Peak

I just read an incredible story in the book, Peak: Secrets from the Science of Expertise by K. Anders Ericsson and Robert Pool.  If you've not heard of Ericsson, there's a good chance that you've at least heard about his research into what has come to be called "deliberate practice".  The story is about Niccolò Paganini, an Italian violinist and composer who lived in the late 18th century.  Apparently, Paganini was a virtuoso, the greatest violinist of his generation (and many today say that he is one of the greatest violinists of all time).  

Apparently, Paganini was playing a difficult piece to a packed concert hall, when one of the strings on his violin broke.  Violins have four strings, and at least during Paganini's day, they were made out of sheep intestines and broke fairly often.  Paganini was playing towards the climax of his musical piece, and the string just couldn't stand up to his forceful playing.  If you've ever seen a violin string snap, it is quite obvious to everyone around, so the audience gasped in disappointment.  Rather than stopping, however, Paganini kept on playing.  The audience was completely stupefied - the beautiful piece that he was playing did not change at all, even though he was only playing on three strings.  

As he continued to play, the unthinkable happened - another string snapped in two!  Again, rather than stopping, Paganini kept on playing and the audience couldn't tell any difference in his playing.  Towards the end of the piece, a third string broke - what rotten luck!  However, Paganini kept on playing.  The song was just as beautiful, even though he was playing on just one string.

Of course, the story quickly spread all around.  Paganini was such a great violinist, that he could play better on one string than other violinists playing on four!  Uncommon ability!  Natural talent!  Simply amazing.

Except - the strings didn't break on accident.  The whole sequence of events was a planned stunt.  Paganini had practiced playing the same piece on four strings first, and when he was comfortable doing so, he practiced on just three strings.  Once he had perfected that, he learned to play the piece on just two strings.  Finally, he practiced so that he could play on just one string.  He also knew how much pressure to apply to make the strings break.  The audience believed that Paganini was just incredibly unlucky, when in reality, he planned everything well in advance.  

I bring this story up because it has been cited as proof in the whole nature vs. nurture debate, when it comes to developing expertise.  The fundamental question is whether individuals are born with some genetically-determined talent or develop it over time through hard work, practice, and collective experience.  I've talked about a number of popular books that have been published in the last few years on this exact topic (including Peak: Secrets from the Science of Expertise), including Malcom Gladwell's Outliers: The Story of Success, David Epstein's The Sports Gene, Daniel Coyle's The Talent Code: Greatness Isn't Born. It's Grown.  Here's How, and Geoff Colvin's Talent is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else.  K. Anders Ericsson is a strong proponent of the "nurture" theory (which led to his theory of deliberate practice).  

Ericsson provides several examples and studies in Peak that support the "nurture" side of this question.  He goes on to refute some of the more classic examples that support the "nature" side of the debate, including Paganini's case above.  The well-known story of the Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart has also been provided as evidence to support that experts are born with their talent.  Mozart was said to have composed his first symphony when he was 8 years old (and composed several shorter pieces when he was even younger).  It would seem improbable for an 8 year-old to have practiced long enough to be able to write a symphony at such a young age.  However, Ericsson provides at least some evidence that suggests that Mozart's father may have been the actual composer of at least the pieces that Mozart reportedly wrote as a child.  

I am not going to weigh in on whether Mozart actually composed first symphony at age 8 or not.  I will say argue that Ericsson has written an interesting and compelling book on a fascinating subject.  Dr. Ericsson died in June, 2020.  However, his research crosses a number of disciplines, including medicine and suggests that expertise can be developed with hard work, focus, commitment, and practice (and lots of experience - Malcolm Gladwell popularized the "10,000 hour rule" in his book Outliers based largely on Ericsson's work).  For me, Ericsson strongly supports the argument that leadership skills can be developed.  In other words, leaders are not born, they are made.  

I will end with a quote by Dr. Ericsson himself.  He wrote, "The clear message from decades of research is that no matter what role innate genetic endowment may play in the achievements of ‘gifted’ people, the main gift that these people have is the same one we all have—the adaptability of the human brain and body, which they have taken advantage of more than the rest of us.''  That should be a welcome statement for all of us.

"I think I know less than I thought..."

I took advantage of the pandemic to watch several of my favorite movies from childhood.  I was absolutely fascinated by one in particular, a movie that came out in 1980 called The Final Countdown.  There's a chance my memories are wrong (recall my post last year about so-called flashbulb memories), but I vividly remember everything about who I saw it with, as well as where and when I first saw it.  The movie is about a modern U.S. Navy aircraft carrier that travels through time to December 6, 1941 (the day before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor).  

The major dilemma in the movie is whether to intervene and try to stop the attack on Pearl Harbor.  One of the major characters, played by the actor Martin Sheen says, "I'm talking about the classic paradox of time. Imagine, for example, I go back in time and meet my own grandfather. Long before he got married, before he had children. And we have an argument, and I kill him. Now if that happens, how am I ever going to be born? And if I can never be born, how can I go back in history and meet my very own grandfather?"  After further deliberation, the commanding officer of the carrier says, "If the United States falls under attack our job is to defend her in the past, present and future."  Unfortunately, the carrier ends up returning to the future before they are able to stop the attack.

Here's the plot twist.  One of the main characters is accidentally left behind in the past.  I always wondered, what would it be like knowing all that you know now, in the past when no one else knows it?  Think about it.  You could invent things or come up with new discoveries, "predict" the future, and gamble and win on sports events (the character "Biff" does this in Back to the Future Part II).  Just imagine what you could accomplish!  What if?

Or not.  As it turns out, all of us have a fairly rudimentary understanding of how everyday things work.  I remember having a book as a child (I think it was a Richard Scarry book, but I'm not quite sure) that explained how everyday things worked, from sewing machines to toilets and bicycles to cars.  However, if you asked me to diagram out or describe how some of these things work, I couldn't do it, even now.  For example, try to draw (from memory) how the different parts of a bicycle fit together?  Now go compare your drawing to either a real bicycle or a picture of one.  How did you do?

If you didn't do so well, you are in great company.  The University of Liverpool cognitive psychologist Rebecca Lawson studied this exact question in a study entitled, "The science of cycology: Failures to understand how everyday objects work."  In her study, Lawson asked a group of students to fill in the pedals, chain, and extra frame for a bicycle (see the picture below).  While the vast majority (96%) of subjects had learned how to ride a bike as children, only slightly over half (52%) owned a bicycle.  Most of the subjects rarely, if ever, rode a bicycle.  

Just to make sure that the inability to draw wasn't impacting the results, Lawson also asked individuals to select the correct position for the frame, pedals, and chain using a multiple-choice test (see picture below).

