Corporate ornithology

# Corporate ornithology

Amongst the more conspicuous inhabitants of the corporate ecosystem is a peculiar species of IT executive: the corporate magpie.

The corporate magpie is the director, CIO, head of technology, or similarly decorated functionary who flits from one glittering object to the next, abandoning each with perfect composure the moment a newer and more reflective specimen is carried into the boardroom.

The result is not difficult to predict. Across the organisation accumulates an archaeological record of pilots, proofs of concept, strategy decks, roadmaps, transformation programmes and declarations of imminent AI leadership – all accompanied by the rather less fashionable absence of anything useful reaching production.

Such executives are seldom devoid of talent. On the contrary, they are often gifted evangelists, accomplished flatterers and, in the more hazardous cases, genuinely charismatic leaders. They know how to inspire confidence, make the next initiative sound historically inevitable and persuade an anxious audience that success remains just beyond the horizon – where, conveniently, no one can yet inspect it.

Their most remarkable ability, however, is financial.

During hiring freezes, budget reductions and periods of general fiscal dismemberment, they display an almost supernatural aptitude for locating funds that no one else knew existed. Somehow there is always money for consultants, strategic advisory engagements, executive workshops or whichever vendor has most recently produced a dazzling demonstration of a product built around a concept that is fashionable, vaguely defined, extravagantly overpromised and, upon contact with reality, fundamentally undeliverable.

The obvious question is what psychology has to say about this shiny-object syndrome.

The more important question is what manner of organisational dysfunction permits such personalities not merely to survive, but to prosper – often at the expense of those unfortunate enough to be responsible for delivery.

## The individual psychology

«Shiny-object syndrome» is not a recognised psychological disorder. It is an informal but useful label for a recurring behavioural pattern produced by several distinct traits, cognitive biases and organisational incentives.

To diagnose narcissism, ADHD or psychopathy on observation alone would be unjustified. It would also be intellectually lazy – a failing best left to executive recruitment panels.

The strongest explanation is not that the organisation has employed a uniquely defective executive. It is that a person unusually skilled at initiating enthusiasm has entered a system that rewards initiation more reliably than completion.

### Novelty is intrinsically rewarding

New proposals offer immediate stimulation: discovery, attention, social activity, status and the possibility of a conspicuous success.

Implementation offers rather less glamour. It brings defect lists, data migration, integration failures, governance meetings, dissatisfied users, security reviews, operating constraints and compromise – all those tedious details by which reality announces that it has not read the strategy deck.

People differ in novelty-seeking, persistence and their ability to protect an active goal from competing alternatives. Goal-shielding research suggests that commitment to a focal goal normally suppresses rival goals. Weak commitment, low tenacity or constantly shifting priorities prevent that protection, leaving every attractive alternative psychologically available. ([PubMed](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12500810/))

In practical terms, such an executive may genuinely experience:

- ideation as energising;
- procurement and mobilisation as proof of progress;
- implementation friction as evidence that the original idea has become obsolete;
- a new initiative as relief from the disagreeable business of completing the old one.

The transition therefore feels rational from within, even when it is plainly destructive at portfolio level.

The executive does not experience abandonment. They experience evolution.

The organisation, meanwhile, experiences invoices.

### Exploration without exploitation

Organisations require both exploration – the investigation of new possibilities – and exploitation, meaning refinement, integration, standardisation and reliable operation.

The corporate magpie is rewarded almost exclusively for exploration, whilst treating exploitation as work beneath the strategic level. Discovery is leadership. Completion is apparently an operational concern.

The pathology is not curiosity. Curiosity is useful.

The pathology is the inability, or refusal, to impose a stopping rule upon exploration. Every project remains provisional, every architecture temporary and every commitment vulnerable to the next executive briefing. Nothing receives the sustained attention required for operational assimilation because permanence would invite measurement – and measurement is rarely kind to theatre.

### Confidence is easily mistaken for competence

Leadership-selection processes frequently depend upon visible cues because actual competence is difficult to assess in advance. Fluency, certainty, energetic speech and dominant non-verbal behaviour therefore become convenient proxies for expertise.

