The central insight of the field of social psychology is obvious to most upon reflection, but seemingly counter-intuitive for most in practice: people’s behavior is profoundly influenced by the situations they perceive themselves to be in. Leaders and managers frequently diagnose problems as the result of individuals’ failings, personalities, or traits seeking to correct them with varying degrees of success through changes of personnel, or institutional training initiatives, or revamped selection systems, among other interventions. Such interventions can be effective under the right circumstances, but leaders too often fail to see that the biggest and most persistent organizational problems emerge out of people’s predictable responses to perceived situations. Problem behaviors are thus often the foreseeable result of the situations created and reinforced by organizational leaders. Having the right people on the bus is only helpful if the bus can accommodate them, the bus is in working order, the bus is preferably already pointed in the right general direction, and the people know why they’re there in the first place.

中文翻译：

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个人很重要，但情况才是关键

社会心理学领域的核心见解对大多数人来说是显而易见的，但在实践中似乎与大多数人的直觉相反：人们的行为深受他们认为自己所处的情境的影响。领导者和管理者经常因此而诊断出问题个人的失败、个性或特质试图通过人员变动、机构培训计划或改进选拔系统等干预措施以不同程度的成功来纠正它们。此类干预在适当的情况下可能有效，但领导者往往无法看到最大和最持久的组织问题来自人们对感知情况的可预测反应。因此，问题行为往往是组织领导者创造和强化的情境的可预见结果。只有当公共汽车可以容纳他们，公共汽车处于正常工作状态，公共汽车最好已经指向正确的大方向，并且人们首先知道他们为什么在那里时，让合适的人在公共汽车上才有帮助。