Over 40% of the subjects made at least one error in both the drawing (top picture) and multiple-choice test (bottom picture).  For example, over one third of the subjects either drew or selected the picture with the chain running around both the front and back wheels of the bicycle.  Several subjects drew or selected the picture with a frame connecting the front and back wheels (which would make turning the front wheel to steer impossible).  One subject commented, "I can't believe I found it so difficult to remember what a bike frame looks like!!"  Another subject sighed and said, "I think I know less than I thought..."  Lawson repeated the above test on individuals who regularly rode their bicycles (either to work or for leisure activity), and, while the results were much better, they weren't perfect.  Even self-identified experts often made mistakes in drawing or selecting the correct position for the extra frame, chain, and pedals.  

Lawson and other investigators suggest that the general knowledge of how everyday things work is not limited to bicycles.  And while this appears to be true, the cognitive psychologist Frank Keil has argued that this may be beneficial in the long run.  We have a limited, superficial understanding of everyday objects so that we can be more efficient in making accurate, causal predictions about the world around us.  In other words, our capacity to store information, such as how a bicycle really works, in our memory is limited.  Why waste valuable memory space on information that is not critical to our everyday lives?  We can still ride a bicycle without necessarily fully understanding how it works.

Don Norman, author of The Design of Everyday Things writes about how people don't understand how thermostats work.  If someone wants to quickly heat up a room, he or she often turns the thermostat all the way up (which isn't how the thermostat works at all).  He argues for better user-centered design, "In the case of the thermostat, the design gives absolutely no hint as to the correct answer.  In the absence of external information, people are free to let their imaginations run free."  

Norman goes on to talk about the doors that people use to enter and exit buildings - I am sure you have seen people push a door when it needs to be pulled and vice versa.  Norman again argues, "When a device as simple as a door has to come with an instruction manual - even a one-word manual - then it is a failure, poorly designed.

So, what are the takeaways here?  Perhaps most importantly, if we ever do travel back in time, we should bring a manual on how everyday objects work.  Seriously though, when we think about how to design commonly used processes and/or equipment, we need to remember that individuals won't necessarily understand or comprehend how they work.  What seems straightforward may not be completely intuitive to others.  We would do well to remember that.  

Just as important, we should realize that at times, we should just get our hands dirty and look at things - take them apart, put them back together.  I am talking in both a literal sense (taking apart physical objects so that we can better learn and understand how they work) as well as a metaphorical one (seeing how the processes and procedures that we design work in real-world situations).  As Carl Jung said, "Often the hands will solve a mystery that the intellect has struggled with in vain."

No words

I know that this news is out there now, so I don't think I am out of line for sharing a few brief thoughts about a dear friend, colleague, and mentor, Hector Wong, who died unexpectedly over the weekend.  To say that the news of Hector's death was unexpected and shocking is a vast understatement.  His loss has been felt by many.  To say that his impact on the care of critically ill children and the field of pediatric critical care medicine will be felt for decades is an even greater understatement.  He was one among those very rare quadruple threats - a superb clinician-scientist, a compassionate and gifted physician, an incredible teacher, and a great mentor.

I've had a few brief moments to pause from my work today to think about what Hector meant to me personally.  Simply put, I would not be where I am today without him.  I took a fairly non-traditional path and spent three years as a general pediatrician in the Navy following residency.  I always knew that I wanted to go on to either a neonatology or critical care medicine fellowship.  For a variety of reasons, I ended up selecting pediatric critical care medicine and was fortunate to be chosen to be a fellow at Cincinnati Children's.  Hector was the Director of the Division of Critical Care Medicine at the time, and I considered myself lucky to join his research laboratory.  I learned a lot from him those first several months of fellowship training, both in the laboratory and at the bedside.  

There were times when I questioned whether I was the right kind of person to be a pediatric intensivist (we didn't call it imposter syndrome back then, but I had it for sure).  Hector was always there to advocate, motivate, inspire, and support.  I ended up finishing fellowship training, and I left a better physician and human being because of Hector.  He eventually recruited me back to Cincinnati, where I joined the great Division of Critical Care Medicine that he built.  I spent the next 16 years in Cincinnati, growing as a physician and leader under his mentorship.  No matter what I was doing or where I was, there was always something that I could learn from talking with Hector.  I remember the day that I told him I was leaving Cincinnati Children's, and he couldn't have been more happy for me and more proud of what I had accomplished.

I've read many of the social media posts that responded to the announcement of his untimely passing.  I can't tell you how many times someone said, "I wouldn't be where I am today without Hector" or "I will remember how Hector bent over backwards to help me with my research" (even if that individual was from another division or even a different institution entirely).  His advice was free, but its value was priceless.  

One of my former colleagues from Cincinnati texted me earlier today.  When I asked him how he was doing, he told me that he was "holding the fort down and taking care of patients, which is exactly what Hector would have wanted us to be doing."  Indeed.  

There are no words to describe what an impact Hector has had on me and so many others.  There are no words to describe what an incredible loss our pediatric critical care community has experienced today.  I know that Hector would have wanted us to carry his work forward.  He would have been extremely uncomfortable with all of the accolades and memories shared about him today.  So, I will honor his memory in the best way I know how - the only way he would have wanted - "holding the fort down and working hard to take care of patients."

Juste milieu

I recently came across a term that I've never heard before (actually, that's not too uncommon for me) that I have been trying to wrap my brain around.  The term is Juste milieu, which literally translates (from French to English) to the "middle way" or "happy medium."  Historically, the term has referred to a centrist political philosophy that attempts to find a balance between two opposing and often extreme viewpoints, and it was first used in the 1830's shortly after the overthrow of Charles X, the last king of the House of Bourbon.  The new "King of the French" Louis Phillipe I (who ruled during the so-called July Monarchy) promised to follow the juste milieu in order to avoid the extremes of the conservative supporters of Charles X and the radicals on the left. He stated, "We will attempt to remain in a juste milieu, in an equal distance from the excesses of popular power and the abuses of royal power."

Apparently the term also refers to a 19th century art form, but I will stick to what I know (which is not art history).  As it turns out, there are a number of philosophies that emphasize this concept of finding a balance between two extremes, one of excess and the other of deficiency (see, for example, the Greek concept of the Golden mean, the Confucian Doctrine of the Mean, or the Buddhist concept of the Middle Way).  I wanted to continue with the theme of the last few posts on confident humility.  We've spent a lot of time talking about the Dunning-Kruger Effect, the cognitive bias that suggests that we tend to overestimate our own level of competence.  We also talked about the Beginner's Bubble Hypothesis, which suggests that a little knowledge is not necessarily a good thing (as the English poet, Alexander Pope, wrote, "a little learning is a dangerous thing").  

We haven't discussed the opposite situation, when truly competent individuals lack self-confidence (the so-called Imposter Syndrome).  I wrote a post about this cognitive bias last year (see "Imposters").  Research suggests that nearly 3/4 of all U.S. adults have had Imposter Syndrome at least once in their lifetimes.  More striking is the fact that up to 30% of high-achievers suffer from Imposter Syndrome (which is counterintuitive - they are already high-achievers).  

