is amazing how some leaders prefer to live in denial or, even worse, deceive themselves that problems will just resolve themselves over time.

Organisations that believe that when ignorance is bliss it is foolish to be wise, sooner or later face reality. In the business world those who postpone surgical solutions when serious problems afflict them often find that, when the rot sets deeply in the core of their organisation, it is too late to take action. Crisis management is rarely successful and surely no substitute to managing the risks that luck in every business expeditiously.

In the political world short-sighted policies and badly executed public projects sooner or later become too hot to handle. Government and Opposition politicians engage in a burlesque exchange of insults, accusations and finger pointing trying to impress an electorate that they aim to control by hollow rhetoric. They rarely realise that an ever increasing element of the electorate is not impressed by public relations wizardry and prefers to pass judgement on what they hear and see happening in public life in the silence of their homes.

The long-term view in business as well as in political life is always superior to the short-term one. Highly sensitive radars that help us identify obstacles in our flight paths are the best tactics for our leaders.

Those who man these radars need to be outspoken enough to indicate the risks they see on their screens

johncassarwhite@yahoo.com