Groupthink can have a dulling effect. So how does the collective mind form in the most successful groups?
As the famous saying goes, you need a whole village - not just to raise one child, but also to keep this village viable. We need designers and engineers to work together to provide infrastructure, parents and teachers to take care of the children, and juries and judges to resolve our cases. Collaboration is an integral part of modern life, and as more tools emerge to communicate with others around the world, tasks that were once assigned to individuals are now taken over by teams.
Take the same science; the past few decades have seen a tremendous shift in the direction of collaboration. If once the authors of scientific articles were individual scientists, today teams of authors prevail in this area. It seems obvious that a group of specialists may have a deeper understanding of the issue than one single scientist, but the team, unlike the individual, faces problems of a different order. It is only in recent years that we have begun to pay special attention to how to form a smart team, instead of being content with a group of smart people.
A strong team can work faster and better than one smart person - but not all teams are strong. If managing one smart person is not an easy task, then what can we say about an effective team that requires special attention. In addition to meeting individual needs, the team must work as a whole - this goal is best achieved in an environment that maximizes the positive contributions of each individual while mitigating their shortcomings. Over the past decade, a number of studies have attempted to decipher and define the qualities of the "smart group". Just as psychologists try to uncover the g-factor responsible for the general intelligence of an individual, they study in detail the c-factor, the know-how of the collective mind. And most importantly, we want to knowHow to integrate this c-factor into all our collaboration, take it in the conference room, in the classroom, in the laboratory, behind the scenes, in the woods or even in space.
Collaboration among humans began long before we showed interest in improving our methods. We always hunted together and looked for food, made fires, built villages. Numbers have a special power - it is not only security, but also cumulative wisdom. One of the first formal observations of this phenomenon belongs to Sir Francis Galton during the 1906 livestock and poultry exhibition in western England. A competition was held on it: it was necessary to guess the weight of an ox; the participants paid sixpence for their guess, and the prize was promised to the one whose guess was closest to the truth. Although none of the 787 contestants gave the bull's weight correctly (1,198 pounds), the statistical average of all guesses came close to the point: 1,197 pounds. “This result, it seems to me,confirms the reliability of a democratic court more than one would expect,”Galton wrote in a letter to Nature.
We tend to despise the average - we like to think of ourselves as being above the average, even if this scenario is impossible for all of us - meanwhile, mediocrity can represent the best that humans have. If you derive the average from a large number of faces, it will be more attractive than any individual person; if the average is derived from collective guesswork, it will be more reasonable.
Scientists are harnessing the power of the mind of the crowd in civil science projects such as NASA's Clickworkers project, in which science enthusiasts looked at photographs of the moon to identify crater features. The results of the average participants were no worse than those of the experts - and they were able to provide as much data as hardly any group of specialists could have. The project was so successful that NASA, using the same technique, launched a new site where students, along with an interested public, help map Mars by studying photographs taken from satellites and rovers and tagging features such as craters, earth and sky.
Large groups of skilled amateurs are able to perform even better than experts. For example, the Good Judgment Project, led by a team of decision-makers, economic experts and financially supported by the American Advanced Intelligence Research Agency (IARPA), has recruited thousands of volunteer forecasters whose task was to predict current national security issues and future issues. in the near future, major world events, such as the likelihood of terrorist attacks or clashes between countries. These volunteers did not have any special knowledge, apart from being briefed on typical forecast errors that should be avoided.meanwhile, collective security predictions outperformed expert estimates by about 30 percent.
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In some cases, the hive mind arises without any prescription. In non-human beings such as fish, bees, ants, and even bacteria, individuals form "clusters" to coordinate complex behaviors such as determining the size of a group and where to forage and build a home. By swarming like this, people have created things like Wikipedia, which, without a central guide, provides quite reliable encyclopedic articles. Human tongue may also be the result of swarming; robotic modeling of a proto-language suggests that we have come across a language through a repetitive process that resembles the swarm intelligence of other species.
There are currently several new projects seeking to harness the collective intelligence of humans through swarming. One of them is Unanimous AI, or UNU, a platform that uses the opinion of the crowd to predict events. This year it hosted a crowd of users who successfully predicted the first, second, third and fourth places in the Derby taking place in Kentucky (as a result, those who bet based on UNU predictions received quite generous rewards), and identified 11 of the 15 Academy Award winners in 2015.
UNU is organized into thematic spaces where the user can ask any question he likes. Questions appear on the screen above the hexagon; each point in the hexagon represents a possible answer. Inside the hexagon is a washer showing the majority's choice; if we imagine that the faces of the hexagon are the walls of the cell, then the washer will be its core. Each person in the group operates a digital magnet to drag the puck to their chosen answer. All this device reminded me of how in childhood, staying at someone's house for the night, we crowded over a "talking board"; after we asked the surrounding ghosts about how they died, our collective consciousness moved the tablet across the board,spelling some sinister or ridiculous words - or expressing our deepest fears and dreams.
