Strategic Ambiguity Has Become a Form of Adult Daycare for Institutions
Ambiguity can be necessary. It can also become a padded room where hard decisions go to sit quietly until the room forgets why they arrived.
Institutions love ambiguity because it keeps multiple constituencies only mildly offended at the same time. Nothing is settled, nobody is forced to admit too much, and the leadership team buys a little more calendar space in which to monitor the weather.
The cost of this posture is public adulthood. Residents, workers, and customers are asked to live inside a sentence that visibly refuses to conclude while the institution praises itself for prudent flexibility.
Some ambiguity is honest. Strategic ambiguity is different. It is delay wearing a tidy blazer and insisting it is protecting optionality for everyone involved.
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