0:00

Breaking down everyday workplace issues

0:03

and diagnosing the hidden sickness, not just

0:03

the obvious symptom. Our hosts, James and Coby.

0:10

Did we lose a patient?

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No, that's just my lunch.

0:14

Hey,

0:17

thanks for joining us. I'm Coby, he's James.

0:17

And let's get started with a question. What

0:26

is some practical psychology that can help

0:26

improve how I lead and work with others?

0:33

So we've

0:35

talked several times on this podcast and in a

0:35

number of other forms about how we really try

0:43

to take a three prong approach to our work,

0:43

and especially in how we build our concepts

0:49

and curriculum. And so we're always looking at

0:49

things from the historical perspective. You know,

0:55

how has the advice and trends over time shaped

0:55

the way that we actually engage with work,

1:00

or how has it shaped how the common perspective.

1:00

And what's the common way of addressing these

1:06

problems? You know, where do they stem from?

1:06

How do they. How did we get to where we are now?

1:12

We look at it from a perspective of my personal

1:15

favorite, which is more of an economic development

1:15

lens, where we're bringing in the perspective of

1:20

how can we make decisions that are going to

1:20

improve not only our business bottom line,

1:26

but also our communities, and where are those

1:26

small tactical investments that are going to have

1:34

a compounding and scalable benefit over time?

1:34

And then we always look at it from what Kobe's

1:40

personal favorite, which is the psychological

1:40

influences that shape our workplace, which I'm

1:47

not going to go into detail on because this is

1:47

really your wheelhouse, man. And so I want to let

1:55

you kind of take the reins on this question,

1:55

which is the focus of today's conversation.

2:01

Absolutely. So, like, I'm

2:05

a huge psychology nerd. Anyone that's read, like,

2:05

any of my writing or anyone that really knows me,

2:11

kind of really, you know, has, I'm sure, has

2:11

picked up on how I embed so much of, like,

2:17

I have a cognitive, psychological approach to the

2:17

work that I do, to the stuff that we build. And

2:25

it's something that is. It is probably the primary

2:25

lens that I view kind of the world through. And,

2:30

I mean, it's kind of funny. Cause, like, there

2:30

was a kind of defining moment in my life when,

2:39

in all honesty, in reality after university, if

2:39

a job offer had came kind of one day earlier,

2:46

I probably would have. I wouldn't be doing this.

2:46

I'd probably be working in academia, in cognitive

2:52

psychology research and application. So it's a

2:52

real passion. But I'm not saying I'm quite happy

3:00

with where we are now, but it's something

3:00

that has always stuck with me. And again,

3:05

part of it was a focus of my undergrad.

3:05

It's a major focus of my graduate degree,

3:09

and something that I feel gives a lot of

3:09

clarity to human interaction and to kind

3:17

of communicating and working with others. But

3:17

where I've taken so much of so much value from

3:26

cognitive psychology has been in the work that we

3:26

do around workforce development and organizational

3:31

culture and change. So I think that it's going

3:31

to be great for us to look at three different

3:39

concepts or aspects that people really should know

3:39

about that would provide some helpful insight,

3:46

some clarity on some confusing kind of

3:46

interpersonal interactions and kind of some

3:53

of the things that kind of govern our workplace

3:53

a little bit. So we're going to try and talk

3:58

about these. I'm going to try and make sure that

3:58

these concepts are really accessible and really

4:04

easy to understand. So, James, absolutely.

4:04

Call me out if I get too technical on stuff.

4:10

My job is to ask questions, to try to help. Well, I mean,

4:11

you understand these a lot better than myself,

4:17

so I'm still. Some of these I'm more familiar

4:17

with than others. So my role will be to ask you

4:24

questions to help explain it, and then

4:24

let's figure out how we can actually,

4:28

how do we make these useful, you know, useful?

4:28

Peer to peer useful as a manager, leading a team.

4:36

And really, how can knowing about some of these things improve

4:37

interpersonal and professional relationships?

4:42

So what you got for us?

4:44

All right, so the first one I want to talk about is the

4:44

concept of what's called Affect Intensity. Now,

4:50

affect intensity is something that most people

4:50

probably haven't heard of, but it's actually

4:56

something that can be incredibly insightful

4:56

for people to know about when dealing with

5:01

other people. So what affect intensity is, it's

5:01

the degree that people feel emotion or that they

5:13

process emotional responses. So a good comparison

5:13

between to affect intensity, which is kind of,

5:22

again, a kind of mental and emotional reaction,

5:22

is with something a little bit more tangible

5:27

that people are probably familiar with, which is

5:27

pain thresholds. So some people have a very high

5:33

tolerance for pain, and, you know, and something

5:33

might, you know, and a pinprick might not even

5:38

register where other people might have a very low

5:38

tolerance of pain. A pinprick could be like, oh,

5:43

my gosh, I'm dying, depending. Right? Yeah. That

5:43

concept transferred over to emotional response

5:51

is what affect intensity is. Some people deal or

5:51

process emotions with a very high range. So, like,

6:00

you know, so, like, so the bottom of their, like,

6:00

their emotional lows and their emotional highs

6:07

are very far apart. And they can experience a

6:07

spectrum, a wide spectrum of emotions within,

6:15

you know, within that. So, like their. Their

6:15

greatest, you know, like, you know, the day

6:20

they got married or met or the children were born

6:20

or, like, that could be such a high. That would

6:25

be like, you know, just a profound high. Then,

6:25

like, you know, the loss of a loved one, you know,

6:30

would be such a major low. But even within those

6:30

kind of wide ranges, more common, everyday things

6:38

like the barista got my coffee order right could

6:38

really put me in a great high level mood where

6:44

like, you know, my, you know, I've left on red

6:44

on my text messages and it's really bumming

6:53

me out. We put you in a pretty low because you

6:53

have this really wide range of highs and lows.