UNU is more complex than Ouija - it uses an algorithm to control the responses of the chat participants. For example, the closer the user places their digital magnet to the puck, the more “pull” they find. Essentially, this way of voting allows UNU to aggregate collective behavior as if we were a herd of animals, which, however, has unity in protecting against typical threats to the integrity of the human group. The model provides anonymity. And real-time mode helps to overcome human bias, such as the tendency to vote for what everyone else chooses.
It may be just a coincidence, but much of the evidence agrees that swarm predictions are doing well - perhaps even better than the average crowd. In 2015, NPR recreated Galton's original ox-weight experiment by interviewing more than 17,000 people whose average guess was not far from the truth: 1,287 pounds at a real weight of 1,355 pounds. On the other hand, UNU has gathered only 49 people, but in their collective guess - 1250 pounds - they came pretty close. UNU founder Louis Rosenberg observed that free gathering provided more effective answers; if you take the same 49 people and ask them to guess individually, their average guess is noticeably worse (1137 pounds).
Even if swarming or some other measure of “collective wisdom” delivers excellent results, this type of crowdsourcing logistics is not well suited to the challenges faced by real teams. It would seem impossible to use such resources in a complex project, such as conducting experimental trials of drugs or sending a man to the moon - projects that require a conceptual vision and simultaneously the ability to share and perform small tasks. In these cases, specialized groups need to engage in discussion and collaboration to achieve specific goals. So how is a smart team built?
The most difficult component is cooperation, it is in this issue that the team runs the risk of falling apart. Individuals come to teams with a range of cognitive biases, and while diversity of perspectives might seem to diminish those biases, collaboration can actually reinforce them, such as our tendency to overestimate our control over events and the degree to which we can generalize small fetching data.
Group work also instills in us the fear of making a mistake. While this sounds positive overall, it should not be forgotten that failure is an important part of learning. Admitting your own mistakes is a difficult part of the learning process. In a group, however, admitting a mistake can be a blow to your self-esteem and reputation - an obvious obstacle to accepting and accounting for your mistakes in the future. When we work together, we can fall prey to base human desires - to be loved, respected, and appear competent - and thus refuse to accept our own mistakes.
In addition, when mistakes are made on a team, it is more difficult to pinpoint their origin, as group members blithely believe that their teammates made the right decisions. Imagine a nurse who discovers that a patient has been hooked up to an IV containing the wrong drug for several hours after surgery. The patient is looked after by an extensive team of specialists. It is difficult to pinpoint exactly where the process went wrong and how it can be fixed. Maybe the other nurse got the IVs mixed up? Or did the pharmacy send the wrong medicine by mistake? And what about other staff who have watched this patient, but not well enough to avoid oversight - do they have their share of responsibility?
A key factor in this type of error is arrogance, a hallmark of group behavior. In order to maintain unity, each individual member of the group tries to avoid the role of "pedant", which interferes with coordinated work; as a result, doubts are not spoken out loud. The isolation of the group only exacerbates the problem; the team may become increasingly self-contained, finding any signs that their decisions or plans will not work as unconvincing, and distancing themselves from potential skeptics, seeing outsiders as narrow-minded or even malicious. The team's satisfaction with their own professional skills is so deeply ingrained that over time it turns into self-confidence.
Psychologist Irving Janis was the first to study this phenomenon and, referring to George Orwell's novel 1984, called it doublethink. Using historical examples of political and military disasters in his analysis, such as Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, Janice argues that the real danger to the group lies not in authoritarianism, but in a kind of quiet complacency that spills over into self-confidence. Not all groups fall prey to groupthink. But if this happens, it can be very difficult to realize this process from the inside.
For example, Janice's research suggests that although the US military was warned of the possibility of an attack on Pearl Harbor, they were too confident in their own safety. Justifying their own complacency, they convinced themselves that the Japanese would never dare to attack, as this would trigger a full-scale war. This sensation did not leave them until the very attack; When Admiral Hazband Kimmel, then Commander-in-Chief of the US Pacific Fleet, was informed of the loss of contact with Japanese aircraft carriers, he is said to have joked, “What, you don’t know where the carriers are? Are you saying that they can surround Diamond Head without you knowing about it? Unfortunately, it was so.
So how do we avoid these pitfalls? Breaking out of the usual rhythm helps teams fight groupthink. One way to do this is to break up into smaller groups that can develop their ideas, providing the team with different points of view. Engaging outside experts to exchange views in meetings can also shake up team dynamics and prevent team members from becoming overly complacent. By creating special opportunities for people to express minority or other views, or by cultivating a work environment in which people are safe to share their personal opinions, we can give the debate a much needed alternative perspective.
Besides fighting groupthink, there are other design features that can increase a team's chances of success. One of them is to study the size of the team. According to a study of 15 large multinational companies such as Nokia, BBC and Reuters, teams of more than 20 people are much more difficult to coordinate; there are simply too many people to manage and track. Large, heterogeneous teams of subject matter experts are less likely to share knowledge and resources with each other, as well as support each other in distributing the workload - for example, changing roles to meet individual needs.