If you were to plot confidence ("How good you think you are") versus competence ("How good you really are") on a graph, you'd end up with something like the illustration by Jessica Hagy below:

Here is where the concept of the juste milieu comes in.  If an individual has too much confidence compared to his/her level of competence, you get the Dunning-Kruger Effect.  Conversely, if an individual is lacking in confidence, even though he/she has been successful, you get the Imposter Syndrome.  The key for leaders is to find a balance between the two, the so-called "middle way" between under- and overconfidence.  I think the term "confident humility" really fits perfectly here as what leaders should strive towards (and I am assuming that most leaders have the requisite level of competence, which is unfortunately not a universal truth).  Adam Grant defines it as "having faith in our capability while appreciating that we may not have the right solution or even be addressing the right problem."

Former Disney CEO Robert Iger also described "confident humility" as an asset for leaders in his book, The Ride of a Lifetime.  He writes, "You have to be humble, and you can't pretend to be someone you're not or to know something you don't.  You're also in a position of leadership, though, so you can't let humility prevent you from leading...It's a fine line, and something I preach today.  You have to ask the questions you need to ask, admit without apology what you don't understand, and do the work to learn what you need to learn as quickly as you can.  There's nothing less confidence-inspiring than a person faking a knowledge they don't possess.  True authority and true leadership come from knowing who you are and not pretending to be anything else."

Vinita Bansal, in an excellent article ("Confident Humility: Paradox of Successful Leadership") lists the following characteristics of a leader with confident humility:

1.  Accepts what they don’t know; don’t fake knowledge they don’t possess

2.  Works hard to fill their knowledge gaps

3.  Doubts their strategies and ask others for input 

4.  Reframes their view from “me” to “we”  

5.  Listens with curiosity while also being confident to speak their mind

6.  Doesn’t shy away from making difficult decisions once they have the information

7.  Leads with an abundance mentality. That means sharing credit where it is due 

8.  Accepts mistakes and takes complete responsibility 

9.  Demonstrates openness to learning from the opposing view during disagreements

10. Seeks feedback to improve

11. Operates with a growth mindset 

12. Quick to change their minds as they do not let their beliefs become part of their identity 

13. Embraces vulnerability while being careful it does not turn into recklessness 

14. Makes space for others to express their ideas before stating their own 

15. Holds people accountable and do not shy away from difficult conversations 

16. Manages conflict by putting things in perspective and focusing on what can be controlled

17. Confident in their ability to prevent bad outcomes

18. Is an efficient decision maker who doesn’t tolerate indecision in others

19. Believes that they can succeed and hence see opportunities where others see threats

20. Builds confidence in others by taking action, especially when the action involves risk and failure

I want to conclude this post (and really, the theme of the previous posts as well) with another quote from Adam Grant.  He writes, "Great thinkers don't harbor doubts because they're imposters.  They maintain doubts because they know we're all partially blind and they're committed to improving their sight. They don’t boast about how much they know; they marvel at how little they understand. They’re aware that each answer raises new questions, and the quest for knowledge is never finished. A mark of lifelong learners is recognizing that they can learn something from everyone they meet. Arrogance leaves us blind to our weaknesses. Humility is a reflective lens: it helps us see them clearly. Confident humility is a corrective lens: it enables us to overcome those weaknesses."

"The Ignorance of Arrogance"

There's a story in Disney's 1940 animated feature film Fantasia (actually, the only part of the entire movie that I really ever enjoyed watching while growing up) that is based upon a classic poem ("Der Zauberlehrling") by the German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, called "The Sorcerer's Apprentice".  The story (one of my favorites, which I have used in a previous post from 2016 in which you can read the entire poem) was originally supposed to be a cartoon for Disney's Silly Symphonies starring Mickey Mouse (apparently the cartoon was supposed to revitalize the character, as audiences had grown bored with the mouse!).  However, with a growing budget for the short film, Walt and Roy Disney decided to turn it into the full-length feature film Fantasia, which would contain other short animated features matched with classical music pieces.  

In "The Sorcerer's Apprentice," Mickey Mouse plays an apprentice who grows tired of fetching water by pail, so he casts a spell that enchants a broom to do the work for him.  Unfortunately, he doesn't know the spell to stop the broom from bringing in more water.  He attempts to destroy the broom with an axe, but all the pieces form new enchanted brooms.  As an entire army of brooms carry pails of water and flood the castle, the sorcerer returns and casts the proper spell to restore good order.

Clearly, Mickey Mouse the young apprentice was in over his head.  He thought he knew more than he really did, and his overconfidence nearly led to a disaster.  In my last post, I introduced the cognitive bias known as the Dunning-Kruger effect, one of the themes in the poem and cartoon story above.  Individuals don't even know recognize that they are overconfident.  As David Dunning reportedly said, "The first rule of the Dunning-Kruger club is you don't know you're a member of the Dunning-Kruger club."  We are ignorant to our arrogance.

Over the winter break, I sat on a beach and read Wharton professor Adam Grant's most recent book, Think Again.  He asked a couple of fairly straightforward questions in a chapter called "The Armchair Quarterback and the Impostor: Finding the Sweet Spot of Confidence":

1. When did English become the official language of the United States?

2. Why were women burned at the stake in Salem?

3. What job did Walt Disney have before he drew Mickey Mouse?

4. On which spaceflight did our astronauts see the Great Wall of China from space?

5. Why does eating candy affect how kids behave?

Before you read any further, please take a moment and try to answer these questions.  How confident are you in your answers?  Actually, the United States does not have an official language.  The women who were believed to be witches weren't burned at the stake, they were hanged.  Walt Disney didn't draw Mickey Mouse, one of his animators named Ub Iwerks did.  Despite what you read on the Internet, you actually can't see the Great Wall of China from outer space.  And finally, sugar doesn't make kids hyperactive.  I bet that you were fairly confident in your answers, right?  Even if you didn't know the exact answer, you probably recall hearing the question and the corresponding answer before.  The Dunning-Kruger Effect is everywhere it seems, and we are completely naïve to its existence (for more discussion, see my post from last year, "Success is a lousy teacher...").

In my last post, I also introduced a concept first described by Carmen Sanchez and David Dunning (yes, the same one) known as the "Beginner's Bubble Hypothesis" (see also a related model, known as the Four Stages of Competence).  This hypothesis was based upon a set of experiments that involved the zombie apocalypse and suggests that novices start out quite cautiously as they are not yet confident in their own abilities.  However, with a little knowledge and/or experience, the degree of confidence increases and surpasses their level of competence.  With a little more knowledge and experience, things self-correct and the degree of confidence matches the level of competence.  

Unfortunately, the relationship between confidence and competence is weak at best.  Studies have shown that people rate leaders based upon their degree of confidence.  However, a little dose of humility is a key ingredient too.  Adam Grant said, "Leadership is not boasting about what you know.  It's having the confidence to admit what you don't know.  You don't need to assure people that you have all the answers.  They just want to know that you've committed to finding a solution - and capable of guiding a group toward it."  More about this in my next post.

