Malicious compliance

Malicious compliance (also known as malicious obedience) is the behavior of strictly following the orders of a superior despite knowing that compliance with the orders will have an unintended or negative result. It usually implies following an order in such a way that ignores or otherwise undermines the order's intent, but follows it to the letter.[1][2] A form of passive-aggressive behavior, it is often associated with poor management-labor relationships, micromanagement, a generalized lack of confidence in leadership, and resistance to changes perceived as pointless, duplicative, dangerous, or otherwise undesirable. It is common in organizations with top-down management structures lacking morale, leadership or mutual trust. In U.S. law, this practice has been theorized as a form of uncivil obedience,[3] and it is a technique which is also used in art practice.[4]

Managers can avoid this by not making excessive or incomprehensible demands of employees.[5]

Examples

As an example of malicious compliance, a group of U.S. firefighters was required to wear self-contained breathing apparatus for safety reasons. In response, they took to wearing the equipment on their backs but not using it. This made their work less efficient than if they had not been wearing the breathing apparatus at all. A further instruction was required that ordered them to wear and use the apparatus.[6]

Another example is a project manager going along with a project, knowing it is impossible to complete. While the rest of their team knows the task is insurmountable, they cut corners to achieve some sort of result.[7]

Malicious compliance is common in production situations in which employees and middle management are measured based on meeting certain quotas or performance projections. Examples of this include:

  • Employees at a factory shipping product to customers too early so their inventory is reduced to meet a projection;[8]
  • Software quality-checkers reporting every minor issue with a program because they are measured based on the number of errors they report (regardless of whether the glitches are important or not);[8]
  • Production plants refusing shipments of raw material at month-end so that monthly completion projections are met, even if doing so causes a negative impact on customer deliverables and overall production figures.[8]

Malicious compliance was common in the Soviet Union's command economy; examples are used in university group assignments to hypothetically show differences between the Soviet command economy and a free market.[9]

See also

References
  1. Tom DeMarco, Tim Lister, Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams, p. 179, Addison-Wesley, 2013 ISBN 978-0-13-344073-7.
  2. "U.S. Set To Begin Massive Military Exercises in Qatar", CNN.com transcript, NewsNight with Aaron Brown, Dec 6, 2002, retrieved June 7, 2007, Malicious compliance is when your boss tells you to do something and you do it even though you know it's not going to have the desired result.
  3. Bulman-Pozen, Jessica; Pozen, David E. (2015). "Uncivil Obedience". Columbia Law Review. 115 (4): 809–872. ISSN 0010-1958. JSTOR 43387025.
  4. Steinberg, Monica (2020-03-01). "Uncivil Obedience: Lowell Darling Follows the Law". American Art. 34 (1): 112–135. doi:10.1086/709417. ISSN 1073-9300. S2CID 218780624.
  5. Cecilie Strømgaard Patscheider (8 August 2016). "Djøf: Lyv dig ud af spørgsmål om babyplaner og seksualitet til jobsamtalen". Politiken (in Danish).
  6. Gagliano, Mike; Phillips, Casey R.; Bernocco, Steve; Jose, Phillip (2008). Air Management for the Fire Service. Fire Engineering Books. ISBN 978-1-59370-129-1.
  7. DeCarlo, Douglas (October 2010). EXtreme Project Management Using Leadership, Principles, and Tools to Deliver Value in the Face of Volatility. Wiley. p. 135. ISBN 978-0-470-57367-9.
  8. Spitzer, Dean R. (2007). Transforming Performance Measurement Rethinking the Way We Measure and Drive Organizational Success. American Management Association. pp. 27–28. ISBN 978-0-8144-0891-9.
  9. Schug, Mark C (January 1, 1997). "From Plan to Market: Teaching Ideas for Social Studies, Economics, and Business Classes" (PDF). uttyler.edu. National Council on Economic Education. p. 2. Retrieved 18 October 2022.
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