Leadership and Decision Making.

CENTRE FOR ENERGY, PETROLEUM AND MINERAL LAW AND POLICY STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY I.

D. STUDENT:100019814 PROGRAMME:MSc International Oil and Gas Management MODULE: Code CP 52060 Name: Leadership and Decision Making TITLE OF THE RESEARCH PAPER: 12 Angry Men and Enron Analysis. ABSTRACT: This research paper briefly analysis the movie clips of 12 Angry Men, an American drama film and Enron Corporation an American energy and Commodity Company.

Implementing the theories of leadership and decision making a brief conclusion is derived.Major theories analysed are selective perception, memory and hindsight bias, context dependence, and cognitive dissonance. WORD COUNT:2933 * PRESENTED TO: Mr.

JOE LAFFERTY CONTRACT CONCERNING PLAGIARISM I, the undersigned, have read the Code of Practice regarding plagiarism contained in the Students’ Introductory Handbook. I realise that this Code governs the way in which the Centre for Energy, Petroleum and Mineral Law and Policy regards and treats the issue of plagiarism. I have understood the Code and in particular I am aware of the consequences, which may follow if I breach that code.I also authorise the centre to scan the e-copy of my research paper through the Plagiarism Detection Software to detect plagiarism SIGNED:____________________________ Date:01 – 08 – 2011 Table of content PAGE 1. Introduction……………………………………………………………………3 2.

Analysis on 12 Angry Men……………………………………………………

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1. Pre decisional Dissonance……………………………………..

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1. Lady with Specs………………………………………………………………9 5. 2. Hindsight Bias Effect………………………………. ………………………. 10 6. Context Dependence………………………………………………………….

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4. Halo Effect………………………………………………………………….. 12 7. The ENRON………………………………………………………………….

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16 1. INTRODUCTION This movie sets a best example for leadership and decision making skills. Then movie starts with accusation of an 18 year lad for the murder of his father. The Jury is set for the discussion of the murder and to submit its impartial verdict to the court.This jury comprises of 12 different professionals.

The main character played by Hendry Fonda stirs the mind of rest 11 jurors, in favour of his reason of doubt on the boy’s embossed image of guilty. The convincing facts and possibility in favour of the boy of being not guilty is presented by Hendry Fonda to his co-jurors and gaining the support and attention of the rest. Here we discuss about the theory of leadership and decision making which suits in the different episode of the movie and analysing its effect and correlation with the ENRON.The major theories contributed towards this analysis are selective perception, cognitive dissonance, memory and hindsight bias, and context dependence. 2. ANALYSING 12 ANGRY MEN This movie starts from a court room were the judge leaves the trial to discuss by the jurors. A young lad around 18 years old accused of his father’s murder, cornered with strong witnesses from his neighbourhood. The boy is already portrayed as murderer and there is no hope for proving his innocence.

The juror’s starts their conversation hoping the boy to be the murderer and 11 jurors voted as guilty.Henry Fonda casted as one of the juror supports the boy and votes not guilty and raises various doubts on the witnesses. The movie starts from this point proceeding towards an optimistic end favouring for the path of his acquittal. 3. SELECTIVE PERCEPTION The people start to selectively perceive what they expect and hope to see as shown in the movie, the jurors expect the boy to be convict for the trial. The assumption and facts portray the boy to be murderer.

The jurors passionate their own way of judgement merely doubt the witness.This is well explained by the theory of selective perception by Jerome Bruner and Leo postman (1949) and they categorize the reactions to incongruity into four major types as dominance, compromise, disruption and recognition. The jurors reacted very dominant over the witness of the knife used by the murderer with a resemblance of the boy’s knife. Henry ford analyses this factor with perfect replica bought from a neighbourhood of the boy’s apartment stating for a possibility of chances the boy’s innocence.The jurors compromised the issue with the finger prints and the reasons laid by the boy for his lost knife through his pocket hole. They never changed their ideal thinking to question the possibility of a mistake. Analysing this issue with the theory of selective perception the reason stated by the jurors over the knife was radical and compromising the doubt raised by Hendry Fonda by relating it to the boys knife exhibited by him to his friends days before the murder and stating his childhood miserable and humiliation by his father.

Some jurors reacted to the incongruity was with disruption.They claimed that they have no idea about the trail and were blindly switching their vote form guilty to not guilty for the sake of their time and their commitments for the day. One of the jury even claimed to go for a match instead of discussing the trial that may lead the lad for a severe imprisonment. As explained by Bruner and postman about the recognition the jurors explained the witness given by lady which was questioned by her eyesight having a mark of spectacles left was not supported till one of the juror explained it precisely with his own experience in wearing a spectacles.This shows the expectations created by the past influencing factors and environment can strongly influence perception. 3. 1 Potent expectation The jurors expect the boy to be the murderer with definite and strong words without any consideration other than his background from slum.