"Tell them about the dream, Martin"

Today is a special holiday in America - we celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr whose birthday was on January 15, 1929 (the official holiday is celebrated on the third Monday of January each year).  I usually honor Dr. King by reading one of his best known speeches, the "I Have a Dream Speech: (see the transcript here).  He gave this speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. on August 28, 1963 during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom to over 250,000 civil rights activists and leaders.  

The speech was ranked as top American speech of the 20th century in 1999 poll of scholars.  Sean O'Grady wrote in The Independent that the speech has "a strong claim to be the greatest in the English language of all time." The writer and historian Jon Meacham said, "With a single phrase, King joined Jefferson and Lincoln in the ranks of men who've shaped modern America." 

I've read the speech many times over the years, but I only recently learned about the actual events around the speech itself.  While there are many versions of early drafts of the speech circulating around, there is apparently not a single draft of the speech that he actually delivered that day.  Dr. King apparently put together passages from several of his older speeches, and the speech was originally entitled, "Normalcy, Never Again."  Apparently (and I learned this from reading Adam Grant's book, Originals over the winter break), Dr. King was working on the speech the night before he was supposed to deliver it.  Clarence Benjamin Jones once said, "Martin still didn't know what he was going to say."

The immortal phrase, "I have a dream" may not have even been planned.  Apparently, the gospel singer Mahalia Jackson shouted to Dr. King from the crowd toward the end of his speech, "Tell them about the dream, Martin."  Dr. King departed from his prepared speech and improvised the most famous passages that we remember to this day:

So even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.

His speech is a masterpiece of oratory and rhetoric.  Dr. King tied together the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, the Emancipation Proclamation, and Lincoln's Gettysburg Address.  The late US Representative John Lewis, who also spoke that day as the president of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, "Dr. King had the power, the ability, and the capacity to transform those steps on the Lincoln Memorial into a monumental area that will forever be recognized. By speaking the way he did, he educated, he inspired, he informed not just the people there, but people throughout America and unborn generations."

It was and is an amazing speech delivered by an amazing man.  Today, on a day when we celebrate the man, the idea, and the dream, let us remember that it is not just Dr. King's dream, but all of ours too.  Let us remember that we have work that remains.  Let us remember that while we have made progress, we still have a long way to go.  

The July Effect and the Beginner's Bubble Hypothesis

Several years ago, in what seems like a lifetime ago, I spent a semester working as a student athletic trainer for my college.  Technically, we were "athletic training students in training" (they called us rookies).  I went to college with plans to go to medical school and become an orthopedic surgeon specializing in sports medicine.  After a couple of years, I wasn't as sure that I wanted to go to medical school, so I saw this opportunity as an alternative career in sports medicine.  

Suddenly, I became the de facto "athletic trainer" and "team physician" for every one of my fraternity's intramural sports teams.  I was taping everyone up before their games, and I responded on the field whenever someone was hurt.  Here's the thing though - I had absolutely no clue what I was doing!  My experience in the athletic training room was limited to observing and shadowing the older student trainers, and my knowledge base was limited to one 3 credit hour class in the basic management of sports injuries ("Introduction to Athletic Training 101").    I suppose I had more knowledge than everyone else on our intramural team, but I really had no business trying to diagnose, let alone manage, my teammates' injuries.

You could definitely say that I was overconfident.  As it turns out, my overconfidence wasn't all that unique.  There is a phenomenon that has come to be called the Dunning-Kruger Effect, named after the two psychologists who first described it in a series of experiments published in 1999.  Dunning and Kruger started their paper with a vignette which I think perfectly illustrates the concept.  

Let me give you a story that illustrates this effect.  Apparently, a man named McArthur Wheeler (no relation btw) robbed two Pittsburgh banks in broad daylight in 1995 with no visible attempt at disguising himself.  He was promptly identified and arrested less than an hour after the surveillance videotapes were broadcast on the 11 o'clock news.  When the police later showed him the tapes, Wheeler reportedly responded with a dumbfounded look and said, "But I wore the juice."  He apparently was led to believe that rubbing lemon juice (which actually is one of the ingredients for invisible ink) on his face would render him invisible to the surveillance video cameras! Overconfidence or just stupidity?

Probably a little of both.

Dunning and Kruger showed that participants in four different studies consistently overestimated their level of competence.  Participants routinely scored in the bottom quartile on tests of humor, grammar, and logic (average 12th percentile), even though they rated themselves in a much higher quartile (average 62nd percentile).  Dunning and Kruger argued that "the skills that engender competence in a particular domain are often the very same skills necessary to evaluate competence in that domain - one's own or anyone else's."  As Charles Darwin said, "Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge."

Incredibly, the cognitive bias identified in Dunning and Kruger's study appears to be fairly ubiquitous.  For example, 90% of professors at the University of Nebraska reported themselves to be above average in their ability to teach.  A 1976 study found that 70% of more than 1 million individuals reported that that they were above average in leadership ability and 60% reported that they were above average in athletic ability.  Check out the famous video of William Hung's audition for American Idol.  Regardless of the domain, people consistently overestimate (frequently by a lot) their own level of competence, expertise, skill, or ability.

Wharton professor Adam Grant suggested in his book, Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know that this "overconfidence among beginners" (i.e., the Dunning-Kruger Effect) may explain what has become to be known as the "July Effect", the observation that the risk of medical errors and complications increase during the month of July, when newly graduated physicians start working for the first time in hospitals.  He offered an additional study by psychologists Carmen Sanchez and David Dunning (yes, the same Dunning in the Dunning-Kruger Effect) as supportive proof.  Study participants played the role of new physicians who had to diagnose "zombie disease" during a "Zombie Apocalypse" scenario.  Subjects were initially tentative and less confident in their diagnoses.  However, as they gained a little experience, they became overconfident with an inflated sense of their level of competence.  Sanchez and Dunning explained their experimental observations with something they called the "Beginner's Bubble Hypothesis" (more on this in the next post).  

Confidence can be a valuable trait for leaders (see, for example, "How confident leadership helps teams thrive" or "20 things leaders with real confidence do differently").  However, overconfidence is not.  Nobel laureate and cognitive psychologist Daniel Kahneman wrote in his book Thinking, Fast and Slow that if he could wave a magic wand to make one of the many cognitive biases disappear forever, it would be overconfidence.  There is certainly a balance here, and Adam Grant defines it as "confident humility" ("a leader's ability to make the right decision while acknowledging that they need others to do it right").  I will return to this whole discussion on the Dunning-Kruger Effect and the concept of "humble confidence" or "confident humility" as an ideal leadership trait in my next couple of posts.

Remote work, again...

I came across a news headline earlier this week announcing that the U.S. set an all-time high record for the number of COVID-19 cases reported (1.35 million cases) on Monday, January 10, 2022, shattering the previous global record of 1.03 million cases.  The highly contagious Omicron variant shows no signs of slowing down, and even though it is potentially less severe, the aforementioned record for new cases came on the same day that the U.S. had the highest number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients.  It doesn't appear likely that organizations will walk back from the shift that they made earlier in the pandemic to remote work.

