#110 from R&D Innovator Volume 3, Number 8          August 1994

M.A.S.H. Mentality:  Prescription for Success
by Jay Terwilliger

Mr. Terwilliger is director of strategic planning at CreativeRealities, Inc., an idea development company in Boston, Massachusetts.  He specializes in marketing and technical innovation.

In discussing effective teams, I often refer to the hugely successful movie and situation comedy, M.A.S.H.  You probably remember this diverse group of doctors, nurses, and support staff who were thrown into the grotesque environment of a Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (M.A.S.H.) in the Korean War. 

Much of the group’s team success (as well as the show's humor) was due to its diversity.   But I also think M.A.S.H. has much to tell us about how to take advantage of individual talents and differences within corporate teams.  We all know that tomorrow's organizations will thrive on team success, and that individuals must respect, trust, and complement each other.  R&D people will increasingly find themselves working within this new paradigm, and will need to take leadership roles to ensure the success of a team concept.

The Diagnosis

The “corporate diagnosticians” have removed their stethoscopes, noted the patient's vital signs in their charts, and spoken: business is hurting.  The old paradigm, the vertically organized organization, is sick.  Yet the prognosis is guardedly optimistic for a new paradigm—the horizontal organization.

So we take our prescription home and puzzle out what to do.  The basic building block of the horizontal organization is the interdisciplinary team, which is organized temporarily or permanently around a specific task.  These teams use self-sufficiency and “empowerment” to identify the necessary strategies and tactics, and to make decisions, solve problems, and implement action.

It sounds good in theory but, as usual, many problems stand between theory and successful reality.  For example, do you have a “group” or a “team”?

Webster’s defines "group" as “a number of individuals assembled together, or having some unifying relationship.”  In contrast, "Team" is “a number of persons associated together in work or activity.”  The key difference is the emphasis on action: group is passive, but team is active.

Success in horizontal organizations won’t come from grouping individuals around a task, but rather from creating teams and encouraging teamwork.  This requires us to break individual and corporate paradigms.  We can subordinate our egos to the team by finding satisfaction, enjoyment, and reward in the team’s endeavor.

Two critical aspects of the team approach are its composition and its interactions.  I call the first the "M.A.S.H. unit;" the second, the “M.A.S.H. mentality."

What is a M.A.S.H. Unit?

Each time we, as consultants, begin a program, we meet the “team,” and nine times out of ten, it’s really a “group” of people assembled around a task.  On good days, the group it’s interdisciplinary.  Too often, it’s a bunch of people from a single department. 

We start by creating a new approach to the team, using the M.A.S.H. unit as a paradigm.  Like M.A.S.H., the team must be interdisciplinary, but instead of doctors, nurses, and creative gofers, we need people from various backgrounds, representing the functional areas necessary to carry out the tasks of the team.  Although different businesses require different team compositions, members typically originate in marketing, operations, sales, finance and R&D departments. 

This multiple expertise is chosen for two reasons.  First, having a variety of perspectives fosters strategic thinking, planning, and problem-solving that can deal with a task in a holistic manner.  Working together, in direct contact, the M.A.S.H. unit analyzes opportunities, issues, and problems; it creates solutions that can actually be implemented in the real world.  Second, with each key function involved, the M.A.S.H. unit has the internal capability to implement its decision.

This interdisciplinary team is not yet sufficient to satisfy the M.A.S.H. concept--it also needs diversity of experience, background, attitude and culture.  Members of diverse teams see an opportunity or task from multiple perspectives, while those in homogeneous teams are strait-jacketed.  They typically reach premature consensus and ignore superior alternatives because they have no framework from which to conceive them.

Remember Corporal Klinger, the M.A.S.H. character who marched to the beat of a different drummer?  He not only viewed the entire world differently, but he got things done--his way.  When he had truck tires, for example, and his unit needed blood, he traded truck tires for motor oil for movies for bandages, and bandages for whole blood.  Problem solved.  (Can you imagine a surgeon having this kind of creativity?)  Klinger, the oddball, was in reality the consummate problem-solver, because he brought new life--a diverse viewpoint--to the team.

And then there was Margaret “Hot Lips” Houlihan--the passionate woman, the consummate nurse.  Rightly or wrongly, her loud profession of her beliefs forced the unit to consider other possibilities.  But when the team had a job, she pulled along with everyone else.

Diversity is the spice of life and, if treated properly, the spark of business success.  Which brings us to the M.A.S.H. mentality.

What is the M.A.S.H. Mentality?

For a M.A.S.H. unit to function successfully, each member of the team must embrace the M.A.S.H. mentality, which is a philosophical and operational mindset that emphasizes team success, not the exploits of individual “war heroes.”  To accomplish this, each member must adopt a problem-solving, “make it happen” attitude, which draws strength from, and recognizes the value of, each other’s thoughts and contributions.  This non-territorial attitude seeks to build upon the ideas of others in the search for the ultimate solution.

