Susan Cain produced a best-selling book on introverts and
their place in society: Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking. She
tells us that introversion and extroversion seem to be genetically determined
because researchers have been able to correlate responses to stimuli by infants
with tendencies toward introversion or extroversion in later life. Roughly a third to a half of the population falls
on the introvert side of the ledger.
There is, of course, a spectrum of tendencies between polar
extremes. Some introverts can perform as
extroverts for short periods when necessary.
Some extroverts are also quite capable of quiet introspection when
necessary.
These personality differences have also been observed in
other animals, suggesting that a blend of the two characteristics within a
population is favored by natural selection.
That being the case, Cain is disturbed by trends in education and in
workplaces that promote environments suited to the extrovert as the ideals for
learning and innovation. She was moved
to produce a chapter titled When
Collaboration Kills Creativity.
To understand the issues faced by introverts in an
extrovert-oriented world, Cain provides some general characteristics of the two
personality types.
“….introverts and extroverts
differ in the level of outside stimulation that they need to function
well. Introverts feel ‘just right’ with
less stimulation, as when they sip wine with a close friend, solve a crossword
puzzle, or read a book. Extroverts enjoy
the extra bang that comes from activities like meeting new people, skiing
slippery slopes, and cranking up the stereo.”
In terms of how the two might comport themselves in a
work environment:
“Introverts often work more
slowly and deliberately. They like to
focus on one task at a time and can have mighty powers of concentration.”
“Extroverts tend to tackle
assignments quickly. They make fast
(sometimes rash) decisions, and are comfortable multitasking and risk-taking.”
“[Introverts] listen more than
they talk, think before they speak, and often feel as if they express
themselves better in writing than in conversation. They tend to dislike conflict. Many have a horror of small talk, but enjoy
deep discussions.”
“[Extroverts] tend to be
assertive, dominant, and in great need of company. Extroverts think out loud and on their feet;
they prefer talking to listening, rarely find themselves at a loss for words,
and occasionally blurt out things they never meant to say. They’re comfortable with conflict, but not
with solitude.”
When researchers study the characteristics of people that
would be defined as “creative” by society, they arrive at a prototype.
“One of the most interesting
findings….was that the more creative people tended to be socially poised
introverts. They were interpersonally
skilled but ‘not of an especially sociable or participative temperament.’ They described themselves as independent and
individualistic. As teens, many had been
shy and solitary.”
Cain provides a few interesting quotes from creative
introverts that describe the mode in which they feel they need to operate in
order to be productive. The first is
from Albert Einstein.
“I am a horse for a single
harness, not cut out for tandem or team work….Full well do I know that to
attain any definite goal, it is imperative that one person should do the
thinking and commanding.”
The following quote is by Stephen Wozniak of Apple
computer fame.
“Most inventors and engineers I’ve
met are like me—they’re shy and they live in their heads. They’re almost like artists. In fact, the very best of them are artists. And artists
work best alone where they can control an invention’s design without a lot
of other people designing it for marketing or some other committee. I don’t think anything really revolutionary
has been invented by committee. If you’re
that rare engineer who’s an inventor and also an artist, I’m going to give you
some advice that might be hard to take.
That advice is: Work alone. You’re
going to be best able to design revolutionary products and features if you’re
working on your own. Not on a committee. Not on a team.”
Corporate executives and educators have marched in the
opposite direction by creating environments in which students and workers are
never allowed to be alone. Teamwork and
constant communication are supposedly the keys to success.
It was encouraging to note that there are indications
that corporations are beginning to take note of the need to accommodate
different personality types as part of their mode of operation. The writer of the Schumpeter page in The
Economist produced an article titled Shhhh!
which included the following lede.
“Companies would benefit from
helping introverts to thrive”
The article references Susan Cain’s book and agrees with
her conclusions.
“Most companies worry about discriminating against their employees on the
basis of race, gender or sexual preference. But they give little thought to
their shabby treatment of introverts.”
“The biggest culprit is the
fashion for open-plan offices and so-called “group work”. Companies rightly
think that the elixir of growth in a world where computers can do much of the
grunt work is innovation. But they wrongly conclude that the best way to
encourage creativity is to knock down office walls and to hold incessant
meetings. This is ill-judged for a number of reasons. It rests on a trite
analogy between intellectual and physical barriers between people. It ignores
the fact that noise and interruptions make it harder to concentrate. And
companies too often forget that whereas extroverts gain energy from other
people, introverts need time on their own to recharge.”
Cain provides us information from studies by
psychologists and others of worker and company productivity when open-plan
offices are utilized.
“A mountain of recent data on
open-plan offices from many different industries corroborates the results….Open-plan
offices have been found to reduce productivity and impair memory. They’re associated with high staff
turnover. They make people sick,
hostile, unmotivated, and insecure.
Open-plan workers are more likely to suffer from high blood pressure and
elevated stress levels and to get the flu; they argue more with their
colleagues; they worry about coworkers eavesdropping on their phone calls and
spying on their computer screens. They
have fewer personal and confidential conversations with colleagues. They are often subject to loud and
uncontrollable noise, which raises heart rates; releases cortisol, the body’s
flight-or-fight ‘stress’ hormone; and makes people socially distant, quick to
anger, aggressive, and slow to help others.”
The Schumpeter
article also points out that leadership is not a simple attribute.
“Many companies
unconsciously identify leadership skills with extroversion—that is, a
willingness to project the ego, press the flesh and prattle on in public.”
Effective leadership depends on the personalities of the
people involved. Extroverts, with the
energy and tendency to dominate that they bring, are effective at managing
workers who have well-defined responsibilities, but less so when dealing with
those whose task is to think creatively.
In the latter case, introvert managers are more adept at encouraging
productivity from that class of employee.
“Many of the most successful
founders and chief executives in the technology industry, such as Bill Gates of
Microsoft, and Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, are introverts who might have
floundered in the extroverted culture of IBM, with its company songs and strong
emphasis on team-bonding. In penalising other people like them, firms are
passing over or sidelining potential leaders. At all levels of company
hierarchies, that means failing to take full advantage of employees’ abilities.”
Besides backing off on open-plan work areas, companies
are encouraged to take into account personality differences in evaluating
prospective employees, and to manage time better so that only necessary
meetings occur and they are conducted in an efficient manner where all
participants are likely to contribute—not just the loudest few.
“Some of the cleverest companies
are beginning to look at these problems. Amazon has radically overhauled its
meetings to make them more focused. Every meeting begins in silence. Those
attending must read a six-page memo on the subject of the meeting before they
open their mouths. This shifts the emphasis from people’s behaviour in the
meeting to focused discussion of the memo’s contents. Google has downplayed the
importance of interviews in recruiting and put more emphasis on candidates’
ability to carry out tasks like the ones that they will have to do at the firm,
such as writing code or solving technical problems.”
A few examples of enlightened management are encouraging,
but it will take much more to overcome decades of propaganda about the “extrovert
ideal.”
The interested reader might find these articles
informative:
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