6:59

So is it. It's

7:02

not just that some people have higher

7:02

threshold for their highs and a lower

7:08

threshold for the lows. And other

7:08

people, you know, may not be able

7:12

to reach those things. It's the same type of

7:12

stimulus will affect them in different ways.

7:19

Exactly. Because those. So,

7:21

so those that have that high range, what we

7:21

call a high affect intensity. Your affect

7:26

density is high, whereas the other kind of

7:26

people might have a low affect intensity.

7:31

And we're assuming this is a spectrum,

7:32

not a one or the other.

7:37

Absolutely, yeah. So the degree that people. That people

7:38

feel them on, there's not just. You're either

7:45

column a or column b. But it's like the idea

7:45

of lower levels and higher levels. Right.

7:50

Gotcha.

7:50

Those with lower levels of affect intensity would, you know, the

7:51

range that they can physically process emotion

7:59

is much smaller. So in theoretically, someone

7:59

with a really high affect intensity, you know,

8:05

the barista getting their coffee order right,

8:05

could have this. They could process that and

8:10

feel that at the same level with someone with a

8:10

low affect intensity at maybe, like, you know,

8:15

or someone. So maybe the date someone got married,

8:15

like, you know, they might be able to process at

8:19

the same emotional level. I mean, I'm talking.

8:19

I'm kind of being a bit, you know, a little bit.

8:23

No, I hear what you're saying, though. I mean, the. If somebody's affect

8:25

intensity is low and it, you know, kind

8:34

of the emotional cap is at a certain place and

8:34

somebody else who has a much higher cap, a normal,

8:43

a regular interaction might reach that threshold.

8:43

That's almost the maximum for somebody else.

8:51

Exactly. Which is why in our personalized and

8:54

our work, the same catalyst, the same stimuli, the

8:54

same event could have some people hitting a very

9:02

emotional high and some people hitting a very low

9:02

emotional high. And part of it is just because the

9:09

person with a high affect intensity can process

9:09

the emotion. It's so much higher. They feel it

9:14

so much deeper. It's so much more. The affect on

9:14

them is higher, whereas with low affect intensity,

9:22

it affects them and they can process it at a

9:22

lower level. So this is why some people might

9:27

give you like, you know, kind of a quiet thumbs up

9:27

to great news, where another person might be like,

9:32

oh, my God. And OMG themselves as they

9:32

walk around not being able to believe it.

9:37

So I think that leads. Yeah,

9:40

I think that leads into a really good next step,

9:40

which is, what does this actually look like to

9:47

other people and why does it matter for work?

9:47

Because I think what's interesting, I mean,

9:56

it's one more. It's one more way as a manager

9:56

to be able to communicate and to be able to

10:03

understand the people that you're leading. I think

10:03

that's important to say upfront. I think it's also

10:09

important to recognize if you have people on

10:09

your team who are very high affect intensity

10:15

and also people who are lower affect intensity.

10:15

The people who are high affect intensity may

10:21

come across as the drama queen. Or the. Just from

10:21

somebody who's not used to experiencing the same

10:31

highs of emotion, may regard their counterpart as

10:31

overly dramatic or overly sensitive or, you know,

10:44

these common interpersonal complaints

10:44

that we hear. If you've led any team,

10:53

I'm sure you've heard these. I don't like

10:53

Jimmy because Jimmy is a lot. Yeah, right.

11:01

Yeah.

11:02

But I think it's important. I like the fact

11:05

that there's actual a psychological theory behind

11:05

it and not just Jimmy's a pain in the rear end,

11:10

because I don't. And I don't like Jimmy. But we.

11:10

The way that we're wired that there's something to

11:18

this that's tangible, that it won't. Understanding

11:18

this won't change it, but understanding this will

11:26

at least allow us to respond with more

11:26

grace than perhaps we would otherwise.

11:32

Well, it's also really good about managing your own expectations

11:33

about how information is going to affect the

11:37

team. So if you come in and some with great

11:37

news and you have a higher affective density,

11:45

then you might want that big reaction of, oh,

11:45

my gosh, this is huge. And somebody on your team

11:52

may not give you that reaction, and you might

11:52

almost take it as an insult or as what's wrong

11:58

with them or this. But the reality is they are

11:58

processed. If they have low affect intensity,

12:03

they are processing it as high as they

12:03

can. It just looks different or just.

