Decisions - Bending The Rules and The Double Bind
It appears on the surface that pilots are occasionally asked to bend rules "for the good of the company" and that this may produce a very stressful situation for the pilot concerned for reasons that need to be understood if the situation is to be avoided.
Poking around, I've found that this problem is not unique, and it has a name:- The Double Bind. I think it needs to be studied and understood in order to arm pilots with some method of dealing with it.
The definition: The double bind is "a situation in which no matter what a person does, they can't 'win'"
In their original 1956 paper, Bateson et al., who were researching this matter as a possible precursor to schizophrenia, defined the necessary ingredients for a double-bind situation (Their words, my comments in red):
1. Two or more persons.... (e.g. Ops and pilot )....
2. Repeated experience....
3. A primary negative injunction.... ("As a Professional pilot, I must comply with Aviation law" ).
4. A secondary injunction conflicting with the first at a more abstract level, and like the first enforced by punishments or signals which threaten survival...("The company has a problem, could you please fly these extra sectors, exceed these limits, accept these defects etc." ).
5. A tertiary negative injunction prohibiting the victim from escaping from the field.(I need this job, I have a training bond, wife and kids to feed, etc." ).
6. Finally, the complete set of ingredients is no longer necessary when the victim has learned to perceive his universe in double bind patterns.
It's obvious from various ramblings all over Pprune that this is a common problem at one time or another in GA and even perhaps RPT operations.
Furthermore, in an aviation setting, if you are caught in one of these situations and have an accident, it is highly unlikely that anyone is going to know that you were placed in this position against your will, your demise will simply go down as "pilot error" and/or you will be blamed for breaking the rules. No one is going to say "ah Yes! Bateson 1956!"
My question is, what is an effective method of dealing with this issue, apart of course from immediately leaving the job?