Have you ever invested time and money on something because it was important to your team members? Perhaps it was in the form of recognition for employees, like an employee function. Or, it may have been a piece of equipment or software that you believed would make life easier for team members. Such commitment to employees is a good thing. However, you should be sure you really have agreement on such investments. Truth be told, employees may support a direction because they just want to be good, supportive team members. In reality, they may not personally care at all about the event or thing requiring an investment of time and money.
This phenomenon is known as the Abilene Paradox. It was first brought to light by author Jerry Harvey, who told a story about his entire family making a 106-mile trip to Abilene, Texas for dinner. Upon returning home after the long journey, they discovered that not even one of them really wanted to make the trip. Yet, they all agreed because they thought the rest of the family wanted to go.
While flexing to meet the needs of others is an admirable thing to do, be sure that you are not flexing to meet a need that nobody really cares about. Manage the "agreement factor", because resources are too scarce to be used on unwanted trips to Abilene.