12:07

It just hits people different. And it's not about that. They're not that. I

12:09

like that. That's. I think that's a really good,

12:14

tangible, realistic experience that managers

12:14

have. You know, being excited about, you know,

12:21

a project or, you know, or about sharing news

12:21

with their team and not getting the reactions

12:28

that they want and then interpreting how we

12:28

don't challenge that because you shouldn't

12:33

really challenge that. But we read into it from

12:33

our own perspective. And our own affect intensity,

12:41

It cuts the other way, too, because if you go team with really bad news,

12:43

you're going to get people having with higher

12:48

affect intensity reacting very strong to what you

12:48

expect, then someone with low affect intensity may

12:54

not give you that same degree of reaction.

12:54

So you may think they're more okay with it,

12:59

that they're not as bothered by it because they

12:59

didn't act out as much as you might thought

13:03

they did. But the reality is they are feeling

13:03

it just, and they may be as bothered by it,

13:11

but they can't process the emotional impact of

13:11

it. So they're might. They're no more on board

13:15

than the person who's losing their mind about it.

13:15

They just are reacting differently because they're

13:20

reacting to the degree that they can because of

13:20

having low affect intensity. So there is a lot

13:27

of value in just realizing that when you're, you

13:27

know, when you're learning about your team, you

13:35

need to kind of hold them to their own benchmark.

13:35

So if, you know, I've got eight people on my team

13:42

and three are really high affect intensity, and

13:42

if you were in the middle and the other ones are

13:48

kind of really low, how don't hold the low people

13:48

to the reaction of the high people. Hold them to

13:55

their. To their historical. But how do they

13:55

normally react? Yeah, is it is a mild grunt,

14:01

an actual freak out first for someone with a

14:01

low affect intensity or is kind of a raised

14:06

eyebrow and a kind of a slight chuckle the same

14:06

as someone, like, losing their mind, excited.

14:11

So is this a subjective measurement that each

14:17

person needs to help? Like, are there. I guess

14:17

the question that I would have is how would I,

14:23

as a manager, try to evaluate this without, you

14:23

know, there could be other factors at play, right?

14:33

Absolutely. And, I mean, so, like, there are,

14:35

like, some measurement tools. There's what's

14:35

called. There's, I think it's called aim, which

14:39

is an actual psychological assessment, but you

14:39

don't really need to go into anything like that.

14:43

Part of it is just, again, observable trends. We

14:43

kind of all know, the person on our team that,

14:49

or people that we work with that, again, are going

14:49

to have a big reaction to something. We all know

14:54

those that are not going to. I'm not saying

14:54

that it's obvious that the only thing going

14:59

on with them is their affect intensity, but it is

14:59

something that we should filter this knowledge, we

15:04

should filter our understanding of people through

15:04

because we. Because, you know, we need to realize

15:10

that, you know, low affect intensity people are

15:10

not just robots and high affect intensity people

15:14

are not just, you know, crazy, you know, emotional

15:14

psychos. Right. There's the individual differences

15:23

allow people to process and kind of experience

15:23

emotions at different levels. And the best way for

15:32

you as the coworker or you as a manager to be able

15:32

to kind of have this help you is let it be another

15:38

lens to view individual differences through. Maybe

15:38

it explains why something. Why someone is one way

15:45

that you might have chalked up to them just being

15:45

a cold robot or over or lower dramatic person. But

15:51

there's, you know, there is something that. That

15:51

might be the reason for it, and it won't change

15:56

it, knowing it won't change it, but it might

15:56

help you create a better, more insight and

16:00

understanding and how this can actually improve

16:00

the way that you lead and work with other people.

16:07

Yeah, this is. This is the one that I. I was not familiar

16:08

with affect intensity before we started this.

16:15

Started prepping for this conversation.

16:15

So it's been a really interesting journey

16:19

for me to kind of figure out what it is and

16:19

then how it can actually be used in some way.

16:27

No, and again, I hope that to you listening

16:30

that this is something that may, again, be another

16:30

little tool in your toolbox of how you understand

16:36

people to might, you know, be just to give you

16:36

that little bit of extra insight that might,

16:40

again, improve your interpersonal, professional

16:40

relationships. All right, so let's move on to

16:45

the next concept. This one we may end up taking

16:45

a little while to talk about. It's what's called

16:52

Belief Perseverance. Now, belief perseverance is

16:52

about maintaining a belief despite new information

17:01

that firmly contradicts it. So it's the idea

17:01

of you have a belief of you or perspective, a

17:08

thought, and even when confronted with information

17:08

that debunks it or that totally contradicts it,

17:18

and you're kind of proven wrong, you hold on

17:18

to that belief, and in some cases, the belief,

17:28

the firmness that you hold that belief can

17:28

actually go so far to the extreme that you

17:35

actually believe in it more. Your belief becomes

17:35

stronger than it was before. You're presented

17:44

with information, and that phenomenon is known

17:44

as what's called the backfire effect. So the

17:49

idea of belief perseverance is you believe one

17:49

thing, and let's say you believe in unicorns,

18:00

and the idea that you're presented with logical,

18:00

empirical data that says, honestly, unicorns don't

18:07

exist. They never have, and this and that. And

18:07

instead of you going, okay, you convince me,

18:13

I changed my mind, you almost double down.