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, only about 5% of all Americans in the labor force worked from home more than 3 days per week.  By April, 2020 (just about a month or so into the pandemic), over one-third of the labor force was working remotely full-time.  A number of companies, particularly those in the technology sector, have developed plans, procedures, and policies that will enable at least a portion of their employees to work remotely, even after the pandemic is over.  I have discussed some of the effects, both positive and negative, of remote working on various metrics in a previous post (see "The WFH question").  I mentioned at the time that the data on the impact of remote working on productivity and engagement were far from conclusive.  I suspect we will continue to see studies on this particular question, as we continue to learn from this large-scale natural experiment.

With all of this in mind, I recently came across a study published in the journal, Nature Human Behaviour, called "The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers".  This particular study reported on the experience of the Microsoft Corporation after they switched, fairly abruptly, to remote work early in the pandemic.  The study investigators leveraged unprecedented access to emails, calendars, instant messages, video/audio calls, and work hours for 61,182 US Microsoft employees over the first six months of 2020.  

What was really interesting about this study, and why it was different from prior studies, is that the investigators used this treasure trove of data to conduct analyze the network topology at Microsoft before and then after the shift to remote work.  Incidentally, if you want to learn more about the science of networks, I would highly recommend the book Linked by Albert-laszlo Barabasi and Jennifer Frangos.

For those of you who are either not familiar or not well-versed in network science, it helps to think about your own personal situation at work.  Who are the individuals that you spend the most time with at work?  What does your organization's formal org chart look like?  What about your organization's informal org chart?  How does information flow through the organization, both formally and informally?  Who are the individuals that seem to be well-connected throughout the organization and have all the answers?  How strong are personal ties between individuals?  

Certain network configurations and topologies favor knowledge transfer, creativity, and hence productivity.  Just as important, the kinds of ties between individuals can impact issues such as cooperation, collaboration, and trust (favored by strong ties between individuals) or access to new information (favored by weak ties between individuals).  

Here were the main results from the Microsoft study:

1. Individual business groups became less interconnected (there were less bridging ties between different groups).

2. Individual employees spent more time with their stronger ties (which tend to favor information transfer) and less time with their weaker ties (which tend to favor transfer of new knowledge).

3. Individuals and groups were less likely to form new bridging ties.

4. Individuals spent less time with newly added ties.

One other major finding came out of this study.  Following the shift to remote work, Microsoft employees spent more time communicating asynchronously (e.g., communication via email) and less time synchronously (communication that happens in real time, such as in-person, by telephone, or in a video conference call).  The investigators suggested that this shift to asynchronous communication at the expense of synchronous communication contributed to the results above.

The investigators concluded that the change in network topology following the shift to remote work created a more static, siloed work environment.  Whether these changes will affect the long-term creativity and productivity at Microsoft is another question that was left unanswered by the current study.  However, I suspect that similar studies will follow, especially as we near the two-year anniversary of this pandemic.  What is clear is that the shift to remote work has changed how we approach management in our organizations, and as leaders we will have to adjust our management methods to these new work models.  

Robbers Cave

My wife and I were bored with the only football game on television Sunday night, so we decided to start re-watching the first season of Survivor.  We haven't watched Survivor for a really long time (I think that the show just completed its 41st season), but we both really enjoyed that first season when it first aired way back in 2000.  The show in a lot of ways fundamentally changed television, and I would argue that it changed society as well.

If you've never watched the show, the game is fairly straightforward to understand (even if it’s nearly impossible to predict).  Sixteen players are basically stranded out in the middle of nowhere (frequently on a deserted tropical island) and compete to win $1,000,000.  Players have to "outwit, outplay, outlast" the other players, who vote off one player every 3 days.  Players are divided up initially into two teams, which must compete to win different rewards and immunity (from participating in the vote).  The real game, if you will, is the one played between the different players, who must strike a balance between cooperation, collaboration, and competition to emerge as the winner - the "Sole Survivor" and last remaining player in the game.

Over the years, experts in game theory have weighed in on the best strategy to play in order to win Survivor and the $1 M prize (hint - there probably isn't one).  As I was watching the first couple of episodes last night, I couldn't help but think about some of the lessons on group dynamics and leadership.  I was reminded of a classic experiment performed way back in the 1950's, called the Robbers Cave Experiment led by the social psychologist, Muzafer Sherif.  The experiment (which probably could not be performed today) had important and lasting implications on group conflict that are just as relevant today as they were almost 70 years ago.

Twenty-two boys, age 11-12 years, participated in the study while attending summer camp at Robbers Cave State Park in Oklahoma in 1954.  Their parents knew that they were participating in a research study (apparently Sherif and his study team gathered extensive information on each of the subjects prior to their participation, including school records and personality test results).  Shortly after arriving at camp, the boys were separated into two separate groups.  Initially, the boys spent all of their time in their respective groups and were unaware of the existence of the other group.  They chose names for their groups (the Eagles and the Rattlers) and developed their own group norms and hierarchies.  The boys bonded with the other members of their group through the usual summer camp type of activities (hiking, swimming, fishing, etc).

After a few days, Sherif and his team told the boys about the existence of the other group, and the boys immediately began to speak negatively about the other group.  He next brought the two groups together to compete in a series of games (tug-of-war, baseball, capture-the-flag, etc) in which the winning group would receive prizes and a trophy.  At first, the groups would only trade verbal insults.  However, the research team deliberately created more conflict by arranging one group to be late for lunch and encouraging the other group to eat all of their food.  The conflict escalated and became more physical in nature.  The groups raided each other group's cabin, and even burned the other group's team flag.  

Apparently the conflict reached a point where the groups had to be separated for two days.  During this "cooling off" period, the research team distributed surveys to the campers, and not surprisingly, they rated their own group more positively than their rivals.  Also during this time, the researchers noted that the groups had become even more cohesive than they were before the competition began.  These results confirmed Sherif's theory that conflict between groups could trigger prejudice and discriminatory behavior, which could even lead to physical violence at times (supporting his realistic conflict theory, which states that conflict between two groups will arise as a result of either conflicting goals or competition for limited resources).

All of this sounds vaguely like William Golding's novel, The Lord of the Flies, which was apparently published just one year after the Robbers Cave experiments.  Sherif and his team next tried to identify ways that the intergroup conflict could be resolved.  They brought the Eagles and the Rattlers together for some fun activities (watching a movie, having a meal, or shooting off fireworks on the Fourth of July), which did not lessen the tensions between the two groups.  

Sherif felt that bringing the two groups together could only be achieved by working on superordinate goals (goals that both groups cared about).  His team shut off the camp's water supply - camp staff blamed this an outside group of "vandals" and apparently the two groups worked together collaboratively to identify and fix the problem.  Through a series of these kinds of activities, the research team started to note that the two groups stopped calling each other names, their perception of the other groups (as measured by the surveys) improved, and friendships were established between members of the two opposing groups.  By the end of the camp, they were apparently all on good terms.

