The events over the weekend at IndyMac Bancorp reminded me of the scene from Disney's 1964 movie "Mary Poppins," when young Michael Banks accidentally causes a bank run when customers overhear him shouting, "Give me my money!" after Mr. Dawes senior grabs his tuppence.
The southern California bank was taken over by the Office of Thrift Supervision late Friday and reopened for business Monday as IndyMac Federal Bank. The bank was closed because the OTS thought it was "unlikely to be able to meet continued depositors' demands in the normal course of business and is therefore in an unsafe and unsound condition."
According to OTS, "the immediate cause of the closing was a deposit run that began and continued after the public release of a June 26 letter to the OTS and the FDIC [Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation] from Sen. Charles Schumer of New York. The letter expressed concerns about IndyMac's viability. In the following 11 business days, depositors withdrew more than $1.3 billion from their accounts."
Schumer vehemently denies he was the cause of problem - although he admits some depositors may have decided to withdraw their money because of his letter.
This episode is one that highlights a paradox in risk communication. How honestly, widely and loudly should risk -- be it to a bank, an IT project or even the national economy -- be talked about if the discussion itself potentially can turn a risk into a real problem?
For instance, Schumer says that his letter was no more than something similar to a guy calling 911 and reporting that he sees smoke. Others likened his letter of yelling "fire" in a crowded theater.
While both characterizations are incorrect, in my opinion, there is a bit of truth in both as well. I don't doubt those who withdrew their money, especially if they had amounts above that which is covered by the FDIC, are very glad they did given the chaos that has followed. (It was reported on Thursday that some California banks are now refusing to take IndyMac FB cashier checks). At the same time, the Schumer-inspired withdrawals also probably hastened the demise of the bank -- although we'll never know whether it would have died on its own anyway.
A few months back, there was an Op-Ed piece in The Washington Post titled "Shhh . . . Don't Say 'Recession.'," written by Dan Ariely, the Alfred P. Sloan professor of behavioral economics at MIT's Sloan School of Management. The piece discussed how the possibility of talking about a recession might actually cause one.
This Op-Ed reminded me of a story in The New York Times last year in which Toll Brothers, one of the nation's largest home builders, blamed the press for the poor housing market. If only the press would stop writing about how bad it was, Toll Brothers CEO said, the housing market would improve immensely.
I also know from personal experience that many project managers keep risk lists closely guarded secrets, arguing that if they were made public, their project team's morale would suffer and they would lose support of senior management for their projects.
As Ariely's article points out, talking about something that you don't want to have happen may indeed increase the likelihood of its occurrence. So where does one draw the line in providing the best risk information available? Should all risk information be transparent or should some of it be tightly held? And under what circumstances?
Opinions anyone?
COMMENTS
Ethics demand transparency to INVESTORs. Everyone else is optional.
Dan 07/23/08 03:45 pm ET
As someone who conducts risk management workshops and program risk assessments for agencies, I have observed that "tightly held" risks are often a sign of management dysfunction. Today's "tightly held so we don't upset the apple cart" risks eventually become tomorrow's "oh, my gosh, why didn't we know about these" major issues.
What project doesn't have risks? The key is to mitigate the more serious ones and this can't be done if they remain hidden. A regularly statused risk register is a key component of a successful project (or bank, for that matter). Unfortunately, it is often missing in action! The GAO and agency IGs might have nothing to write about if it weren't for hidden risks. Enlightened managers will encourage honest reporting.
Mike Lisagor 07/23/08 01:13 pm ET
IndyMac and the other criminals needed an excuse to mitigate their crimes... blame it on a Shumer.
That's a good one. At least Shumer gave the rest of the shareholders and depositors time to withdraw their lifesavings before it went to other creditors.
The bank was doomed to fail. Might as well make them all fail before the taxpayers lose their shirts trying to bail them out!
frank 07/21/08 09:57 pm ET
What this really points toward is the deficit of faith we have in each other, our institutions, ourselves, and God.
In a correctly-operating world, an honest assessment of risk would be delivered to the participants as part of the initial project summary. Those participants would either decide that the risk was acceptable, or that it wasn't. If it was judged acceptable, and the outcome desirable, then they'd DO THE WORK and believe in the outcome. If there were failures, they'd assess them honestly and give those who failed an opportunity to get back up and succeed again.
Instead, we try to avoid every type of risk, not recognizing that failure and fault is part of life. We punish every outcome short of perfection as a black-hearted deliberate failure, when in most cases folks don't plan or try to fail at all. This makes folks tend to hide any possibility of failure (or any real failure) and hope like crazy that nobody finds out.
In summary, we are willing to settle for mere existence rather than real living, much like a toadstool. This means that some other nation who isn't so attuned to seeking perfection and avoiding risk is going to clobber us someday, and we'll deserve it.
arclight 07/18/08 08:33 am ET