18:13

And you either. If you double down and say,

18:20

no, I believe in it more, that's the backfire

18:20

effect. If you just say, no, you know what? I

18:23

still believe in it no matter what you say, that's

18:23

belief perseverance. So belief perseverance is

18:29

holding on to it, and your belief strengthening

18:29

is actually what is called the backfire effect.

18:35

So I've got a couple. I just want to jump in with a couple

18:36

questions, because as you're talking about it,

18:40

I'm assuming that this is not a cognitive

18:40

process. This is not like they're not

18:45

going through the same stages that you just

18:45

described of. No, I'm going to disregard that,

18:51

and I'm going to choose to continue to believe.

18:51

This is not a conscious response. This is a…

19:01

Well, the thing is, it's not a rational response.

19:08

It's an irrational response, which basically means

19:08

it's an emotional response. It's not a logical

19:15

conscious. I've decided to ignore this. It's my

19:15

emotional response to hearing this information

19:25

is going to be to protect myself, either out of

19:25

fear, out of embarrassment, or out of anxiety.

19:33

It's. I'm choosing to go into, either go into

19:33

denial and not accept that this is happening,

19:41

and just, again, out of fear of protecting myself

19:41

from the feelings around fear or embarrassment or

19:46

anxiety or kind of whatever the negative feeling

19:46

that we're trying to avoid is. And it becomes an

19:51

emotional reaction to a logical tool to a logic

19:51

based argument. And that's when things get messy.

19:59

And I. Yeah,

20:02

because you can. You just cannot

20:02

argue emotion with facts, right?

20:10

Yeah.

20:10

It not saying one is right. And,

20:13

you know, emotions wrong and facts are, the

20:13

emotional responses are incredibly powerful.

20:19

And I believe that, like, our intuition and

20:19

the way that we respond with our emotions

20:26

is very healthy and very much a good thing. But

20:26

if somebody has a firmly held emotional belief,

20:35

trying to dissuade or persuade somebody who's

20:35

holding an emotional belief with purely a

20:42

factual based argument, or what you believe

20:42

to be a factual based argument is not going

20:48

to. They're not going to connect because

20:48

you're trying to. There's a misalignment

20:53

there. And I think that's one of the big

20:53

takeaways with this particular concept,

21:01

is that understanding that when this happens,

21:01

it's often emotion based. And the trap that we

21:10

fall into as co workers or as managers is that

21:10

we try to take a systematic, logical, factual,

21:22

whatever, evidence based approach to dissuading

21:22

somebody of a firmly held emotional belief.

21:29

Yes. And again, not to kind of go off at the

21:29

risk of going off and onto a tangent or down

21:37

a path that we really shouldn't go down. This

21:37

is probably one of the most prevalent, like,

21:44

you know, difficult things to process with

21:44

our current political climate that we're in.

21:52

You're opening a can of worms!

21:54

Yeah. We're going to move away from this very quickly. But the idea of somebody

21:56

holding on to a belief, then, you know, and just

22:05

because we present the people with clear, logical

22:05

evidence does not mean that it will persuade them.

22:11

Or sometimes we believe to be clear, logical evidence.

22:12

Because, again, these are individual beliefs.

22:19

Absolutely. But you're right. Using a logical, evidence based

22:20

argument to an emotional reaction does not really

22:27

work. And when we get into the backfire

22:27

effect and we double down on the beliefs,

22:32

largely what happens is that we're trying to

22:32

avoid the negative feelings of potentially being

22:39

wrong. We don't want to process that we could be

22:39

wrong. So we tend to use a form of projection,

22:44

which is assigning your own unacceptable feelings

22:44

or qualities onto someone else. And we think,

22:49

well, no, I can't. Again, we don't think this

22:49

consciously, but the idea of. It's almost like

22:55

the logic of I can't process that I could

22:55

be so wrong about this for so long. So my

23:02

feelings of negative. My negative feelings about

23:02

how wrong I am, I'm going to project that on the

23:07

person telling me the contradicting information

23:07

and so that they must be wrong, so I must be

23:14

even more right. And that's kind of some of the

23:14

logical process behind the backfire effect. But

23:19

it really can be something that, again, I don't

23:19

want to get into the political stuff, but this.

23:24

But there is. There's value in the illustration, because unless

23:24

you've been hiding under a rock, you can probably

23:33

relate to conversations like this. I don't care

23:33

what your political beliefs are. We have all

23:39

encountered this particular phenomenon.

23:39

One thing that I want to ask you about,

23:47

or kind of how I see it, is it's not so much

23:47

about the person being scared of being wrong,

23:56

it's the implication for other how that being

23:56

wrong affects so many other firmly held beliefs,

24:07

because very few. I don't think

24:07

we can hold opinions in a vacuum.

24:12

Right.

24:13

Our opinions are, and our beliefs

24:16

are a intermingled web of a lot of different

24:16

things. And this is my assumption, and please

24:25

correct me if I'm getting the psychology wrong,

24:25

but my thought would be that it's the strain

24:31

that happens of being confronted with. What does

24:31

this mean for everything else that creates that?

