Escalation of Commitment
🇳🇴Eskalerende forpliktelseDefinition
Escalation of commitment is the tendency to continue investing time, money, or resources into a failing course of action because of prior investments, rather than evaluating future costs and benefits objectively.
Real-world example
In organizations, leaders may continue funding an underperforming IT project because so much money and reputation have already been invested. In personal life, people may remain in unsatisfying relationships or programs because they have "already spent years on them."
Supplementary perspective
Escalation of commitment is closely related to the sunk cost fallacy and cognitive dissonance. Ending a failing course of action requires admitting past mistakes, which threatens self-image.
Practical advice
Recognize
- —Notice whether your justification focuses on past investments rather than future value.
Counteract
- —Separate past costs from future decisions.
- —Ask what you would choose if you were starting fresh today.
Ethical use
- —Define exit criteria in advance.
- —Normalize stopping decisions that no longer make sense.