Mutual respect is a big part of the M.A.S.H. mentality.  I’m talking about recognition and appreciation for the fact that individuals of other functions and backgrounds can contribute because of, not despite, their diversity.  Although this atmosphere may be hard to instill, there is little choice, since businesses are crippled by intolerance and disrespect.  We see this all the time:  sales distrusts marketing, marketing distrusts operations/manufacturing, and everybody distrusts research.  Each component is frustrated by the inability of others to see the world as they do.  Each component marches in its direction, speaks its own language, sees a different part of the whole process, and conceives unrelated solutions. 

Here are several tips to get you started in creating a M.A.S.H. mentality:

1.  Break the paradigm of having to be right—right away.

This mentality, a legacy of ancient, corporate individualism, is no longer appropriate.  Teams benefit from varied thinking.  To operate as a team, you must be able to listen to everyone’s ideas before judging them.

Encourage individuals to separate their “left brains” from their “right brains."  Start considering problems and opportunities with non-judgmental, creative thinking, when the team first entertains ideas or wishes, not criticism or evaluation. 

2.  No “bazookas” during the exploratory period.

A “bazooka” happens anytime anyone, by word or deed, pans a suggestion.  Ban bazookas!  Explain that ideas at this point are “beginning ideas,” and even patently absurd ones may stimulate other thoughts and eventually produce a powerful new approach or concept.  “Bazooka-ing” these early thoughts cripples the opportunity for breakthrough thinking.

3.  Encourage the “inner voice.”

During the creative period, encourage people to offer odd, partly-formed, or even absurd ideas.  Remember:  any statement may be the foundation for a “big idea.”  Encourage people to present ideas without internal censorship.  Get the thoughts out and see where they go!  As Albert Einstein once observed, “If at first an idea doesn’t seem totally absurd, there’s no hope for it.”

4.  Steal but give credit.

If I represent your idea as my own, I have destroyed key elements of trust, respect and team spirit.  But if I steal your idea, credit you, and build on the idea, I have complimented you by announcing how much I value your thoughts.  I am building trust and respect--we have created a new thought, as a team.  This is critical to creating a M.A.S.H. mentality. 

5.  Evaluate with an open mind

It’s easy to find what’s wrong with an idea—especially someone else’s.  The problem with this approach is two-fold.  First, it’s punishing.  Rather than supporting the team, it denigrates individuals by focusing only on what’s wrong with an idea, and not acknowledging what’s right.  The result is that the “author” is chastised (often publicly), and grows hesitant to voice future thoughts.  This is not a M.A.S.H. approach.

Furthermore, close-minded, problem-oriented evaluation usually acknowledges only ideas that are well-articulated, well-defined, or evolutionary rather than revolutionary.  The best ideas rarely spring forth as fully developed, “ready-to-go” thoughts.  Ideas that represent “quantum leaps” generally need some nurturing and building to become practical and successful.  If an idea is rejected out-of-hand, based only on its deficiencies, it loses the chance to develop its strengths and become a breakthrough.

To avoid these pitfalls, M.A.S.H. mentality requires the team to use open-minded evaluation.  After the period of “no bazooka” creative thinking, we use the ideas generated to move toward an answer or solution.  As you develop the strongest possibilities, look for more than just the “easy answer.”

If it’s a good goal, look for ways to make it work.  Think “How to...” instead of “It can’t....”  For example, I'd rephrase the common idea killer, “It’s too costly,”  this way: “My concern is to make it work within budget parameters--let's talk about that.”  This gives the idea a chance to survive.

6.Creatively problem-solve.

When a recognized roadblock stands before a promising idea, use some team effort to overcome it.  Have the group problem-solve with a series of “What if...” statements.  "What if we decrease the machine’s weight by half?”  Look for "jumps" over the obstacle, because they will give you a very powerful idea.  If not, you can move to other options knowing that you have given a good idea a fair chance.

Teams that operate in this fashion are fulfilling the M.A.S.H. mentality.  They give everyone a chance to contribute.  They use their internal diversity as a source of new possibilities.  Each member is part of the solution, so all feel collective pride of ownership, and all want to implement the program. 

Tomorrow's horizontal organization demands teamwork.  If you don’t have any “Klingers,” or if you can’t respect them because all you see is how they dress, you have no chance of success in the world of tomorrow.

The beauty of the team on M.A.S.H. was that in a crisis, all the diverse, incompatible members pulled together.  That’s what today’s R&D world needs:  More respect.  More optimists.  More problem solvers.  More people willing to see the potential of a thought, who recognize the weaknesses and work together to overcome them. 

It’s no longer business as usual.  We need to learn new ways to operate, and M.A.S.H. is a good model to follow.