Do you prefer to work alone or in a team?
What do you say when you apply for a job that explicitly requires "teamwork skills"? And what do you say if you want the job but would rather work undisturbed in a single room? What do you say when you're asked about your favorite music over a glass of wine? "Classical music, especially Beethoven," you hear yourself say, while thinking "Helene Fischer." This pressure to avoid social rejection by engaging in "desirable behavior" is called "social desirability."
"Social desirability" was once a blessing for many corporate cultures, but today it is increasingly becoming a curse. In the past, when long-term planning was possible, social desirability ensured that employees were harmonious and focused on getting the job done. That worked very well. But today's pace of change requires free-thinking leaders. That is a completely different culture. This is precisely where we are experiencing a very acute conflict. We hear about "disruption." Disruption means radical thinking that has nothing to do with social desirability. We read about agility. Agility means independent intellectual autonomy, which was never a goal of social desirability. And that is the conflict:
The new words are preached, but the heart longs for the familiar.
People demand diversity, agility, authenticity, or disruption from others, but want to be spared themselves. It always strikes me as very strange when decision-makers signal to me in conversations that others should do this or that. In other words: wash me, but don't get me wet. Or more accurately: wash us, but don't get me wet. The beginning of the sentence is particularly revealing: "We must finally..." Calls, appeals, theses, or discussion papers. As if appeals could change cultures.
"To educate means to set an example. Anything else is merely training."
The gifted psychiatrist Oswald Bumke is said to have said, "Corporate culture means leading by example. Everything else is just training," I would like to add. Imagine the following scene: You arrive at your neighborhood in the evening. Suddenly, everything that still belongs to a financial institution disappears. Many a house roof can hardly stay in the air on its own. And many a dream car simply vanishes. All that remains is called substance. The illusion is gone. The mask has fallen.
Diagnostic tools must exclude social desirability
HR professionals use diagnostic tools to try to reveal the human reality behind the mask. As an aptitude test or potential development test. As if their questions weren't often quite transparent. The more intelligent ones quickly catch on and respond accordingly. After that, their game of social desirability simply continues. It worked, after all. The desired, authentically induced, agile disruption fails to materialize. Does that mean the tests are useless? Not at all! But they work best on those who open up and make themselves vulnerable. And unfortunately, there aren't that many of them.
Are you aware of your inner conflicts with social desirability? It takes a lot of courage to show yourself as you are. But it pays off. You may be less popular, but you will certainly be more respected. And you won't waste energy pretending to be something you're not. If you think it through consistently, everyone will finally find a place that suits them better. Only then will the necessary changes work. Because agility and disruption only work with people who can and want to live this way. Don't appear authentic, be authentic. That's how it all comes together.
That's why you're not really happy.
Why success and fulfillment have nothing to do with each other.
Image source: ©Free-Photos Pixabay