There are certainly a number of valid critiques and concerns about Sherif's study design (particularly with respect to the ethics of manipulating a group of 12 year-old boys in this fashion).  However, there are some key takeaways as well.  First, consistent with what has come to be called social identity theory, being part of a group has a really powerful effect on individual's identities and behaviors.  We identify with our social groups (see a couple of previous posts on this topic, "Why didn't you tell me about the Jeep Wave?" and "There's no team without trust"), and leaders can certainly leverage that simple fact in order to achieve the group's goals and objectives.  Second, according to social psychology's contact hypothesis, prejudice and intergroup conflict can be minimized if members of two different groups spend time with one another.  Importantly, as Sherif and his research team witnessed, simply bringing two groups together is not enough, but working together towards common goals or objectives may produce the desired effect.  Here, I am once again reminded of a book I read recently, called The Best of Enemies, in which a white supremacist and single Black mother in the 1960's join forces to improve the local public schools.  

At the end of the day, Sherif's Robbers Cave experiments, Golding's The Lord of the Flies, and Survivor tell us a lot about group dynamics and intergroup conflict.  They probably even have important lessons for leaders.  I will end this post with what Survivor host Jeff Probst always says at the end of each Tribal Council, as he snuffs out the player's torch who just got voted out, "The Tribe has spoken."

Carpe diem!

Our family started watching the Disney+ documentary special Get Back over the holiday break.  The three-part series covers the making of the Beatles' 1970 album Let It Be, whose working title was apparently Get Back.  Director Peter Jackson (of LOTR fame) and his team condensed over 60 hours of film footage and 150 hours from the original Let It Be film project for the documentary, which premiered this past November 25, 26, and 27 on the Disney+ network (if you prefer to read about the documentary, check out this fantastic article by David Remnick and review by Adam Gopnik in The New Yorker).  We only made it through the first episode due to time constraints.  I am a huge Beatles fan, so I really enjoyed the episode, which ends when George Harrison tells everyone that he is quitting the band and walks out of the studio.  I will have to wait for the second episode to see how things turn out, but admittedly I do know what happens - Harrison returns and the band finishes recording their album.  They end up playing a 42-minute live show on the rooftop of the Apple Corps headquarters in London.  Incidentally, this was to be their final live performance as a band (but that is a topic for another day).

After watching the first episode, I started to think about what it means to leave an organization.  Harrison was clearly frustrated with the rest of the band members in the documentary - perhaps he felt marginalized by both Paul McCartney and John Lennon.  He quit, like many superstar employees do, due to his ongoing frustration with how things worked in his organization, which in this case happened to be one of the most famous rock-n-roll bands in history.  In other words, he was pushed to leave.  There is a subtle, but important difference between being pushed out and leaving an organization versus being pulled into and joining a new one.  It should be intuitive that the grass is not always greener on the other side, so if you are leaving an organization out of frustration, you will likely be disappointed in your new one (and less likely to be successful in the new one).

In my last two posts, I talked about Harvard Business School professor Boris Groysberg's research on what has come to be called the "Portability Paradox" (covered at length in his book Chasing Stars: The Myth of Talent and the Portability of Performance).  I discussed some of the reasons for why superstar employees aren't always as successful in a new and different organization in my first post ("You can't take it with you...or can you?").  I discussed ways that organizations can mitigate some of these factors to increase a superstar employee's performance in my second post ("Superstars").  In today's third and final post on this topic, I wanted to discuss ways that an individual (i.e. the superstar employee) can increase her/his chances of success at a new organization.  Groysberg identified the following common mistakes that superstar employees often make:

1. Doing inadequate research

Recall from Groysberg's research that the relative quality of the two firms is an important factor in the "Portability Paradox."  If the superstar employee is moving to a new organization whose level of performance falls below that of the old one, she or he is not likely to be as successful at the new organization.  There is no way that one person alone can save an organization, so know what you are getting into when you leave for a new organization.  It's better to move up than to move down.  Just as important, according to Groysberg's research are the kinds of support resources that you will be provided at the new organization.  Onboarding and orientation to the new culture is just as important - it's better to look into this before making a final decision to leave your old organization.  Finally, understand what role you are being asked to fill at the new organization - is it a similar role to your old one, or will the level of responsibilities, role, and scope be completely different?

2. Leaving for money

Changing organizations solely for financial reasons isn't always the best move.  Superstar employees should be wary of organizations that overpay.  As Groysberg found, these organizations inadvertently create a culture of "us versus them" (i.e. the old employees who may be getting paid less than the new superstar employee).  In addition, organizations expect a return on their investment - overpaying for a superstar employee may be an act of desperation to try to bring in a "savior" for the organization.  

3. Moving "from" rather than "to"

As I stated above, moving "from" an organization (being pushed) versus moving "to" a new one (being pulled) rarely, if ever, works out in the end.  Superstar employees should plan their career moves carefully rather than moving from one crisis to the next.  Those individuals who move "from" an organization generally fail to do their due diligence when researching the new organization.  It's as though they are so desperate to leave their old organization, they ignore warning signs or red flags during the recruitment and hiring process at their new one.  Again, as I stated above, the grass is never greener on the other side.  

4. Overestimating your worth

Again, as I have stated, there is absolutely no way that a single employee can be the organization's savior.  Recall that Groysberg's research showed that superstar employees who left for a new organization as part of a team usually maintained their same level of performance, while those who left their teams and moved to a new organization by themselves almost always did not.  There are many reasons why you have been successful at one organization - hard work, commitment, and expertise are all important reasons.  However, as Groysberg shows, the old organization's culture, resources, and team are just as important.  

5. Not taking a long-term perspective

Groysberg's research shows that it takes time for superstar employees to learn their new organization's culture, systems, and political landscape (in terms of finding the necessary resources in the organization).  All of this takes time - do not expect to match your same level of performance quickly.  There are a number of well-known management books that speak to the importance of establishing yourself in your first 90 days or 100 days - however, the evidence suggests that it often takes much longer for new employees to find their groove (generally on the order of 6 months).  

Leaving for a new organization is never without risk.  However, if done carefully, it can be an extremely rewarding experience.  Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg said, "Feeling confident - or pretending that you feel confident - is necessary to reach for opportunities.  It's a cliché, but opportunities are rarely offered; they're seized."  Carpe diem - seize the day!  But do your research and have a plan!

"A republic, if you can keep it."

There is a story - likely overused and perhaps apocryphal - about something that Benjamin Franklin said on the last day of the Constitutional Convention of 1787.  Apparently, as Franklin left Independence Hall, a woman named (allegedly) Elizabeth Willing Powel asked him, "Well Dr. Franklin, what do we have, a republic or a monarchy."  Franklin replied, "A republic, if you can keep it."