Experimental research has found that confident, leader-like behaviour can suppress participation by others, including when the confident individual is wrong. Related research suggests that socially dominant people may report greater decisional confidence without corresponding improvements in accuracy. ([ScienceDirect](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191886924004975))

Such confusion produces a recurring selection error:

> The person most willing to make an unqualified prediction is treated as the person most capable of delivering it.

Technical experts qualify their statements because they understand dependencies, constraints and failure modes.

The charismatic promoter removes those qualifications and consequently sounds more competent to non-specialists.

One describes reality. The other describes victory.

Boards have always found the second more agreeable.

### Narcissistic traits can assist emergence

Some cases will involve grandiose or narcissistic traits, although failed projects alone do not justify that conclusion.

Relevant characteristics may include status-seeking, exaggerated confidence, desire for admiration, sensitivity to competitors and attraction to conspicuous, identity-enhancing initiatives.

Research has associated CEO narcissism with more aggressive adoption of technological discontinuities. Such leaders may be particularly willing to champion major new technologies, attract attention and force resources through organisational resistance. ([Sage Journals](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0001839213488773))

The effects are not uniformly negative. Moderate grandiosity can support risk-taking, mobilisation and decisive action.

The difficulty emerges when admiration-seeking is accompanied by rivalry, self-maximisation and the derogation of critics. Longitudinal research has found that narcissistic rivalry predicts declining assessments of leadership effectiveness as colleagues increasingly perceive self-serving motives and reduced concern for the group. ([Sage Journals](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/01461672231163645))

Such findings help explain why such executives may create an impressive initial impact whilst leaving behind an increasingly dismal record.

They arrive as visionaries, mature into impediments and depart as misunderstood reformers.

It is an efficient career model – provided one leaves before the post-implementation review.

### Impression management may be the actual competence

Some people are genuinely skilled, but skilled at a task other than the one the organisation believes it has hired them to perform.

Their competence lies in:

- reading senior stakeholders;
- adapting language to the audience;
- constructing optimistic narratives;
- manufacturing urgency;
- associating themselves with prestigious technologies;
- recruiting supporters before technical scrutiny begins;
- distributing responsibility once delivery becomes difficult.

High self-monitoring is the psychological tendency to adapt one’s self-presentation (and self-preservation) to social circumstances. Workplace research connects it with leadership, networks, career progression, impression management and, under some conditions, deception. ([Annual Reviews](https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-031424-094951?TRACK=RSS))

Such an executive may repeatedly outperform stronger delivery leaders in promotion, sponsorship and budget negotiation.

The organisation is selecting for political and presentational performance, then assuming operational performance will follow.

Such an assumption is not merely a hiring error. It is a category error.

The executive is not failing to perform. They are performing magnificently – at a different game.

### Strategic ambiguity protects the promoter

Nebulous language is not merely poor communication. It offers substantial political advantages.

Terms such as «digital transformation», «intelligent enterprise», «AI leadership», «AI-enabled operating model» and «future-ready platform» permit different sponsors to imagine entirely different outcomes.

Precise claims create precise tests.

Ambiguous claims create interpretive manoeuvrability.

When delivery fails, the promoter may explain that:

- the organisation lacked maturity;
- implementation failed to embody the original vision;
- market conditions changed;
- the technology evolved;
- the programme was insufficiently funded;
- the operating model was not ready;
- the next initiative will correct the deficiencies of the previous one.

The original proposition is never exposed to a clean falsification test.

Failure is therefore not recorded as failure. It is reframed as evidence that a still larger transformation is required.

One must admire the elegance. The cure for an undelivered programme is another programme – preferably with a larger budget and a less measurable name.

## Why organisations reward it

### Management fashions supply ready-made legitimacy

Management-fashion theory describes how consultants, gurus, journalists, analysts and academics disseminate temporary collective beliefs that particular techniques represent the forefront of rational progress. ([Columbia Business School](https://business.columbia.edu/faculty/research/management-fashion))

The crucial point is that adoption has symbolic value independent of operational value.

An organisation can demonstrate that it is modern, responsive and innovative merely by announcing the fashionable programme. Delivery is desirable, naturally, but announcement is sufficient for the first press release, the next board update and several months of reputational benefit.

