This concept stems from the idea of a house that gets its window broken. If the window doesn't get mended within a reasonable time, it represents the apathy of the owner, or simply that the people who would've cared are no longer there.
Regular passers-by begin to expect that the broken window will never be mended. In time, no one even notices it. But a deep mental note is taken - that nobody cares.
Before long, petty thieves have looted whatever they can, miscreants have used the house for all sorts of illegal activities, pests have overrun the place, and the structure of the house has begun to deteriorate. Nobody even remembers the broken window, but it was the broken window that started it all.
But what if the broken window had been mended? And had been continually mended each time it was broken?
The book "The Tipping Point" tells the true story of the Chicago underground train system in the 60s. By 1970, it had become a den for troublemakers. Mugging, gangsterism, and drug trafficking were rampant once the night set in. The trains were smeared inside-out with obscene graffiti.
The Chief of the railways wanted to get it all straight. Do you know what they started with? The graffiti. They had only one objective - come what may, a train having graffiti will not leave the main terminal. They had gangs of inspectors to spot graffiti and cleaned it all up before the train would leave the main terminal. Some troublemakers would come at night to write graffiti when the train was in the yards. In the early mornings, inspectors would clean up the graffiti. No graffiti would see the light of the day.
Slowly, things started improving. People began to take notice. People began to care. People began to object to miscreants writing graffiti in trains. Others took active interest in keeping the trains and train stations and the urinals clean. The number of available dark places was reduced. Trains began to run on schedule. Crime faded. In six years, the whole underground underwent complete transformation. That is the power of the broken window.
Find the tiniest, most neglected, but visible area of a problem - whether it's an undesirable personality, a wayward community, a relationship, or a disillusioned organisation - find it, keep working on it and everything else will fall into place.
Eugine Loh, 938Live, MediaCorp Pte Ltd
