Groupthink and the innovator's dilemma: France's sudden and shocking defeat in 1940

The innovator's dilemma shows how dominant established firms and well-established professional fields often fail to see or address disruptive innovations that are entering their domains and disrupting their activities. These disruptive innovations have been shown to have potentially devastating consequences for organizations and professions that fail to respond to the threats posed. Theorists have proposed that organizations and professions actually do see disruptive innovations and appreciate their threats, but find it difficult to respond because of their dependence on key resource providers, such as major customers or clients. But this may not always be the case: sometimes decision makers may not see the disruption coming at all, or they may completely dismiss the threat. This paper proposes that sometimes groupthink draws decision makers away from seeing and responding to disruptive innovations. It does this by examining one of the greatest military catastrophes in history: France's sudden and utter defeat at the start of World War II. The groupthink phenomenon has potential to augment explanations of disruptive innovation and change by showing how the leadership of an organization or profession may fail to consider alternative technological paths and solutions to problems.