Innovative Express
"Improving effectiveness by making the complex simple and making the simple work!"
December 2006
In this issue:
While I do watch TV, I hardly ever thought of myself as a TV critic. That was until I was recently approached by Rebecca Aronauer at Sales & Marketing Management Magazine, the leading authority for executives in the sales and marketing field. Rebecca was writing about the real life lessons from the NBC sitcom, The Office and wanted my take on it. The show has an average of 8.9 million viewers per episode and in August it won the Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series.
Having had my share of terrible bosses, I felt that the show hit a little too close to home. I said to Rebecca that the show was clearly exaggerated to make it humorous, but was still a microcosm of the American workplace. Guess what? The executive producer of the show Greg Daniels disagreed! I don't blame him for not wanting the show to be perceived as a “training video.” Why would nearly 9 million people tune in every week to re-live their miserable lives at work? If you want to read more about this very interesting article you can go to: Must See TV: Lessons from NBC's "The Office"
As 2006 draws to a close, I feel myself becoming a little philosophical. I read with horror a story in the Phoenix newspaper about vandals tearing through an elderly black couple’s custom home still under construction and scrawling profanities and racial epithets. Mr. Walter Conley, a retired manager for GE, asked, “How do you fix people’s emotions, or the fact that we have been violated just because of the color of our skin?” The current issue deals with something we all share—our implicit biases. How do we recognize and understand them so that we can make this a better place to live?
Inspired to agree, disagree, or otherwise comment? Have an interesting story to share? We hope that you will let us know your thoughts.
Wishing you joy and peace during the holiday season
and much happiness in the New Year!
Abhay Padgaonkar
President, Innovative Solutions Consulting, LLC
Soaring to the Top
The main article in last month's newsletter on marketing yourself using the SOAR model was published in two publications including Marketing Profs—a website catering to over 220,000 marketing professionals worldwide. The expanded article appeared under the title Marketing When YOU Are the Product and made it to the website's most popular list in a matter of two days.
Understanding What Lies Beneath
Take a look at your U.S. passport. Don’t have one? Then take out a U.S. dollar bill, or a quarter, or a nickel. If you carefully look at the imprinted Great Seal of the United States, it says “E PLURIBUS UNUM” inside it. This was one of the first national mottos of the United States of America. Translated from Latin, it means "From many, one" or "Out of many, one." Originally, it referred to the integration of the 13 independent colonies into one united country. (By the way, the motto itself has thirteen letters.)
But the modern day translation could almost be used for workplace diversity. We have many differences along the lines of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. In addition, we are different when it comes to age, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, veteran status, physical or mental disabilities, and citizenship. And that doesn’t even take into account differences in our education, emotional makeup, health, habits, motivators, skills, competencies, and behaviors to name just a few! So the question is: “Are we different or are we the same?” That depends on what you look at. According to the Human Genome Project, the human genome contains over 3 billion chemical nucleotide bases. Almost all (99.9%) nucleotide bases are exactly the same in all people. So at the genetic level, we are all pretty much the same!
According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission or EEOC in the U.S., it is illegal to discriminate in any aspect of employment, including hiring and firing, compensation, transfer, promotion, layoff, etc. Discriminatory practices under these laws also include harassment, retaliation, and denial of employment opportunities. Why do we have to guard against such a long list of illegal employment practices? In 2005, the EEOC received over 75,000 complaints of discrimination. According to a national survey by Hudson, one out of five (20 percent) U.S. workers claims that racial or ethnic discrimination exists in the workplace. Further, nearly one out of four (23 percent) workers reports that they know someone who has been adversely affected at work because of their gender. These numbers indicate that although we have made tremendous progress over the last 40+ years, we have a long way to go to have an inclusive workforce.
