2 posts tagged “collaboration”

On Regis Philbin’s TV show, “Who Wants to be a Millionnaire?”  a contestant could call his smartest friend or ask the audience for help with the answer.  Contestants are more apt to get the right answer when they ask the audience.  The insight?  Calling on the collective intelligence can get you smarter support, and often sooner.  

Cultural critic and cofounder of the Web zine Feed, Steve Johnson came to the same conclusion in his book Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities and Software (Scribner, 2001).

He found that intelligence resides at the street level, whether you are observing harvester ants - capable of great coordination or quick improvisational response to attack, despite their limited cognitive skills -  or workers in the primitive factories of 19th-century England. Johnson found that groups could achieve extraordinary feats through decentralized thinking or what is often called emergent behavior.  More bluntly, that means that even simple agents following simple rules can create sophisticated structures. In the Digital Age, this is a powerful concept because of the Webís capacity for facilitating far-reaching group intelligence.

As massive proof of this theory consider the most popular e-commerce site, E-Bay. The E-Bay community rewards people who play by the rules, and banishes those who do not.  In fact, the collective intelligence of the E-Bay users has raised the level of their collective game over time, to the benefit of all players. Some participants have build an entire business for themselves that could not have existed before the emergent intelligence of the E-Bay model.

This finding is especially important in our post-7/11 world, when we want to live a life that matters.  More that self-styled solo star performers, we seek out those who want to create opportunity and community together.  We want to find healthier ways to communicate to connect.

Pods are another way for people to feel more connected and capable, even in a larger group, and to reap the benefits of their collective intelligence.  Transform a larger organization such as a company, college student body, synagogue or civic club into 8 to 10 person pods of diverse people with specific goals and Rules of Conduct. Like the ants, we can accomplish much together.  We are more nimble in changing direction when weíve established one in the first place.  People in pods tend to feel a deeper affinity with each other and for their common purpose.  

Further they are more likely to demonstrate more confident, higher-performing behavior. The University of California campus at Santa Cruz, was created around pods of students who are then part of colleges within the larger campus. Compared to the other UC campuses their students have fewer reported health problems and accidents, and a higher sense of well-being.

In the early 1990s, George Colony began organizing his company into pods of 8 or 10 people from different disciplines. Colony is chairman and CEO of Forrester Research, Inc., one of the largest Internet research firms.  Says Colony, ìThe pods are a way to mitigate the alienation of size as our company grows.  Itís like being in a squad of people in the military.  You get so that you are willing to die for the guy next to you.î

In his book The Tipping Point, author Malcom Gladwell writes that the human brain is wired to have no more than 150 relationships.  The deeper the affinity and rewards people feel in those relationships, the more optimistic they feel about their participation.  

The more optimistic one feels, the better one performs. Thus the group creates a reinforcing upward spiral of smarter mutal support.  That ís probably why people are more likely to excel, not in solo tasks, but when they are part of a small group with a specific goal and deadline, be it a product launch or a team game.

In this time of turmoil and greater uncertainty, when people are more likely to seek affinity, we have grand opportunities to test these ideas. We desire camraderie more than competition.  Want to make a difference with others?  Find or form a pod around your greatest passion or talent and see emergent intelligence in action.  

Why do we instinctively like some people and find others irritating or worse?

What makes us agree, buy, help . . . or not?  Do your gut instincts help or hinder your “LQ” – Likeability Quotient? From an expert on gut instincts, gain insights about how to say it better next time.   Answer this quick nine question quiz and get some tips.  Some of the answers may surprise you.

1. Do people get along better when talking to each other if they are facing
each other or if they are standing side by side?

2. Who tends to face the person with whom they are speaking (men or women) and who tends to stand side by side, facing more or less the same way (women or men)?

3. If you want to increase the chance of knowing if someone is lying to you, what is one helpful phenomenon to notice about that person’s face when he or she is talking to you?

