Defensive Routines

"These walls were not meant to shut out problems. You have to face them."
--Mother Abbess (The Sound of Music)

Defensive routines are thoughts and actions employed by individuals, groups, and organizations to protect their usual ways of dealing with reality (Argyris, 1985: 5). Essentially, defensive routines are behaviors to prevent or avoid embarassment or threat.

Common defensive routines include blaming, stereotyping, advocating views without encouraging inquiry, acting to save face, making arguments personal, intellectualing, and creating diversions. Defensive routines can take the form of physical action as well as mental thought processes.

Defensive routines are components of fast thinking, and probably a consequence of our evolutionary past. While they might promote near term self-protection, defensive routines discourage learning over the longer run. Difficult situations are avoided rather than faced.

By helping us avoid our problems, defensive routines blind us to improvement possibilities.

Reference

Argyris, C. (1985). Strategy, change, and defensive routines. Boston: Pitman.