In the book The Culture Code, Daniel Coyle mentions a fascinating "bad apple" experiment that caused a group performance to fall apart.
It was a total "a-ha" moment for me.
Daniel is typing now:
Meet Nick, a handsome, dark-haired man in his twenties seated comfortably in a wood-paneled conference room in Seattle with three other people. To outward appearances, he is an ordinary participant in an ordinary meeting. This appearance, however, is deceiving. The other people in the room do not know it, but his mission is to sabotage the group’s performance.
Nick is the key element of an experiment being run by Will Felps, who studies organizational behavior at the University of South Wales in Australia. Felps has brought in Nick to portray three negative archetypes: the Jerk (an aggressive, defiant deviant), the Slacker (a withholder of effort), and the Downer (a depressive Eeyore type). Nick plays these roles inside forty four-person groups tasked with constructing a marketing plan for a start-up. In effect, Felps injects him into the various groups the way a biologist might inject a virus into a body: to see how the system responds. Felps calls it the bad apple experiment.
Nick is really good at being bad. In almost every group, his behavior reduces the quality of the group’s performance by 30 to 40 percent. The drop-off is consistent whether he plays the Jerk, the Slacker, or the Downer.
“When Nick is the Downer, everybody comes into the meeting really energized. He acts quiet and tired and at some point puts his head down on his desk,” Felps says. “And then as the time goes by, they all start to behave that way, tired and quiet and low energy. By the end, there are three others with their heads down on their desks like him, all with their arms folded.”
When Nick plays the Slacker, a similar pattern occurs. “The group quickly picks up on his vibe,” Felps says. “They get done with the project very quickly, and they do a half-assed job. What’s interesting, though, is that when you ask them about it afterward, they’re very positive on the surface. They say, ‘We did a good job, we enjoyed it.’ But it isn’t true. They’d picked up on the attitude that this project really didn’t matter, that it wasn’t worth their time or energy. I’d gone in expecting that someone in the group would get upset with the Slacker or the Downer. But nobody did. They were like, ‘Okay, if that’s how it is, then we’ll be Slackers and Downers too.’ ”
Except for one group.
"It's the outlier group," Felps says. "They first came to my attention when Nick mentioned that there was one group that felt really different to him. This group performed well no matter what he did. Nick said it was mostly because of one guy. ...this guy could find a way to flip it and engage everyone and get people moving toward the goal."'
We'll call this person Jonathan. He is a thin, curly-haired young man with a quiet, steady voice and an easy smile. Despite the bad apple's efforts, Jonathan's group is attentive and energetic, and they produce high-quality results. The more fascinating part, from Felps's view, is that at first glance, Jonathan doesn't seem to be doing anything at all.
"A lot of it is really simple stuff that is almost invisible at first," Felps says. "Nick would start being a jerk, and [Jonathan] would lean forward, use body language, laugh and smile, never in a contemptuous way, but in a way that takes the danger out of the room and defuses the situation. ...Then Jonathan pivots and asks a simple question that draws the others out, and he listens intently and responds. Energy levels increase; people open up and share ideas, building chains of insight and cooperation that move the group swiftly and steadily toward its goal.
"Basically, [Jonathan] makes it safe, then turns to the other people and asks, 'Hey, what do you think of this?" Felps says. "Sometimes he even asks Nick questions like, 'How would you do that?' Most of all he radiates an idea that is something like, Hey, this is all really comfortable and engaging, and I'm curious about what everybody else has to say. It was amazing how such simple, small behaviors kept everybody engaged and on task." Even Nick, almost against his will, found himself being helpful.
Let me give this to you as straight as I can. (Brace for impact.)
We believe words carry weight.
We think how well a team performs is linked to how smart and skilled its members are at talking and expressing complex thoughts.
But guess what?
That assumption is dead wrong.
Words are noise.
The real deal is how the team behaves and sends out one strong message.
We're all good and tight with each other, and we got each other's backs.
We are safe.
Jonathan was totally killing it without doing any of the typical stuff we link to a boss.
He wasn't taking charge or giving orders.
He wasn't analysing, inspiring or painting a picture of the future.
Instead, he was creating the perfect setup for others to shine.
He was good at jelling the team.
It only takes one Nick - one jerk, one slacker or one downer - and the team's productivity, innovation, and cooperation is gone.
I've made up my mind.
In a meeting, either I'll be the Jonathan and crush it, or I'm outta there.
They don't need me holding them back.
PS. Do you struggle to set yourself apart from your competitors? Does your tone of voice lack a little personality? Either way, get in touch and I’ll help you become remarkable. Or get more communication advice that doesn't suck here.
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