4. If you want to keep someone’s attention, is it better to wear a patterned
shirt or blouse or a plain blouse or shirt?

5. What is the most directly emotional of all the senses, bypassing the
thinking facilities and causing a quicker, more intense reaction in the limbic
(emotions) system than any other sense?

6. Are you more likely to get someone to support you or buy something if you give them something up front, unasked, before you ask for the favor?

7. Who tends to maintain wider peripheral vision when entering a new place, men or women?

8. Who tends to be more specific in their descriptions, adults or children?

9. Of the previous eight questions, which is the one people are most likely to
ask for the answer to first, and if reading the questions in a group, are most
likely to comment on first?

~~~~~
Answers
1. People get along better when they “sidle”, stand or sit side by side  rather than when they face each other.

2. Men are more likely to sidle than women.

3. Note the timing and duration of the first “reactive” expression on someone’s face when you think that person is not telling you the truth. When lying, most people can put an innocent expression on their faces, yet few (except pathological liars) will have the right timing or duration of that expression.

If you ignore the expression itself and, instead, consider whether the timing and duration of the expression seem natural, you’ll greatly increase your chances of knowing if that person is lying.

4. Wearing a plain, unpatterned shirt or blouse will increase the chances that the listener will hear you longer. A patterned top or ornate jewelry or loud tie will break up the listener’s attention span sooner, and that person is more likely to go on more “mental vacations” sooner.

5. Smell is the most directly emotional of the senses. The right natural scent can refresh or relax you and others in your home or work site. Vanilla, apple, and chocolate are the scents Americans most like.

6. Yes, up to 14 times more likely to get their support or a purchase. This gut instinct is often called “reciprocity reflex.”  Learn more by reading influence by Robert Cialdini.

7. Women. That is why storeowners who serve men will increase their sales if they have prominent, eye-level signage over large displays where men will see the signage soon after entering the store.

8. Children are more vividly specific, hitting their prime around fourth grade and then beginning to speak in generalities, more like adults. A specific detail proves a general conclusion, not the other way around. Plus, specifics are more memorable and credible.

9. Question number 3.
It seems that we have an inordinate interest in lying.
~~~~~
Three related insights on instincts that may interest you:

Finding #1: “Move to Motivate”
MOTION

Motion is emotional. It increases the intensity of feeling about whatever is
happening.

Further, people remember more the things they dislike or fear that they
experience in motion, more than things they enjoy. Motion attracts attention and causes people to remember more of what’s happening and feel more strongly about it, for better or for worse.

Insight:
This is another justification for golf!  Think of the memorability inherent in a golf swing. The more dimensions of motion involved (body moving up/down, left/right, backward/forward), the more memorable the motion.

Get others involved in motions with you that create good will: walking, sharing a meal, handing or receiving a gift, shaking hands, turning to face a new scene. You are more likely to literally get “in sync” (vital signs become more similar: eye pupil dilation, skin temperature, heartbeat) and to then get along.

Finding #2: “Deep Convictions”
PASSION

The more time, actions, or other effort someone has put into something,
someone, or some course of action, the more deeply that person will believe in
it, defend it, and work on it further.

Insight:
If you want more from another person, wait to ask until after she has invested more time, energy, money, or other resources. The more someone talks about it, repeats and elaborates it, writes it down, and explains it to others, the more deeply that person will believe it – and feel inclined to tell others. Imagine your customers raving about their experience with your product.

Finding #3: “True Timing”
LIKEABILITY

If a person likes the way he acts when he is around you, he often sees the
qualities in you that he most admires. The opposite is also true. Two universal truths: people like people who are like them, and people like people who like them.

Insight:
Pick the moments when someone feels most at ease and happy to move the relationship forward. Don’t make suggestions or requests when they are acting in an unbecoming way your efforts will only backfire. Praise the behavior you want to flourish. Don’t ask for more from someone until they have invested more time, money, other resources, or emotional “chits” in the relationship.