24:42

So, so the. The degree

24:45

of the negative feelings definitely plays into

24:45

the prevalence of belief perseverance. So let me

24:51

give you an example. If you believed unicorns

24:51

were real, just because it'd be kind of cool,

24:59

and you're presented with evidence, you're

24:59

like, hey, I don't have a lot invested in it,

25:02

all right? I'm wrong. Unicorns aren't real. Moving

25:02

on. If you've taken out a massive bank loan for

25:08

your unicorn ranch, and you built your whole

25:08

life around being a unicorn rancher, and this is

25:15

the. Your whole life is invested in this, that's a

25:15

much harder pill to swallow. And the implications,

25:23

like you said, the degree that you were

25:23

invested in this, what this means for every

25:27

other decision that you've made is when I can't

25:27

process how devastating being wrong is going.

25:37

To because it's just about the unicorns.

25:38

It's about the. The impact this

25:42

is going to have on my livelihood and my

25:42

family and every ripple effect of that.

25:47

Yes. It's like, it's what I've tied

25:50

my. It's the dock I've tied my boat to. I can't.

25:50

It's this ability I've created. It's part of the

25:55

identity I've carved out for myself. And that. And

25:55

that is so hard for me to challenge and not become

26:05

overwhelmed that it's just easier for me to accept

26:05

the denial of the information and say, you know

26:13

what? No, I'm gonna believe it anyway because I

26:13

kind of have to. Because of the implication of it.

26:18

And that, again, not in a conscious manner.

26:22

Our brains speed through that logic chain

26:22

that I just said, and they just said, nope,

26:27

you're wrong. Because, you know, they. Because

26:27

that's just the only acceptable output. Right.

26:34

And because part of it is that is. Again, I'm

26:34

going to throw another cognitive thing out

26:41

there. We talk about this in our change management

26:41

program is a concept called cognitive dissonance.

26:46

Right.

26:47

Cognitive dissonance is the perception of dealing with contradictory

26:49

information and the mental toll it takes on

26:54

having two contradictions in your head. So, like.

26:54

And it is stressful to hold two conflicting ideas

27:03

in our heads. And often one of the ways that we

27:03

protect ourselves from that stress and anxiety is

27:11

we fall into denial. A good example is like,

27:11

you know, I believe that all life is sacred,

27:17

but I also love me a hamburger. So to deal

27:17

with that kind of cognitive dissonance,

27:23

we often just don't think about those

27:23

two things together. We just keep them.

27:28

Don't think about how the hamburger's made or what is.

27:30

Exactly. We just get into denial that

27:32

they're plucked from the burger tree. So it's

27:32

just, we just don't think about it. So again,

27:39

dealing with cognitive dissonance, denial

27:39

is one common reaction, but another one,

27:43

depending on the degree that we are invested

27:43

in that knowledge, belief perseverance can be,

27:50

you know, it is a common way that we go. Now,

27:50

the real question is, what do we do about it?

27:57

So with belief perseverance, part of it is

27:57

we just need to understand that sometimes

28:07

one of the things we have to overcome when

28:07

we're talking about change, whether we're

28:11

changing minds or whether we're changing views,

28:11

whether we're changing organizational processes,

28:16

is that some people get very attached to a belief

28:16

or a position or a view or a way of doing things.

28:25

And just presenting them with the logical reason

28:25

to change isn't enough. We have to create the

28:31

buy in for them to be willing to unpack what this

28:31

means for me and try to help them and facilitate

28:39

the idea that, you know, the way things were

28:39

before, what you believe before was fine. But

28:46

this new shift is actually going to better for

28:46

everybody, and we're going to help you get there.

28:50

And I think my advice from a management

28:54

perspective on this is actually going to be a

28:54

little less generous than I usually am. I mean,

29:04

obviously, when our work, we take a very people

29:04

centered approach to everything. And however,

29:13

the way that I see this playing out in the

29:13

workplace can be very damaging. And I'm not

29:19

talking in extremes, I'm talking, let's think

29:19

about it from a standpoint of trying to battle

29:24

a culture of complacency. Where we. How I have

29:24

encountered this so many times where we've

29:32

been working with teams that are trying to move

29:32

forward, there's either change is being imposed

29:40

on them and it's a, this is just how things

29:40

are going to be. So we need to come together

29:46

as a team and move forward, or it's a much

29:46

smoother process of, we're trying to generate,

29:55

buy in for the change and bring people along.

29:55

However, when you have that ingrained complacency,

30:03

and that people are really attached to that

30:03

safety, that I don't want to change because I

30:10

am comfortable with my job, I'm comfortable doing

30:10

things the way that I've done it for the last 20

30:16

years. Why would I change? Obviously, the first

30:16

step is to try to bring people along. It's trying

30:25

to understand what those reservations are and to

30:25

generate buy in that will resonate with the person

30:31

to help them come along. However, at there comes

30:31

a point where complacency unchecked can lead toxic

30:44

behaviors and that cannot be allowed to fester in

30:44

an organization. It poisons everyone around them,

30:53

it poisons the individual who is engaged in those

30:53

behaviors, and it poisons the rest of the team,

30:59

and it can spread like a cancer if it's not dealt

30:59

with. So while this may all come down to belief

31:08

perseverance, and there is a psychological

31:08

theory behind why all of this is happening,

31:15

sometimes we need to just use the tools that

31:15

we have at our disposal. If people are so

31:21

unwilling to change that they are not only hurting

31:21

themselves, but they're hurting those around them,

31:27

then it's time to look at our discipline and

31:27

termination policies. Progressive discipline

31:32

first, ideally. But ultimately, it's

31:32

not worth hanging on to. Poison, right?

