Have we gone too far in our wish for consensus? The eighties marked the start of the typically Dutch practice of poldering , or consensus seeking. It has seeped into our DNA and we have been compromising until the cows come home ever since, writes Annemarie van Gaal.

In this country, leadership is often about taking a back seat in order to stimulate team effort. Statements such as ‘he has gathered a good team around him’ or ‘his people are preparing his decisions’ are typically Dutch.

Administrators, managers and politicians tend to give prominence to their staff’s input over what they themselves might think. At meetings everybody has his say and each is entitled to his own little amendment. Every proposal is pummelled and moulded until the result is nothing but a series of compromises.

Decisions

But if you want to achieve extraordinary results, or change world you shouldn’t be guided by compromises put together by your staff. Is our present polder management style still suited to the kind of decision making the country needs?

The most successful companies in the world are led by people who identify with their company but who reserve the right to take the main decisions themselves. Consensus? Not a chance. Legendary leaders who changed the world were guided by their own opinion, not those of others.

If these leaders occupy one side of the spectrum, our typically Dutch polder politicians and polder managers take up the opposite position.

Ingrained

Is a country like the Netherlands, with its ingrained consensus culture, capable of producing real leaders? A by-product of poldering is openness to meddling. That was fine in the eighties and nineties because then only the people sitting in at meetings could interfere. But the internet and the social media have turned interfering into an almost universal pastime.

I know of no other country in the world where so many people feel so called upon to put in their two cents: hundreds of comments on a small news item is no exception. Apart from a couple of sensible commenters  most people seem to be motivated by boredom and bent on enforcing each other’s negativity.

It’s this motley gathering which represents public opinion, the same public opinion which politicians, faithfully obeying the orders of the polder DNA, base their policies on. Is this constant interference killing political vision?

EU conference

With their eyes glued to the polls, politicians come up with an opinion which may or may not change, depending on tomorrow’s results. It’s turn and turn again. There is a different opinion for every function, be it minister, MP or local politician.

A politician may say one thing at a EU conference and another at home. Never say what you really think, always hide behind the opinions of your party, the polls, your position, your staff and, of course, all those meddlesome Dutch people. Our politicians are slavishly following public opinion instead of shaping it with a vision of their own.

If the polls are anything to go by we are going to need at least four, five or six parties to form a coalition in September. Now that’s something to look forward to. People get the government they deserve and in our case that means a government which will polder until the cows come home.

Get on with it

If we don’t banish the polder mentality from our DNA, perhaps we should remove the DNA from our system. We could have a two party-system, like the Americans, or a very rapid decision making process which will make it impossible for meddlers to meddle. Three hours max to get draft legislation through, an hour for a debate and ten minutes for each MP’s question. Stop poldering. Get on with it.

Annemarie van Gaal is an entrepreneur and head of publishing company AM Media. She is also a writer and television personality.

This article was published earlier in the Financieele Dagblad