It was one year ago today when our republic nearly foundered (see my post "Our America" from January 7, 2021).  I have tried hard to avoid any discussion of politics in this blog, but given the current state of our country and remembering the events of January 6, 2021, I wanted to share a few thoughts, because I believe that the next 12 months or so will define the future of our American republic.  

Shortly before our last President's second impeachment trial accusing him of inciting the insurrection that occurred at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts called on all Americans to help preserve the constitutional principles that have been the foundation of our government for almost 250 years.  He wrote, "Each generation has an obligation to pass on to the next, not only a fully functioning government responsive to the needs of the people, but the tools to understand and improve it."

Roberts went on, "In our age, when social media can instantly spread rumor and false information on a grand scale, there is even greater danger that political passions can turn us against one another or against constitutional government itself."  Today, more than perhaps any day in our recent history, we remember that the ideals that this nation claims to stand for - justice and freedom - take work to protect and defend.  It means, as the American journalist Irving Kristol wrote more than 40 years ago, "curbing one's passions and moderating one's opinions in order to achieve a large consensus that will ensure domestic tranquility."  

Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch writes, in his book aptly titled, A Republic, If You Can Keep It, in order for "a government of and by the people to work, the people themselves need to talk to one another respectfully; debate and compromise; and strive to live together tolerantly.”  As Americans, we have a fundamental duty to "listen to and tolerate other points of view."  In order to keep our republic, we need to be willing to hear and respect what our fellow Americans say, even if we do not agree.  Somewhere along the way, we have failed in our duty.  

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to attend a lecture by former President Bill Clinton in Chicago.  He is an amazingly gifted speaker, and I thoroughly enjoyed his remarks on the state of health care in America (even if I didn't agree with everything he said).  He was asked what he thought was the most important problem in America today.  He quickly answered, "We have lost the ability to respectfully disagree."

Let me be clear.  I am not saying we should not hold individuals accountable when they spread false or malicious information.  There are certainly a number of examples of that right now in our country.  I believe, though, that part of our issue and how we got to this point is because, to paraphrase President Clinton, we no longer seem to be able to acknowledge that our opinions are not always the right ones, or that others' opinions can matter too.  

We have significant issues to address in this country, and there is no way that we will agree on the right solution to these problems.  Whether we agree or disagree, we still need to respect that we each have our own opinions.  We can always find common ground.  Over the break, I read a book called The Best of Enemies: Race and Redemption in the New South, by Osha Gray Davidson, which tells the story of how two individuals from starkly different backgrounds living in Durham, North Carolina in the 1960's develop a lasting friendship.  C.P. Ellis grew up on the poor white part of town and joined the Ku Klux Klan as a young man (he actually became the leader of the Klan in Durham).  Ann Atwater was a single mother who grew up on the poor black part of town.  She became a civil rights activist and local leader in Durham.  Through a rather unique set of circumstances, they found themselves co-leading an effort to improve the local public school system.  While they initially did not trust each other, they soon learned that they actually had more in common than they realized.  They found common ground to solve real problems in the public school system, and over time the level of trust between them grew.  They eventually became friends (and Ellis quit the Ku Klux Klan).

We can respect our different opinions, and we can always find common ground.  We can compromise and find solutions to the problems that exist today, without necessarily compromising our morals and principles.  I realize that I can do better in this regard as well.  We, as leaders, can model the kind of behavior that we need to move forward as a country.  And, if we work at it, we can even keep our republic. 

Superstars

While I am not that much of an athlete, I do enjoy watching all variety of sports.   Here's a fun fact - I actually majored in Sports Science in college.  I must confess though, I don't understand the game of cricket.  It looks like baseball, but it's definitely not.  Brian Lara is apparently an international superstar in the sport and is widely acknowledged as one of the great batsmen of all time.  He once said, "You don't need a group of superstars, you need a team working together to bring you better results."

There have been a number of "superstar" sports teams over the years - teams so loaded with talent, that they seemed like a "sure thing" to win a championship - that just haven't lived up to the hype.  Take, for example, the 2003-2004 Los Angeles Lakers NBA basketball team.  The Lakers already had future Hall of Famers Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant and a Hall of Fame coach in Phil Jackson.  Together, they had won 3 straight NBA World Championships.  During the offseason, O'Neal recruited future Hall of Famers Gary "The Glove" Payton and Karl "The Mailman" Malone, two players who had not been fortunate to win a NBA World Championship during their otherwise brilliant careers.  It almost seemed a foregone conclusion that they would do so prior to the start of the season.  The Lakers did win their Division and did make it to the NBA Finals, but they lost the series in five games to the Detroit Pistons.  Following the Finals, Phil Jackson was fired as the head coach, though not before claiming that Kobe Bryant was "uncoachable."  Payton signed with another team, Shaq asked for and got a trade to another team, and Karl Malone retired for good.

It takes more than a group of superstars to win basketball games, just like it takes more than a group of superstars to make a good team (and by team, I mean any team, whether it's in health care, business, or sports).  This is not really a new concept for this blog - in fact, I've posted a number of times in the past on this very subject (see, for example, "Chemistry is culture" and  "Superstars and the mess in Cleveland").  In my last post, I talked about the so-called "portability paradox" and the studies showing that recruiting superstars may not always work out the way you think.  I promised to talk about ways that leaders and managers on the one hand, and the superstar employees on the other, can mitigate this paradox.  Today we will address the "portability paradox" from the perspective of the leader/manager.

Perhaps most importantly, given the "portability paradox", it is even worth trying to recruit and hire superstar employees from another organization?  If you go back and look at my last post, Groysberg offers a couple of key suggestions to increase the chances that a newly recruited superstar employee is just as successful in her/his new firm as she/he was in the old one.  If you are hoping to convince a superstar to join a struggling firm, don't waste your time.  Groysberg's research suggests that the chances that the superstar will find the same level of success in the new firm are slim to none.  If you are recruiting a superstar to perform a similar role in your organization (exploitation versus exploration), then go for it.  And while you are at it, make sure that you spend the time and energy into onboarding the new superstar and integrating her/him into your organization's culture.  Also, if you can recruit the superstar as part of a "package deal" (bringing in other member's of her/his old team), the superstar's chances of success will significantly increase.

Groysberg offers some additional suggestions to make sure that the superstar recruit pays off in the long run:

1. Hire for the individual's talent, expertise, and experience as well as the cultural fit within the organization.  Allow the superstar's future colleagues, including individuals from different parts of the organization, to interview the candidate before the hiring is finalized.

2. Don't overestimate the importance of pay.  Paying a superstar recruit far more than what you are paying your current employees will only create problems for the future.  

3. Do not create a double-standard for the superstar.  There should be one culture and one set of rules and expectations for everyone. 

4. Even superstars need a strong group of colleagues and systems to make sure that they are successful.  Do not neglect the latter for the former.