31:41

Yes, I mean, you're right. So,

31:44

like we talked about a climate of complacency

31:44

a couple podcast episodes ago. In our culture

31:50

of innovation. One, and one of them, one of the

31:50

warning signs for that is the rigid thinking,

31:55

which really kind of does kind of couple

31:55

nicely with belief perseverance is that

31:59

there's a rigidity to what is, what are. What are

31:59

you willing to believe or what are you willing to

32:04

follow? And that's one of the major sign of it.

32:04

And you're right, I think probably the most,

32:10

one of the most practical use of understanding

32:10

belief perseverance will be in combating

32:16

acclimate of complacency in our workplaces.

32:16

And it is the idea that you're right,

32:21

knowing about belief perseverance and the backfire

32:21

effect and even cognitive dissonance is helpful

32:28

to consider what is behind the actions,

32:28

the pushback. But it doesn't excuse it.

32:37

It's a reason not an excuse.

32:39

Reason not an excuse is an excellent way to put it.

32:43

No, so I think that is very helpful in that knowing that there is

32:45

an emotional component to people holding on to

32:53

traditional ways of doing things that has to

32:53

be considered and addressed, and which. And

32:58

you can't just mandate emotions to change. So it's

32:58

why you need to do more work on the buying inside,

33:03

not just from a logical standpoint, but

33:03

also considering the emotional impact.

33:07

But I think, again, I used this line with our last concept,

33:08

and I think I'll probably end up using it again.

33:17

Understanding that this is not just Jimmy being

33:17

a frustrating, irritating, whatever else you want

33:28

to put on that chain of language allows us to

33:28

approach this with hopefully less frustration,

33:37

less anger, less resentment, and extend more

33:37

grace. We still have to deal with the situation,

33:45

but understanding where this is coming from and

33:45

that this is a emotional response to a firmly

33:52

held belief at least allows us to approach

33:52

the conversation not as well. This person is

33:58

just. They're just stubborn, and they're

33:58

just trying to irritate me and they just

34:02

don't want to do. People aren't just anything.

34:02

we are complex. So extend grace where you can.

34:10

And hopefully this will give you a little bit more of a tactical approach

34:11

to resolving these issues rather than just,

34:16

you know, getting yourself all frustrated and

34:16

potentially just, you know, and handling it,

34:20

like I say, with less grace than you probably

34:20

could. All right, so let's move on to our last

34:27

concept I want to talk about, which is the concept

34:27

of self sabotage. So what? So what self sabotage

34:34

is it's when we essentially get in our own way

34:34

and we end up, like, tanking our own actions,

34:44

that will be the best thing for us. It's we.

34:44

The name is pretty descriptive into itself and

34:50

that we will make decisions that are going to

34:50

eventually that will hold us back. They may be,

34:58

you know, they're often short term, short

34:58

sighted, prioritizing our short term comfort

35:05

decisions at the end, sacrificing what's

35:05

best for us in the medium and long term,

35:12

or what's the best thing to do for others. And

35:12

it's something that is quite prevalent in our

35:19

kind of our own career progression when we kind of

35:19

take what is, you know, we overvalue the safety of

35:26

our current situation and don't put ourselves out

35:26

there, but so also. But it can be a very difficult

35:32

thing to. To experience when you were watching

35:32

someone do else that you work with or care for

35:37

go through it. But the one thing that I should

35:37

really say is that the real danger with self

35:44

sabotaging behavior is that it's subconscious.

35:44

People don't consciously think, I'm going totally

35:52

burn this bridge. I'm going totally, you know,

35:52

like, just keep procrastinating until nothing,

35:57

you know, until everyone gets mad at me and I

35:57

lose my job. It's that the rationalization to

36:04

maintain those short term comfort zone becomes

36:04

logical and becomes a very natural, easy thing

36:13

for us to do. The path of least resistance in some

36:13

way that the person who's engaging in it doesn't

36:20

realize that it's happening or that they're doing

36:20

it. And they think to them, well, no, this is the

36:28

most logical. This is the best thing for me.

36:28

When in reality it's them avoiding the negative

36:36

feelings that come with change or come with, or

36:36

the fear that might come with doing something new

36:42

or not willing to sacrifice the short term

36:42

comfort to obtain the long term success.

36:49

Of the three concepts we're talking about,

36:53

this is one that I'm most familiar. Unfortunately,

36:53

in my own life and in profession and the work.

