Like the weather, people are subject to the whims of butterflies

The butterfly effect, popularized by Edward Lorenz, says that something as small as the flapping of a butterly's wings can affect something as large as the weather. This is because the weather is a chaotic system; it is complex, non-linear, and highly sensitive to initial conditions.

The behavior of people is also chaotic, even though each individual thinks they are consistent and rational. The discrepancy arises from a lack of knowledge of all of the internal rules and conditions that make perfect sense to the individual, but are unknowable to others.

On the way to work this morning, I was stuck behind someone on a two lane road with almost no passing zones. This person drove exactly the speed limit, although most locals will exceed the speed limit by at least 10 mph in this area. If this person wants to adopt a "law and order" posture, that's fine with me. However, in a different section of the road, this person started going 20 mph over the speed limit in order to get around a large truck.

To me, I thought this was inconsistent behavior. When I was in a hurry, this person wanted to follow the law. When they thought they would be delayed, then the law goes out the window. Internally, I'm sure the person's behavior was thoroughly consistent with his internal rules.

This is what makes management and other interactions with people so difficult. You can think you are interacting with the person the same way on two different occasions and get completely different outcomes, because you didn't understand all of the details from their perspective.