Organizations who can mitigate against the "portability paradox" will create a virtuous cycle.  Superstars, when they are successfully integrated into their new organization's culture, create an environment where everyone else gets better too.  For example, a study of an academic department found that, on average, department productivity (in terms of numbers of scientific journal publications) increased by 54% after the arrival of the superstar.  Most of this impact was indirect - hiring a superstar increases the chance of successfully bringing in more talent.  High-performers like to work with other high-performers!

Hiring superstars doesn't always work out.  However, taking into account all of the considerations above will definitely increase the chances for success.  Next time, we will talk about what the individual (i.e. the superstar) can do to increase the chances of her/his success at a new organization.

"You can't take it with you...or can you?"

It's that time of year again, at least theoretically.  If it weren't for this year's major league baseball lock-out, fans would be sitting back and watching all the free agents signing with new teams.  Here's a great opportunity for baseball teams to recruit and bring in new talent, fill any gaps in their line-up, and make the moves that can put a competitive team on the field in the next season.  It's always a big gamble to sign a free agent to a big contract - win or lose, it's always a costly endeavor.  

Here are a couple of examples.  Several years ago (December, 2014), the Chicago Cubs signed free agent starting pitcher Jon Lester from the Oakland Athletics to a six-year contract worth $155 million.  Lester won 77 games with the Cubs (his W-L record was 77-44), and he was a two-time All Star (2014, 2016), NLCS MVP (2016), World Series champion (2016), and NL wins leader (2018).  He became a free agent again at the end of the 2020 season, eventually signing with the Washington Nationals.  Clearly this free agent signing worked out for the Cubs.

After winning the World Series in 2016, the centerfielder and lead-off hitter for the Chicago Cubs, Dexter Fowler, became a free agent and signed with the St. Louis Cardinals with a five-year contract worth $82.5 million.  While Fowler was a key component of the Cubs World Series championship team, his play in St. Louis was nowhere close to his previous level of play.  He spent most of his time in St. Louis battling injuries and hitting slumps.  He was traded to the Anaheim Angels on February 4, 2021 for cash and the proverbial player to be named later.

The question then becomes - are superstar free agent signings more like Jon Lester or Dexter Fowler?  I can frame the question in another way - can superstars be just as successful with their new team?  Is superstar talent transferable from one team to the next?  As it turns out, this question has been studied extensively, both within sports and in other organizations.  Harvard Business School professor Boris Groysberg has both studied and written extensively on this topic (see, for example, his book Chasing Stars: The Myth of Talent and the Portability of Performance).  While most of his research has focused on the financial sector, many of his findings (called the "Portability Paradox") are directly applicable to other industries as well.

Building upon a framework that the economist Gary Becker developed in the 1960's, Groysberg proposed that the specific nature of a job determines whether a superstar performer at one company can replicate that level of performance at another company.  There are at least two kinds of knowledge and skills at play here.  Broadly speaking, general skills are those that can be applied to any industry or organization, while specific skills are likely to be applicable only in a specific organization or industry.  For example, knowing how to access information (e.g. who to call) or use proprietary software are specific skills, while knowing how to look at a balance sheet or income statement would be a general skill.  Groysberg's research suggests that individuals with firm-specific skills and knowledge are not only less likely to move to another organization, they probably won't be as successful in that new organization.

As I mentioned, most of Groysberg's research focused on financial analysts and investors, though I think his findings are applicable to almost all knowledge-based industries (at least, though likely to almost all industries).  He looked at the success of "superstar" analysts for a period of five years after moving to a new organization.  In general, Groysberg found that superstars who moved from one organization to the next experienced a significant decline in their performance, which persisted for at least five years!  The following factors had the most significant impact on he "portability of superstars" (i.e. whether these individuals continue to be superstars at the new organization):

1. The relative quality of the two firms - Stars who moved to a superior firm (better level of organizational performance) did not experience a decline in individual performance, while stars who moved to inferior firms failed to live up to expectations at the new firm.

2. The orientation of the employee's firm of origin - Customized, firm-specific resources (information systems, firm-specific training, elements of culture, etc) can be difficult to replicate by other organizations.  Stars who left organizations with a lot of these customized resources generally saw significant declines in performance after leaving.

3. The hiring and integration capacities of the new firm - Onboarding and integration into a new organizational performance is important.  Superstars who joined firms that focused on these issues usually maintained their superstar level of performance.

4. The function an analyst is hired to perform - Superstars who leave firms for similar roles at the new organization (exploitation) performed far better than those who left for new roles (exploration).

5. Leaving solo or with a team - If the superstar takes her/his team to the new organization (versus going to the new firm alone), they were able to maintain their superstar level of performance. 

6. Gender - Interestingly, women superstars generally were more successful at the new firm compared to men.

If these results weren't compelling enough (and I think they are absolutely fascinating), Groysberg's team applied their research methodology to an entirely different industry - professional football (the National Football League).  They compared the performance of superstar wide receivers and punters who switched teams with those who did not.  Wide receivers were felt to have more team-specific knowledge (offensive strategy, playbooks, an interactions with other players on the field, specifically the quarterback), while punters were felt to have more general knowledge.  Again, consistent with their previous results with financial analysts, superstar wide receivers who switched teams suffered a decline in performance.  However, in contrast to the financial analysts whose performance declines persisted up to 5 years after a move, the superstar wide receivers' performance recovered in about a year.  The performance of superstar punters did not decline.  

It's always good when an independent group of investigators can validate the findings of another research team.  For example, a study on player trades from 1900-1992 in Major League Baseball found that the players with the most team-specific knowledge (catchers and shortstops) are the least likely to be traded compared to those with more general knowledge and skills (outfielders).  Middle infielders ranked somewhere in between.  Another study performed with lobbyists found similar findings to the studies above.

One could argue that health care is a knowledge-based industry.  Is there evidence to the "portability paradox" in health care?  The answer might surprise you.  Several years ago, investigators at the Harvard Business School asked this question in a study of nearly 40,000 coronary artery bypass graft procedures performed by 203 cardiac surgeons at 43 different hospitals.  Many of these surgeons performed multiple procedures at several different hospitals, so the investigators looked at the volume-outcome relationships for each surgeon.  Historically, studies show that the more procedures that a surgeon performs, the better her/his outcomes will be over the long run - this makes perfect sense and is consistent with other industries.  Practice does make perfect.  Of interest, the greater the number of procedures performed at a given hospital, the better the outcomes.  In other words, an individual surgeon's outcomes improved, not with the overall number of procedures performed amongst all the hospitals, but with the number of procedures performed at a specific hospital.  The surgeon's outcomes were different at each hospital!  The investigators suggested that as the surgeon became more comfortable working with a particular operating room team (anesthesiologist, nurse, surgical assistants) and the equipment at a specific hospital, her/his outcomes improved.

All of these studies suggest that, as the old saying goes, you really can't take it with you ("it" being your specific performance at one institution).  Groysberg's study also suggests a few ways that we can mitigate the so-called "portability paradox."  More on that in the next post.