37:02

I mean, we're all guilty of this to some degree,

37:02

right? Procrastination, avoiding making a decision

37:09

until the decision is made for you, is making a

37:09

decision. There's all of these things that are

37:18

at play. But I'm really glad that you mentioned

37:18

fear, because that has been the biggest theme that

37:26

I have seen with self sabotage, is that oftentimes

37:26

it's rooted from some fear. Fear of the unknown is

37:38

a legit, like, even in terms of something that

37:38

could be very positive for your career path,

37:44

whether it's, you know, do x, you just need to

37:44

finish x, y and z, and you are up for a promotion,

37:51

but you procrastinate or you don't do it.

37:51

Because the fear that comes from changing,

37:57

the fear that comes from, well, I know what

37:57

I'm doing now. What happened? And again,

38:03

these are not always fully conscious thoughts.

38:03

They are things that we process very quickly and

38:13

come to a decision. We know what the conscious

38:13

outcome of the decision, not necessarily all

38:19

the. The thought chain that led us to that

38:19

decision. As a manager, if you. This can be so,

38:28

especially as a manager or as a mentor, seeing

38:28

this behavior in somebody who you care about,

38:36

somebody who you have invested time and energy

38:36

in their personal or professional growth,

38:42

and to see these behaviors can be so very

38:42

frustrating and demoralizing and almost feel

38:50

like a personal attack. Why won't they just do

38:50

the bloody things that I need them to do so that

38:57

they can continue to on the path that we've set?

38:57

Yeah, but understanding that this is not a slight

39:06

on you, this is not a. It's not even necessarily

39:06

a conscious decision that they've made. If you can

39:14

get to the root of the fear that's holding them

39:14

back, is it? It could be fear of failure. We talk

39:23

a lot about psychological safety and how important

39:23

psychological safety is in the workplace to being,

39:31

central to the employee experience and, but

39:31

also that if we know that in our workplaces

39:39

I can try something and I can, even if I'm not

39:39

100% successful, I'm not going to be ridiculed or

39:45

I know that I'm going to be supported along the

39:45

way. That is a major fear that we can eliminate

39:51

for people by providing something that is a

39:51

cornerstone of a healthy work culture. So this

40:02

one I love and hate self sabotage. It's way too

40:02

prevalent. But there are things that as a manager

40:13

or as a mentor, if you can understand the fear

40:13

and help your person to overcome those things.

40:26

And one thing that's really important to consider

40:26

with this too is the correlation between the

40:32

abundance of self sabotage and generational multi

40:32

generation workplaces. Because this is more,

40:42

there's a correlation between the prevalence of

40:42

self sabotage and younger workers, not to say Gen

40:48

Z innocent. Any young worker over generations tend

40:48

to have a higher level of newer in your career.

40:54

You are more likely because there's more.

40:56

To be afraid of.

40:57

Yes.

40:57

You have less experience totally blowing

41:00

it and you don't know what that's going to mean

41:00

for you. So the, like, because again, we've seen,

41:07

you know, like mentor problems with people, young

41:07

people that are, that they're rationalized, say,

41:14

well, you know what? The job has to me have to

41:14

get up early in the morning. I'm not down for

41:18

that. I'm not going to take the job. That type

41:18

of ridiculous rationalization for a job that

41:24

they went to school for and have a huge student

41:24

loan for. It's, it's, it's a, it's the excuse

41:31

they're going with because the best one they

41:31

can come up with. But the reality is they're

41:34

afraid of what success is going to look like,

41:34

what the pressures are going to be on them. And

41:39

it's they're holding on to something that might,

41:39

they've convinced themselves is a rational reason,

41:46

but it's totally not. And the person looking at

41:46

it is going like, are you crazy? What is wrong?

41:51

What is wrong with you? It is a defense mechanism

41:51

against fear of change or failure. And if we write

42:01

it off as just being a flaky young person, we're

42:01

never going to actually get to. The true cause

42:06

of it is that we have not done a good enough

42:06

job eliminating the fear of change and the

42:13

fear of failure and helping and normalizing that

42:13

your comfort zone is something that is holding

42:21

you back and that there are supports behind

42:21

you to build a new comfort zone with this.

42:26

Incorporated but let's be real,

42:28

too, right? When we're young, you look at

42:28

experienced professionals as people who have

42:36

their proverbial stuff together. They know what

42:36

they're doing. They're. They're professional.

42:41

They are educated. They're experienced.

42:41

They. They have this on lock. The truth is,

42:48

nobody has a sweet clue what they're

42:48

doing. We're all making it up as we go,

42:52

and we are all failing and continuing

42:52

to get better. And that realization of,

43:01

if I am further along in my career, it's

43:01

probably because I failed a lot more than you.

43:08

Yeah, exactly. And so it's one of those

43:08

things where you're right. Psychological

43:11

safety and normalizing, you know, the, you

43:11

know, that. The freedom to fail and that,

43:21

you know, their support to help you through

43:21

the uncomfortable transition period,

43:27

those are things that can be powerful to combat

43:27

self sabotage and actually can be something that

43:34

should be really considered with organizations

43:34

and industries that employ a very young workforce,

43:41

because that's. And because the thing, too, is

43:41

that is something where we need to understand

43:49

that we've all, like, we've. We failed our way

43:49

to where we are now, kind of, in a large sense.

