Plenty of profiles of individual businesses were written in support of congruence. But in the first study that systematically examined a broad swath of organizations across an industry, researchers who studied cultural congruence at 334 institutions of higher education found that it had no influence on any measure of organizational success whatsoever. Administrators, department heads, and trustees in strongly congruent institutions did have an easier time classifying the culture when asked, but there was no impact at all on performance, from the academic and career development of students to the satisfaction of faculty and the financial health of the college. The researcher who led that work went on to study thousands of businesses. She found that the most effective leaders and organizations had range; they were, in effect, paradoxical. They could be demanding and nurturing, orderly and entrepreneurial, even hierarchical and individualistic all at once. A level of ambiguity, it seemed, was not harmful. In decision making, it can broaden an organization’s toolbox in a way that is uniquely valuable.
David Epstein in Range