decision making

There is an interesting phenomenon in social psychology called pluralistic ignorance or the "Abilene Paradox".  In short it is the reluctance people have to voice a minority opinion in a group, especially if they feel that they're the only ones holding that opinion. 

When a system is overconstrained (i.e. there are too many rules or too much bureaucracy) it often folds back into chaos i.e. order collapses.  For example, too much bureaucracy forces employees to find all kinds of work-arounds to get their work done, leading to a collapse of discipline.  Once a system is in chaos, order is often imposed by a despotic leader.  All goes well for a while, but slowly the bureaucracy creeps in again, and in an attempt to avoid the chaos ("that will not happen again on OUR watch syndrome") stricter policies are implemented, more oversight etc etc until the system becomes overconstrained again, and back we go to chaos.  It becomes a never-ending pendulum, unless a visionary leader manages to break out of this pattern. ...

Over the last few years, we've seen many people jump onto the 'intelligence' bandwagon, with varying levels of success (and substance). Of these Emotional Intelligence (or EQ), which has become part of business jargon globally, is probably the most well-known. Others such as spiritual intelligence and social intelligence haven't really caught on (personally I feel the jury is still out on the business value offered by these concepts).