HAVE you seen any of those gag shows where strangers unwittingly follow the actions of a group of strangers even if the actions seem bizarre? I recently saw one where someone went inside an elevator and the practical jokers suddenly announced their floors towards the camera and then faced a corner one at a time. Do you know what the stranger did? You guessed it right! The stranger followed even if it seemed absurd.
Though funny, this is a phenomenon known as social pressure. This is similar to peer pressure where people follow the behavior of others with the same social status as theirs. In an office setting, this also happens in what is called groupthink. The term was coined by a psychologist, named Irving L. Janis, in 1972 to describe an occurrence where people are more concerned with illogically preserving harmony within their group, rather than critically evaluating decisions or providing alternatives.
While it is easy to think that conformity is not such a bad thing, consider the case of the new member who was forced to go along with everybody else. Or the frustration of a new manager who finds everybody in his team just agrees with all his decisions and absolves themselves of any accountability by blindly following what their leader says when in fact, they know of better alternatives. This is a real threat to maximizing everyone in the team.
Also, just because people do not react does not mean they agree. They can just be blindly following orders which can stifle creativity because they just rely on the leader, or the dominant personality in the group. While conformity seems to indicate a cohesive and aligned group, it can also be indicative of a lack of means through which members can express themselves. This is especially the case when there are overly assertive team members who dominate the conversation and stifle other’s ideas.
If leaders are the dominant voice or allow a few to dominate the group, it can lead to other members doubting themselves and what they have to say. So they censor themselves to the detriment of the entire team and eventually to themselves. Being in a team requires members to significantly contribute to the success of the whole team. This cannot happen when ideas are repressed by a few.
When members are suppressed to give their ideas, they will also not contribute to planning how to mitigate potential risks and how to address negative outcomes of the group’s decision. They will just blame their leader or whoever suggested the idea. Similarly, when groupthink is adopted by the whole team, they can become overconfident and ignore significant information from other teams and how their ideas can be used for possible solutions. This leads to silos where groups are concerned only with their own work without regard for how their team affects the work of other teams in the organization.
Aside from creating an atmosphere of open communication and allowing room for creativity and critical thinking, there are several things you can do to avoid groupthink. One of these is to acknowledge it when groupthink happens and ask the team what is contributing to it and what can be done to address the issue. If you discover that you, as the leader, are what is causing them to blindly follow, take a step back and allow team members to speak freely. If you need to, step out of the team meeting and allow them to brainstorm by themselves and ask for the result of their discussion later.
If you choose to stay in the meeting, you could hold off speaking until everybody has had the chance to talk. This will minimize your effect on members’ decisions and will also serve to dissuade the more dominant members of the group from monopolizing the discussion. Ask everyone to contribute individually to the discussion and do not allow for repetition of ideas. To give time for people to think and prepare properly, let them evaluate the merits of an issue individually by asking them to write down several pros and cons. This way, you can ask everyone to participate and prevent members from merely acceding to the ideas of others.
Consider inviting leaders from other teams to join in team meetings or projects. They can observe how you handle your team, as well as provide new insights on how their group handles similar issues. Not only do you gain the best practices from other teams, but you also help your team gain a new perspective of other teams within the organization. This prevents silos from developing and encourages your team to look beyond the group and appreciate how their work contributes to the success of the entire organization.
You can also break your team into smaller groups so they can meet team members they do not usually work with so they can get to know each other better. This is especially effective for big groups because it allows for your team to know other members and discover a new point of view. Hopefully, they will also discover a better way of doing things. Also, people are more comfortable expressing themselves in small groups because there is no added pressure of everybody looking. People also tend to contribute to the entire group’s discussion more when they have a smaller group to support them.
You can also periodically assign a devil’s advocate whose job is mainly to nitpick and voice out possible risks and issues with people’s ideas. This will force the assigned person to look for loopholes and possible concerns which might otherwise be ignored by everyone. Having everyone do this encourages critical thinking, and to not just accept things as they are but to understand why things are done the way they are.
Conformity does not always mean acquiescence. Sometimes, it indicates an underlying issue with how leaders mismanage their members and their lack of confidence in the ability of their team to generate creative and intelligent ideas. Your role as a leader is to bring out the best in everyone. How can you do that when they cannot even find their own voice?