CHICAGO–“Collaboration” is among the hottest of buzzwords within credit unions, hailed as a key ingredient to collaboration both within credit unions themselves and the community as a whole. But “collaboration creates mediocrity, not excellence, according to science,” Inc. Magazine is reporting.
It cites one recent study suggests that a “collaborative work environment can make top performers--the innovators and hard-workers--feel miserable and socially isolated.”
The study, published by Applied Psychology http://psycnet.apa.org/psycinfo/2017-06323-001/, found that that the problem is that rather than seeing a top performer as a role models, mediocre employees tend to see them as threats, either to their own position in the company or to their own feelings of self-worth.
In his analysis of the Applied Psychology research, Geoffrey James, a contributing editor to Inc. magazine, said he agrees with the findings. James noted that “if you listen to management pundits, "collaboration" is all the rage. While the term is a bit fuzzy, what's usually meant by collaboration is 1) plenty of ad-hoc meetings and 2) open-plan offices that increase the likelihood that that such meetings take place.
In previous columns, I've pointed out that open-plan offices, with all their interruptions, distractions, and noise pollution, are productivity sinkholes. I've also pointed out that collaboration tends to penalize the competent who end up doing most of the work.”
The Applied Psychology study found that rather than improving their own performance, mediocre employees socially isolate top performers, spread nasty rumors about them, and either sabotage, or attempt to steal credit for, the top performers' work, noted James.
“As the study put it: ‘Cooperative contexts proved socially disadvantageous for high performers’,” James shared.
This social isolation creates special difficulties for introverted employees who work in open-plan offices. While some extroverts seem to draw energy from a chaotic environment, introverts find such environments draining, James added.
What often happens, the study found, is introverts find the only way to get work done is to work from home, and if that isn’t checked, it leads to ‘an exodus of top talent.”
“This is not to say that teamwork is a bad thing, per se. Indeed, most complex projects require a team to successfully complete,” James wrote. “For teams to be effective, though, they need leaders who can swiftly squelch any attempt to isolate or denigrate a top performer.”
The Inc. story can be found here.