Reinforcing organizational defensive routines: An unintended human resources activity

Abstract Although human resources professionals are against the proliferation of defensive routines, they often design programs that reinforce them. This paper examines one organization in depth in order to illustrate how its human resources professionals acted in ways that unintentionally reinforced the very defensive routines that they were trying to reduce. Organizational defensive routines organized into self‐reinforcing loops can result in lack of effective line leadership and increasing difficulty for management development, organizational development, education, organizational diagnosis, and compensation to achieve their objectives.