The composition of the group is also a key factor. Building an effective group doesn't just mean picking off strong individuals. Rather, it is a combination of the strengths and weaknesses of individuals, their passions, work styles and preferences that interact with each other in different ways. Add baking soda to the sugar, eggs, and flour for cake batter, but add baking soda to the dish soap and vinegar for a bubbly frothy mixture; people also mix with each other in different ways.
What we definitely don't need is an overly diligent upstart. While wielding power can increase productivity in individual tasks, nothing breaks team dynamics faster than a proud leader. When a person is assigned to lead a group, power can turn his head; look at the boss who controls your every move, at the overly zealous basketball team captain, at the chairman of the parent committee, always sticking his nose into other people's affairs. Those in power are often less polite and less empathetic, more concerned with maintaining their reputation and authority than the success of their team.
It follows from this that we do not need a team of such leaders at all. While at first glance it may seem like a good idea to bring the best of the best together, it can lead to serious contention. A confrontation of pride will begin, which can distract group members from the task at hand. It turns out that there is a delicate balance between strong leaders and subordinates, the presence of which is a prerequisite for a productive group. In NBA and FIFA World Cup matches, performance reaches its peak when about half of the team members are star athletes. Once this balance is upset, productivity drops. A similar decline in efficiency also occurs in teams of powerful Wall Street analysts; performance reaches its maximum,when about 50 percent of the group are highly qualified specialists. In this sense, we are no better than chickens: if too many dominant high-yielding laying hens are placed in the same colony, total egg production will decrease.
This is true even when you create imaginary stars. When researchers randomly assigned authority over subordinates to a member of the group, they found that even a fraction of imaginary power could turn people's heads; Judges who evaluated groups against their bogus business plans noted that the supposed leaders were increasingly worried about their own status in the group and less focused on the task at hand. This behavior also affected the rest of their group; they were less likely to come to an agreement.
To avoid this power clash, teams may try to assign roles and tasks before starting work on a project; this will allow team members not to waste extra energy fighting for positions. Most importantly, team members must be willing to voluntarily give up their ambitions. Researchers have identified social sensitivity as an integral part of the c-factor, group intelligence. What good leaders know next is that you need to create an environment where people feel valued for their contributions and that the group will function better with the participation of all of its members. The researchers found that groups in which all members participate equally in the discussion work well. No one wins when the boss dominates the discussion; team members want to be heard,and they are more willing to share ideas and offer honest feedback when they feel their work is appreciated by the team.
In part, effective collaboration depends on how well you know your own teammates to read their subtle cues: Rob rubs his eyes when he's bored; Kim hesitates to answer as she ponders how to say politely that the idea is bad. It also means learning to understand teammates well enough to appreciate them the way they want them to and to resolve conflicts productively.
Given the role played by social skills in the group c-factor, it is probably not surprising that the researchers found that groups that include women tend to outpace predominantly male groups. Politeness and empathy in laying hens are just a few of the many social skills women are expected to possess: they can combine criticism with responsiveness, and talk about office politics with a smile in small talk. A large proportion of delicate, rarely recognized emotional labor tends to be left to women; If you are working among peers, ask yourself: who on your team brings baked goods to your colleagues' birthdays? Who cleans up the office after these parties? It is not uncommon for these people to respond to the slightest signals during the weekly general meeting.
Highly functional teams also leave open channels of communication, set aside time, and create dedicated spaces to stimulate interpersonal relationships. This is why so many of the newly emerging companies are developing campuses with built-in social zones: natural, spontaneous conversation in the gym or cafeteria can help build relationships and possibly generate new ideas. As more teams go digital, allocating funds for periodic face-to-face meetings or corporate outings can improve team productivity.
Of course, there is no proven formula for building constructive relationships. One way is through exceptional, unflinching honesty, as in the case of a Google manager who admitted to his team that he has stage 4 cancer. From that point on, his team members began to share personal details with each other, which gave them the courage to speak more openly about the pros and cons of working in the office - and ultimately made them one of the most productive teams at Google.
Another option for building relationships within the team is humor - I mean good-natured humor. Tactful jokes can make team members feel alienated. In an optimistic scenario, however, humor helps teams stay engaged in their work, which can improve morale, especially when more employees expect their work to be fun. Humor also helps team members feel closer to each other even in the presence of work hierarchies and can build trust and honesty, without which teams find it difficult to achieve their goals. During tense disagreements or discussions, a joke delivered to the place can cheer up and restore the team's lost harmony of communication.
By avoiding groupthink, eliminating ego-driven behavior, and fostering trust and openness, we can give teams the best chance of being successful, but realizing all of these ideas is indeed challenging. And it's worth noting that the success of the team is an ever-changing quantity. Any research that reveals the secret of a good team is simply a snapshot of how a particular group of people in a particular situation accomplished a particular task. In real life, things are much more messy and largely out of our control. However, just like teamwork itself, the potential benefits of being able to solve the c-factor puzzle are enormous - and we'll keep trying until we succeed.