They questions the major convicts are breaded in slum and expect him to be the murderer. He defines the crime rate is highly influenced by the kids in the slum and its neighbourhood. This is explained as the cognitive factor by the psychologist. It is well explained by the experiment Alcohol test conducted by G.Terrence Wilson and David Abrams (1977) and conclude that people are more influenced by expectations and what they want to see. Perception is thus explained by their way of expectation in the trial and the jurors expecting to see the boy as murderer. 4. COGNITIVE DISSONANCE It is defined as the motivation that reduces or avoids psychological inconsistence.

It is well described by story told by Nathan Ausubel (1948). When the jurors were not interested in the discussion Henry Fonda stimulates them to a scenario for discussion by explaining the importance of the discussion which can save the life of the innocent boy.This is stated by definition and experiments of Leon Festinger and Merrill Carlsmith (1959). The stimulation by an external force can change the total output in ones psychological activity. Further deepening this analysis Plous differentiate or categorize the dissonance arousing situation into pre-decisional and post-decisional.

4. 1 PRE-DECISIONAL DISSONANCE This theory explained by the analysis of Jim Sherman and Larry Gorkin (1980) by their female surgeon story. The facts and ideas stimulated will react in jurors mind by earlier influences.When Henry Fonda explains the situation of the boy failing to recollect the movie name and the cast when asked by the police, Fonda explains how a person gets emotionally stressed to the other jurors by examining one of the jurors. This create an impact not only to the jurors but it convinced the one who used the same witness of the police a very strong one to vote for not guilty. 4.

2 POST-DECISONAL DISSONANCE After a long conversation with the jurors each jurors were convinced to vote for not guilty by a clear doubts raised by Henry Fonda.The jurors who were not clear about their decision earlier were more confident when they voted for not guilty after they had increasing support towards not guilty vote. This shows that the jurors were confidence level increased after committing themselves to support not guilty by breaking their proofs and facts they believed earlier in spectacular way by Henry Fonda. This shows that cognitive dissonance can be success thriving weapon in the hands of a master. The commitment of the jurors increased towards the support of Henry Fonda’s not guilty vision as he explained the situation by making them react to the situation.When one the juror mentioned the boy yelled towards his father stating he will kill him before the time of murder, Henry Fonda stimulated one of the jurors to act and say the same words with anger which Henry Fonda mentioned that he never mean those words.

This is well explained by the statement of Aronson (1972, p. 108) “If you want someone to soften his moral toward some misdeed, tempt him so that he performs that deed: conversely, if you want to harden the moral of a person toward misdeed tempt him- but not enough to induce him to commit the deed” . MEMORY AND HINDSIGHT BIAS Memory plays a key role in decision making skill. The source of memory is received from brain which is constructed at the time of withdrawal.

Myers (1990) explains this effect with a self involvement experiment which clearly states the reconstruction of memory. When Henry Fonda explains the boy’s miserable life by his father, he states the incident before the murder referring the boy been slapped and humiliated. One of the jurors intrudes and explains he not only been slapped but punched in face.Loftus and Palmer explain in their experiments that a form of question altered even with a single word can markedly affect people’s reconstruction of their memory of an event.

5. 1 LADY WITH SPECS The jurors were very strong by the witness given by the Lady living in an opposite apartment. When Henry Fonda questions about her eyesight to the jurors, some denied the marks of specs left on her nose. Finally when other jurors strongly supported it the juror accepted the lady must be wearing specs and the normal habit people usually don’t wear specs at bedtime.

This shows the clear example of memory reconstruction, when jurors try recollect their court room memory and accepts the fact. The old juror raised a valuable doubt in the walking style of old man witness by recollecting the memory that he saw the old man with one leg creeping. This played a key role in convincing jurors in favour of the boy to analyse his innocence. John Bransford and Jeffry franks (1971) explain this theory of memory as memory is not stored separately by their experiments with students on reading survey.They conclude that people do not memorize but they construct and memorize the scenario, if one piece of information integrated with other it is hard to remember the new and already known information. 5. 2 HINDSIGHT BIAS EFFECT In this movie major jurors act with this quality without analyzing the trial they were more confident on the accusation and predicted the boy will be the murderer.

This effect is clearly explained Baruch Fishchhoff and Ruth Beyth (1975). It is also termed as “I know it all along” effect.One of the jurors portrayed as a garage owner act from the beginning of the discussion with a high self prediction and expecting the boy to be the murderer. This shows the outcome of the discussion was more predicted than actually was. 6. CONTEXT DEPENDENCE Plous categorize context dependence in the area of judgement and decision making as contrast effect, primary effect, recency effect and halo effect. 6.

1 CONTRAST EFFECT The theory of contrast effect is explained by Stanley Coren and Joel Miller (1974) with their analysis of announcer height with various sports person.The same is the issue of analysis deals with contrast effect in decision making and judgement. The boy was expected to be murderer until the various witness were breached and doubts rose against their testimony by Hendry Fonda. When an issue is analyzed with the outside look the clear decision cannot be made unless the source and data’s are thoroughly investigated. 6.

