"Let others do it" - in teams, people often hide behind their colleagues. Why is this so and how can management easily motivate their employees.
What is social idleness
One works day and night. Another does only the bare minimum. The rest sit back and let their colleagues do the work.
Teamwork often brings only frustration. Not only for the employees, but also for the boss: he has to deal with the arguments of his employees, and he could have completed the project faster himself.
Leadership and team management experts acknowledge that individuals in teams hiding behind others is not uncommon, but it is normal. There is even a term for it: social loafing.
Social loafers are reticent to participate actively and tend to be more of a bystander than an active participant.
What is the cause of social laziness?
In groups, many people feel that their contributions do not count or cannot be counted. This behavior is usually not malicious, but occurs unconsciously.
What Experiments Prove Social Idleness
Back at the end of the 19th century, a scientific experiment was conducted in which social idleness could be proven.
Max Ringelmann, a French agricultural engineer, allowed subjects to pull a rope alone and in a group and measured their efforts. The results, also known as the Ringelmann effect, were striking: when alone, everyone pulled very hard; when in a group, the strength of individuals decreased.
Bush observed similar behavior in students: when he led group work, he noticed that some students worked hard while others were lazy.
Some needed a grade, others just needed to pass the course. The students who just needed to pass tried to hide behind the others.
How to Prevent Social Loafing
Social loafers can put off projects for weeks, causing problems. The good news: Social loafing is easy to prevent.
Experiments have shown that people go out of their way to measure their own contribution in every way possible. This does not mean that entrepreneurs should assign each team member a clear task - this will likely frustrate employees and cost the boss a lot of time.
It's much simpler: reduce the team. The team should consist of three, maximum five people. No one can hide there. Everyone can make a visible contribution.
In small groups, each employee feels important and is more motivated to work.
Small groups are also usually more efficient: meetings don't lead to hours of discussion because each of the many participants wants to express their opinions.
This way, the entrepreneur can achieve better and faster results, and it will be easier to organize meetings that everyone will have time for.
However, if the management notices that employees are not slacking off unconsciously, but intentionally, that is, they refuse to work, they should talk to them. Most likely, such employees belong to the group of slackers.
Previously, we talked about what things in life you need to give up in order to achieve financial well-being.