Staw and Epstein found that companies associated with popular management techniques did not show higher economic performance, but could gain reputational legitimacy, whilst their chief executives received higher pay. ([Sage Journals](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.2307/2667108))

That finding closely matches the phenomenon under examination.

The initiative need not achieve its nominal purpose to deliver career and reputational benefits to its sponsor.

From the executive’s perspective, such an outcome is not failure. The programme has already delivered its most important outcome.

### Crisis makes charisma more valuable

Economic pressure does not necessarily eliminate speculative programmes. It may make them more attractive.

Threat-rigidity research suggests that organisations under threat tend to restrict information processing and constrict control. Authority becomes more centralised, fewer voices influence decisions and the organisation relies upon simplified responses. ([ResearchGate](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/242540547_Threat-Rigidity_Effects_in_Organizational_Behavior_A_Multi-Level_Analysis?el=1_x_8&enrichId=rgreq-61ec1b64-e3e0-4a45-abff-67b3dd403ca7&enrichSource=Y292ZXJQYWdlOzIzNDIxOTY4O0FTOjEwMjgyMzg4MjY1NzgwMEAxNDAxNTI2NTMyNzE1))

At the same time, crisis increases demand for a convincing rescue narrative. Research on charismatic leadership indicates that crisis can create favourable conditions for charismatic emergence, although charisma is not automatically effective and may impair some followers’ performance. ([IDEAS/RePEc](https://ideas.repec.org/p/wrc/ymswp1/45.html))

The combined effect strongly favours the shiny-object executive:

1. Senior management is frightened.
2. Ordinary operational improvement appears too slow.
3. A transformative proposal promises discontinuous improvement.
4. Centralised control reduces dissent.
5. The promoter’s confidence is interpreted as command of the situation.

Severe budget reductions may therefore strengthen rather than weaken the market for alleged «game changers».

When an organisation becomes desperate enough, improbability begins to resemble ambition.

### Transformation is classified differently from maintenance

A recurring governance asymmetry is that maintaining existing systems is classified as expenditure, whilst replacing them is classified as investment.

The executive can present a speculative programme as:

- future cost avoidance;
- productivity improvement;
- workforce reduction;
- regulatory protection;
- strategic capability;
- competitive necessity;
- an urgent response to disruption.

The existing platform’s engineers ask for money to remove known defects.

The promoter asks for money to eliminate the entire category of defect through a future architecture.

The second claim is less testable, less immediate and considerably more expensive – which naturally makes it more attractive at executive level.

Consultants improve fundability by supplying financial models, benchmark comparisons, maturity assessments and executive-grade slides. They also provide borrowed authority and partial insulation from blame: the decision may later be defended as externally validated.

Nothing confers courage upon a weak decision quite like the logo of an expensive advisory firm.

### Initiation is visible; completion is distributed

Programme launches have identifiable protagonists.

Successful delivery is usually the cumulative work of architects, engineers, service managers, security teams, procurement staff, users, operational support and a small number of exhausted individuals who understand how the organisation actually functions.

Consequently:

- the sponsor receives concentrated credit for initiation;
- delivery teams share diffuse credit for success;
- delivery teams absorb concentrated blame for implementation difficulty;
- the sponsor may distance themselves from operational detail.

Such a distribution of credit and blame is an attribution problem.

Organisations over-credit visible leaders for collective outcomes whilst under-observing the less theatrical work that makes delivery possible.

The executive stands upon a stage and announces the destination.

Others build the road, move the obstacles, repair the vehicle and explain why the bridge shown in the presentation does not exist.

At the ribbon-cutting ceremony, the executive is thanked for leadership.

### Feedback arrives too late

Shiny-object personalities flourish where the interval between commitment and measurable outcome exceeds the executive’s political horizon.

Favourable conditions include:

- frequent restructures;
- two- or three-year executive tenures;
- programmes lasting longer than their sponsors remain in post;
- benefits measured through self-reported milestones;
- no baseline against which outcomes can be tested;
- changing programme names and scopes;
- responsibility transferred between committees;
- suppliers paid for activity rather than realised outcomes.