2 PRIMARY EFFECT It is described as the first impressions are the most important impression but the second and third impression still shows a significant influence in judgement making.This theory is well analysed by Norman Anderson (1965) in word arrangement experiment. The jurors were highly influenced by this primary effect. The boy was portrayed and expected by jurors as a slum born and convict of theft cases. The boy’s sympathetic motherless life was explained only after his pathetic childhood. This creates a strong pessimistic view over his character. 6.

3 RECENCY EFFECT Miller and Campbell (1959) analysed that recency effect were a function of differences in recall.They explain it as secondary information also influences the presentation than the first presentation. The jurors were compiled with information about the boy which had a primary effect, Henry Fonda analysed the secondary information which helped him to raise various doubts on the witnesses. The recency effect which acts in the secondary presentation with a time interval to analyse.

The lack of analysing and time made the jurors to expect the boy to be the murderer, when sufficient time and details were produced; the jurors were convinced to take decision favourable to the boy.This is well explained in movie as discussion and doubts grew the vote for not guilty increased with a mean time interval. When the data and evidence were reassembled the radical ideology of the jurors about the trial started to shift in favourable of the boy. This reassembling of data can change the course of decision, this is explained and analysed by the analysis of a court trial made by Norman Miller and Donald Campbell (1959) 6. 4 THE HALO EFFECT This theory is named by Edward Thorndike in 1920, explains it as physical, intellectual and other variable personality are highly correlated.

The appearance of the boy and his background from a slum neighbourhood and his lack of education had a high impact on the jurors, deciding him as vague and jaded personality. This is well explained by the analysis of aviation cadets and flight commander by Thorndike. 7. THE ENRON The failure of ENRON financially following a bankruptcy led to the arrest of its top management including its CEO and vice president. This situation is a suitable example of failure in decision and leadership skills.

The ENRON was an energy company which later invested in various commodity sectors expanding its business fortune.Until 2001 ENRON was a top and key energy organisation in U. S. A topping the chart of best companies in U. S. A. The financial tragedy of ENRON was announced on late 2011 and filled for a bankruptcy protection in late 2001. The top management failed for a transparency in their accounts and motivated the investors and share holders without clear view on their asset and commodity investments.

The board were more selectively perceive expecting an easy go in their business strategy. The theory of selective perception by Jerome Bruner and Leo Postman (1949) defines it as people expect what they want to see.Even the board was aware of their consequence; they only tried to stimulate their fortune expecting the strategy will work well. This is well explained by the experiments of David McMillen, Stephen Smith , Elisabeth Wells-Parker (1989) defining these people as high sensation seekers who liked to take risks. The board was more confident with the magazine rating them in top companies of U.

S. A and Fortune rating it as “Americas Best Innovative Company” for six consecutive years from 1996 to 2001.This is explained by Robert Vallone, Lee Ross, And Mark Lepper (1985) as Hostile media effect. The media coverage encouraged people to invest in Enron and commit themselves with the growth of the company. Vallone, Ross, and Lepper conclude that media coverage will help in decision making. The board members were confident in their decision of raising the stock value and manipulating its fortune.

Darly Bem explains this situation with his self perception theory. The board never reacted precautious with the decision made by its Board of director in Audit committee Wendy Gramm.The halo effect sates by Edward Thorndike (1920) that intelligence, physique and other personality are correlated in human evaluation. Wendy Gramm was a high profiled Commodity Futures Trading Commission from 1988 to 1993 which made the board to rely on her hidden strategy of the company. Dr. Wendy Gramm, in her capacity as chairwoman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), exempted Enron’s trading of futures contracts in response to a request for such an action by Enron in 1992. At the time, Enron was a significant source of campaign financing for Wendy Gramm’s husband, U.

S. Senator Phil Gramm.Enron also developed mutually beneficial relationships with federal regulators and lawmakers to support policies that significantly curtailed government oversight of their operations.

This made ENRON to boldly manipulate its profits with the support lawmakers. This explained by Robert Knox and James Inkster that the commitment of people will increase their confident level. This theory of pos-decisional dissonance affected the ENRON board of directors to rely more on government officials.

8. CONCLUSION This research analysis on 12 Angry Men and Enron explains varies theory in leadership and decision making.It shows the importance of decision making skills which can act both positively and negatively shown with two suitable analysis of “12 Angry Men” and the case study of Enron. The major theories of leadership and decision making skills like Selective Perception, Cognitive Dissonance, Memory and Hindsight Bias, and Context Dependence are analysed and implemented in this research. This gives an extensive idea about the key theories in decision making. The analysis on the clips of “12 Angry Men” gives a positive impact on leadership and explains how a good leadership and decision making skill can help in capital offence.

The analysis on Enron gives a good example on the consequence of horrible and bad decision making and leadership skills. 9. REFRENCES BOOKS Scott Plous, The psychology of judgment and decision making, 1993. Jeffery J Franks, John D Bransford , Constraints on Access: Costs and Benefits (Spontaneous Memory for Relevant Experiences), 1989. JOURNALS Theodore F. Sterling, The ENRON Scandal WEBSITES http://www. businessweek. com/magazine/content/01_51/b3762001. htm http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Wendy_Lee_Gramm