Structural Secrecy

Structural secrecy refers to the concealment of information by the structural features of organizations: their size, complexity, geographic dispersion, social distance between members, and the specialization of knowledge, tasks, and language. The concept was first articulated by sociologist Diane Vaughan in her 1998 study of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) fatal decision to launch the space shuttle [Page 916]Challenger, which broke up shortly after launch in 1986. A malfunction in one of the shuttle's solid rocket boosters led to the disintegration of the vehicle and loss of its crew shortly after launch. Subsequent investigation revealed that NASA had been aware of the flaw in the solid rocket boosters that caused the tragedy but had misjudged the risk it posed. Vaughan concluded that a contributing factor to this misjudgment, and hence the tragedy itself, was structural secrecy.

As Vaughan described it:

The major sources of structural secrecy can be categorized as stemming from either size or complexity. First, consider size. In a large organization, dispersed over a wide geographic area, information flow is limited between members. For instance, a cashier at a coffee shop in Seattle can communicate more easily with a coworker standing next to her than with her counterpart at a shop in New York. This limitation is compounded as complexity is added to the organization. As the division of labor is increased, information becomes segregated by specialization of knowledge and tasks. To continue the coffee shop example, one cashier can more effectively share organizational information with a fellow cashier than with a delivery person, a supply chain manager, or a corporate accountant. Along with the division of labor comes social distance through hierarchy. Messages traveling through a status hierarchy can be distorted on the way up as well as on the way down. A subordinate may be tempted to conceal bad news from a superior, or minimize its extent, for the sake of saving face. Alternately, information traveling up a hierarchy might be ignored or minimized. This process can also happen in reverse. Additionally, information from the top of the hierarchy can be distorted as it travels down, passing through several layers of interpretation by managers at intermediary positions in the organizational structure. Finally, inconsistent or incomplete execution of reporting requirements across an organization can conceal information as it crosses boundaries within the organization—concealing information while presenting the appearance of transparency. As Vaughan noted in 1999, structural secrecy not only increases the possibility of crisis through failures of knowledge, but also simultaneously “minimizes the ability to detect and stave off activities that deviate from normative standards and expectations.”

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