RELEVANCE
A lot of what we identify as excellence can be thought of as minimizing golem effects and maximizing Pygmalion effects. Catmull’s plus-ing or what we are calling freestyling is just minimizing Golem and maximizing Pygmalion in a systemic but simple way in team discussions. To maximize team performance and maximize our own performance, we need to constantly seek to minimize Golem effects and maximize Pygmalion effects.
The Pygmalion Effect is a powerful secret weapon. Without even realizing it, we can nudge others towards success. In this article, discover how expectations can influence performance for better or worse.
The simple idea in practice section from Livingstone’s brief article is useful practical advice. Also, notice how golem and pygmalion effects are specific types of feedback effects — so, in connecting these concepts to the complexity frameworks these fit into the broader category of feedback loops.
Pygmalion in Management,
(Harvard Business Review Classics)
by J. Sterling Livingston
[Emphasis in the passage below is ours.]
[Opening passage]
In George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion, Eliza Doolittle explains: “You see, really and truly, apart from the things anyone can pick up (the dressing and the proper way of speaking, and so on), the difference between a lady and a flower girl is not how she behaves but how she’s treated. I shall always be a flower girl to Professor Higgins because he always treats me as a flower girl and always will; but I know I can be a lady to you because you always treat me as a lady and always will.”
Some managers always treat their subordinates in a way that leads to superior performance. But most managers, like Professor Higgins, unintentionally treat their subordinates in a way that leads to lower performance than they are capable of achieving. The way managers treat their subordinates is subtly influenced by what they expect of them. If managers’ expectations are high, productivity is likely to be excellent. If their expectations are low, productivity is likely to be poor. It is as though there were a law that caused subordinates’ performance to rise or fall to meet managers’ expectations.
The powerful influence of one person’s expectations on another’s behavior has long been recognized by physicians and behavioral scientists and, more recently, by teachers. But heretofore the importance of managerial expectations for individual and group performance has not been widely understood. I have documented this phenomenon in a number of case studies prepared during the past decade for major industrial concerns. These cases and other evidence available from scientific research now reveal:
• What managers expect of subordinates and the way they treat them largely determine their performance and career progress.
• A unique characteristic of superior managers is the ability to create high performance expectations that subordinates fulfill.
• Less effective managers fail to develop similar expectations, and as a consequence, the productivity of their subordinates suffers.
• Subordinates, more often than not, appear to do what they believe they are expected to do.
…..
[Ending summary]
Idea in Practice
To unleash the power of positive expectations:
• Don’t overcommunicate negative feelings. Managers often communicate low expectations far more effectively than high expectations, for example, through “silent treatments.”
• Clearly communicate positive feelings. If subordinates can’t perceive your high expectations, they can’t fulfill them. Example: When one manager tried to replicate the Metropolitan experiment, she didn’t tell the supervisor of the high-performance unit that she considered him the best. The group’s performance never improved.
• Set realistic expectations. Subordinates won’t work to achieve their best unless they view your expectations as achievable. In one manufacturing firm, production actually declined when quotas were set too high.
• Expect the most from yourself. Superior managers have confidence in their own ability to select, train, and motivate subordinates. Their confidence influences their beliefs about their employees–and their expectations and treatment of them. Managers’ self-confidence gives their high expectations credibility. Subordinates who view their managers as credible consider their expectations realistic–and strive to fulfill them.