Eugene Robinson writing in the Washington Post about Kramer (actor Michael Richards) going postal along with Mel Gibson’s anti-Semite rant and Sen. George Allen’s “macaca” moment said, “Something ugly erupted from somewhere so deep inside that I'm not sure Richards, Gibson or Allen even knew the ugliness was there.” According to Daniel Siegel and Mary Hartzell (authors of the book Parenting from the Inside Out), there is a lot of truth to the fact that ugliness can lurk just beneath the surface. They explain that there are two forms of memory: implicit and explicit. Implicit memory is responsible for generating emotions, behavioral responses, and perception. Another important aspect of implicit memory is that it creates generalizations of repeated experiences through mental models. Implicit memory is present at birth and continues throughout the life span.
The encoding of implicit memory occurs without our needing to consciously attend to it. Siegel and Hartzell explain that the fascinating feature of implicit memory is that when it is retrieved it lacks an internal sensation that something is being “recalled” and the individual is not even aware that this internal experience is being generated from something from the past. Little wonder then that our biases influence our present perception and behavior. In other words, we all have stereotypes of all kinds without being conscious of them. And they can rear their ugly head in an unguarded moment—no matter how strong our desire to be politically correct.
Very few of us would admit to being openly biased. But according to Project Implicit at Harvard University, “psychologists understand that people may not say what's on their minds either because they are unwilling or because they are unable to do so.” We may be too embarrassed to admit and therefore unwilling to give the correct answer. It is also possible that we honestly believe in the incorrect answer by engaging in self-deception and therefore unable to provide the correct answer. The Implicit Association Test (IAT) makes it possible to penetrate both types of self-deception. The IAT measures implicit attitudes and beliefs that people are either unwilling or unable to report. The findings observed in seven years of operation of the Project Implicit website are quite sobering:
- Implicit biases are pervasive. Over 80% of web respondents show implicit negativity toward the elderly compared to the young; 75-80% of self- identified Whites and Asians show an implicit preference for racial White relative to Black.
- People are often unaware of their implicit biases. They are found to harbor negative associations (i.e., implicit biases) in relation to various social groups even while honestly reporting that they regard themselves as lacking these biases.
- Implicit biases predict behavior. Those who are higher in implicit bias have been shown to display greater discrimination.
- People differ in levels of implicit bias. Among other things, they are a function of the level of bias existing in the immediate environment. This last observation makes clear that implicit attitudes are modified by experience.
If implicit attitudes are modifiable through richer experiences, then there is a hope for us all!
But the first step is to recognize that we all have implicit biases that can lead to discrimination. As Anais Nin so eloquently said, “We don't see things as they are; we see them as we are.” Best places to work are those vibrant environments that are able to tap into the diverse skills, talents, imaginations, and creativities of people without regard to their outward appearances and different styles. They not only recognize that different is good, but that different is highly desirable. If you want to learn more about how you see things, I encourage you to take one of the relevant IATs at: https://imp licit.harvard.edu/implicit
The Bottom Line: There is no better time than the end of the year to check out your mental filters!
Personally Speaking...
I was driving with my two boys (ages 15 and 9) to see the movie Happy Feet. We were listening to National Public Radio (NPR) in the car. The discussion was about the suspension of a U.K. teacher for refusing to remove a veil that left only her eyes uncovered.
As we were getting down from the car, I asked them, “How would you like if a teacher wearing a veil came to your classroom on Monday when you go to school?” Both of them responded in unison: “We won’t care if she is a good teacher. How she is dressed has nothing to do with how she is teaching.”
To be honest, I was more than a little surprised! I pressed on: “Really? Even if you believe that it could represent a symbol of oppression—at least in some people’s minds?” They said, “It would be her personal choice. Who are we to tell her otherwise?”
Refusing to give up, I asked them, “What if you couldn’t hear what she was saying? Wouldn’t that affect the quality of teaching?”
No, not really. If we can’t hear, we will just ask her to please speak up.”
I told them that I was very proud of them and shut up!
The Bottom Line: More often than not, implicit biases are a learned behavior. What are we teaching those around us?
Disclaimer: "This written advice is absolutely intended to be used, and if used under expert supervision is known to improve organizational and individual effectiveness substantially."
© Abhay Padgaonkar 2007. All Rights Reserved.