By the time failure becomes undeniable, the sponsor may have been promoted, departed the organisation or reclassified the programme as a valuable learning exercise.

The final manoeuvre is particularly refined.

Success produces benefits.

Failure produces learning.

In neither case is accountability required.

### The organisation confuses expenditure with progress

Programme environments frequently measure what is administratively available:

- budget consumed;
- consultants mobilised;
- workshops completed;
- vendors selected;
- prototypes demonstrated;
- steering committees established;
- staff «engaged»;
- press releases issued.

These are activity measures.

They say little about production use, reliability, adoption, unit cost, decommissioning, realised savings or user outcomes.

A demonstration is especially powerful because it compresses uncertainty into a vivid experience. It displays the desirable path whilst concealing integration, security, data quality, supportability, exception handling, operating cost and the inconvenience of actual users.

The executive sells the visible 5 per cent.

The organisation later discovers the invisible 95 per cent – usually after the vendor has issued an invoice and the sponsor has moved on to «the next phase».

### Dissent is politically expensive

The people most capable of identifying implausibility are often those who will be required to implement the proposal.

Their objections can therefore be dismissed as:

- resistance to change;
- legacy thinking;
- lack of ambition;
- territorial behaviour;
- technical obstructionism;
- failure to understand the strategic picture.

Once disagreement is treated as a cultural deficiency, corrective information disappears.

The sponsor receives increasingly favourable reports and may sincerely conclude that only a handful of negative individuals oppose an otherwise successful programme.

Such is the manner in which an organisation blinds itself whilst congratulating itself upon alignment.

Software-project research identifies escalation of commitment as a substantial problem: organisations continue investing in losing courses of action because of psychological, project, social and structural pressures. ([Academy of Management Journals](https://journals.aom.org/doi/abs/10.5465/amj.2010.0696?cited-by=yes&legid=amj%3B55%2F3%2F541))

The longer the programme continues, the more politically difficult it becomes to admit that continuation is irrational.

Money already spent becomes an argument for spending more.

Public commitment becomes a reason to avoid correction.

Prestige becomes collateral.

Eventually, the organisation is no longer investing in the programme. It is financing the preservation of executive dignity.

## Three different personalities can produce the same behaviour

The observable pattern does not identify a single motive.

The enthusiast sincerely overvalues novelty and repeatedly underestimates implementation.

The career entrepreneur understands that visible initiatives generate influence, funding and promotion, whereas maintaining reliable services does not.

The defensive deflector launches a replacement initiative whenever an existing commitment approaches objective evaluation. Perpetual transformation prevents any stable accounting of failure.

A single executive may, of course, contain all three elements.

The enthusiast creates the idea.

The career entrepreneur secures the budget.

The defensive deflector explains why its failure proves the need for something newer.

An admirably self-sustaining arrangement.

## The favourable organisational ecology

Such personalities thrive when the following conditions coexist:

1. Success is defined rhetorically rather than operationally.
2. Sponsors are not personally accountable throughout the full benefits-realisation period.
3. Funding approval requires a compelling story but not a testable causal model.
4. The organisation rewards novelty, scale and visibility more than reliability.
5. Technical challenge is culturally classified as negativity.
6. Projects can be renamed, rescoped or replaced without formally recording failure.
7. Consultants and vendors participate in determining whether their own proposals succeeded.
8. Senior decision-makers lack independent technical advice.
9. Budget scarcity creates demand for miraculous savings.
10. Executive selection emphasises charisma, stakeholder management and «vision» without examining completed outcomes.

Remove those conditions and the personality becomes considerably less consequential.

A charismatic novelty-seeker operating under hard portfolio limits, independent assurance, explicit termination criteria and personal accountability for benefits may be useful.

Without those controls, the same traits produce serial initiation, resource fragmentation and permanent pre-production.

The central diagnosis is therefore organisational:

> The system pays for promises, mistakes mobilisation for delivery and allows the promiser to depart before the promise can be audited.

The individual may be exploiting that system consciously or otherwise.

The organisation is what makes the behaviour sustainable.

It selects confidence over competence, spectacle over completion and rhetoric over evidence – then expresses astonishment when the strategy deck reaches production before the product does.