The Law of Unintended Consequences

The Law Defined: The law of unintended consequences, often cited but rarely defined, is that actions of people—and especially of government—always have effects that are unanticipated or unintended.

 Most people have never heard of the "The Law of Unintended Consequences."  And, even if you were aware of it ... it's probably not something you actively think about and/or apply in your everyday life.  However, the law affects you every single day!  

If you are a coach, sports analyst, CEO, surgeon, business consultant, etc. you may make consider the law in your normal workday.  An offensive coordinator may find his team in a 4th down situation, on the 3 yard line, with 10 seconds left in the game ... needing three (3) points to tie and four (4) to win.  He's thinking that he wants to run a particular play [let's call it "Zebra 88 Amazon Blue"].  But first, he uses his last time out so that he can talk to his offense and discuss their options and what the defense may do if they run Zebra 88 Amazon Blue. 

A surgeon may be operating on a gunshot victim and has to look at all the potential consequences if he removes a bullet that is in a delicate spot or ... what if he leaves it in?  What will the victim's future quality of life be, will the bullet shift, will it have to be removed eventually anyway?

A CEO of a large company may be considering what will happen if his company suddenly drops a dying product line that their distributors count on for income ... or is phasing it out slowly going to suck up company resources and prevent the successful launch of a new product.  What will the customers think, can they afford to lose 30-50% of their customer base?

Being aware of the law and applying it on occasion is one thing ... applying it fully to every decision that you make is another.

Think of you as an individual, you are up later than usual and your stomach starts to growl.  Do you walk to the refrigerator and take a peek inside?  What harm could having one scoop of ice cream at 11:00 pm do ... just this once?  Would it start a habit of having a snack every night at such a late hour?  If so, will you switch to healthier snacks ... an apple perhaps?


As it turns out, if you give enough proper consideration there are very few consequences that you aren't able to predict.  Remember, everything matters, somethings just matter more.  So every decision that you make (or choose not to make) deserves some consideration ... make sure that you give your decisions enough proper consideration!