43:55

But it's not. You're not being rewarded for failure. Failure is a

43:57

natural consequence of trying something.

44:03

Your success has got you to where you are, but your

44:04

successes are built on all the failures.

44:08

A lot of failures, right?

44:10

So the whole point is,

44:12

a lot of it is to normalize that, because

44:12

procrastination, short term thinking, fear

44:16

of change, and the willingness to burn everything

44:16

down to protect your comfort zone are the warning

44:21

signs of someone going through self sabotage.

44:21

And one of the problems is that pointing out self

44:28

sabotage can actually lead to belief perseverance,

44:28

because people will hold on to that. No, you don't

44:35

understand. I need to sleep in every day. That's a

44:35

deal breaker for me. That is them doubling down on

44:41

belief perseverance, and holding that as the most

44:41

important thing out of that fear of change or that

44:48

short. Or that protecting that short term comfort

44:48

zone that the person does need to be open to some

44:55

degree to having their mind changed, to be able to

44:55

kind of being presented. But combating that with

45:01

discipline without understanding the psychological

45:01

toll that's taking on people is often what leads

45:07

us to the common mistakes that we run into with

45:07

these problems. And it's something that we need

45:11

to have a little bit more understanding and

45:11

a clearer lens to view these things through,

45:17

because that's going to be where the real success

45:17

and the real improving again, how we lead and

45:23

work with people is really going to come from

45:23

understanding all of these psychological factors,

45:28

because they just give some context to what is

45:28

happening in your workplaces right now. They

45:34

don't fix anything, but they give you a better

45:34

understanding of where the real, true root causes

45:41

of some of these problems are, so you can be more

45:41

tactical and intentional in how you address them.

45:46

Yeah, I think that's a really good kind of final statement,

45:47

is if you understand that these are legitimate,

45:57

actual psychological principles at play. Not

45:57

somebody being highly emotional or acting like

46:04

a robot, not somebody who just is doubling down

46:04

and is irritating and frustrating and stubborn,

46:12

not somebody who is willfully sabotaging their own

46:12

best interests. Again, understanding where these

46:21

are coming from, hopefully you will be able to

46:21

respond with a little bit more grace and patience,

46:27

rather than, as unfortunately we have done in

46:27

the past, respond with frustration and anger.

46:33

Yeah, absolutely. All right, so I'll just kind of wrap

46:34

some of these, although you did a pretty good job,

46:39

do it. But I'll just put a little bit more context

46:39

behind it just to tie up. So the question was,

46:46

what's some practical psychology that can improve

46:46

how I lead and work with others? Well, the three

46:51

things we talked about were the concept. Well,

46:51

the first one's a concept of affect intensity,

46:56

the degree that people process emotional

46:56

responses. People with higher affect intensity

47:03

will process things at a much higher level and

47:03

will feel things to a degree that people with a

47:10

low affect intensity cannot, which is why a common

47:10

catalyst or a common event will yield different

47:17

results from people. And sometimes we misread

47:17

the meaning behind those different results. But

47:23

having a bit of clarity about sometimes people's

47:23

reactions are based on how they process emotional

47:29

responses can actually give us a nice lens to

47:29

have a little more understanding about cutting

47:35

people some slack and holding people to kind of,

47:35

you know, maybe not the. The unified benchmark

47:40

of what an appropriate reaction should be. Next.

47:40

Next, we talked about belief perseverance, which

47:46

is the idea of, despite new information being

47:46

presented to us, we maintain our current beliefs.

47:53

This is often done as a way to protect ourselves

47:53

from the toll that confronting and changing our

48:01

views or beliefs will have on not just our own

48:01

views, but also all of the stresses and problems

48:09

that might come from how ingrained this belief is

48:09

in kind of our core identity or the life that we

48:14

cargo for ourselves. And the last concept was

48:14

self sabotage. The idea that we will sabotage

48:22

our own best interest through procrastination,

48:22

prioritizing short term thinking, fear of change,

48:29

or the desire to protect our comfort zones. This

48:29

is often because of a fear of change or a fear of

48:36

failure. And when we are worried about that

48:36

environment, we will often try to avoid the

48:44

things that are really going to be the best thing

48:44

for us long term. And the way that all of these

48:50

need to be addressed and approached is to give

48:50

you a little bit of context about what might be

48:55

causing some of the frustrating interpersonal and

48:55

professional relationships that you're in. What

49:01

are the things that are hurting those? What are

49:01

the things that are destroying morale? What are

49:05

the things that are the common frustrations you

49:05

deal with leading or working with other people?

49:10

These don't solve those problems, but they give

49:10

you some. So at least a new lens to view them

49:15

through, and maybe again, a more tactical

49:15

way to address them to have better results.

49:20

Awesome.

49:21

All right, so that about does it for us. For a full

49:22

archive of the podcast and access to the

49:27

videos hosted on our YouTube channel, visit

49:27

www.roman3.ca/podcast thanks for joining us.

49:30

For more information on topics like these, don't

49:42

forget to visit us at www.roman3.ca. Side effects of this podcast may include improved retention, high productivity, increased market share,

49:43

employees breaking out in spontaneous dance,

49:48

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49:48

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