How to Defeat the Herd Mentality (at work and in life)

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Herb Mentality

Last week on the blog, we talked about how to think like a great innovator. But what if you are not an innovator? What if you are stuck going with the flow? How do you break free? Try these helpful hints and incorporate them slowly into different areas of your life and watch your results shift.

“Herd mentality” or groupthink can be defined as “a pattern of thought characterized by self-deception, forced manufacture of consent, and conformity to group values and ethics” (Merriam Webster)

By this definition, we can identify three powerful strategies to avoid the herd mentality at work or in life.

Know Thyself
Avoid self-deception. Ralph Waldo Emerson said it well. “Whatever games are played with us, we must play no games with ourselves.”  Benjamin Franklin said it even more succinctly. “Observe all men; thy self most.”

Self-awareness is a vital component to your ability to go against the flow. If you want to change the status quo, you must become a master of yourself. The greatest knowledge a person can gain is the knowledge of the lies one tells one’s self. It is not the conscious shading of the truth that causes most damage but the unconscious untruths. Surround yourself with and value those who help illuminate your blind spots. Dig them up. Hunt them down. And uncover them. Learn to tell yourself the absolute and brutal truth at all times.

Recognize Manufactured Consent
Have you heard the expression, “he’s preaching to the choir”? That is manufacture of consent. Manufactured consent is “the practice of controlling or manipulating the norms, values etc. held by an audience by controlling what they are exposed to in the media.” (dictionarycentral.com)

Combat this obstacle by seeking out a variety of information sources. News or information sources that challenge your fundamental perspectives of an issue are particularly valuable. When you confront your own biases and beliefs with information that opposes them, you become stronger. Your ideas become more clear. You communicate your opinions and perspective more concisely and effectively.

Ask “Why?”
One of the most powerful questions you can ask (yourself, or anyone else) is “why?”  Dedicate yourself to the task of uncovering underlying motivations for your opinions, beliefs, and actions. When your “why” comes into alignment with your core values, you become powerful. Clarity allows you to step out of the herd. When you have a clear understanding of what motivates you, you are free to choose your own path.

Self-awareness, diverse information sources and an ability to align personal and professional values with driving motivations and a sense of purpose are all keys to defeating the herd mentality. Practice these skills and you soon find yourself rising above the rest.

How to Think Like a Great Innovator

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innovation, business

Innovation has become a ubiquitous term in the realm of entrepreneurism. So what does innovation really mean and how can an entrepreneur leverage the power of innovation to solve problems and create a profitable business? Work to incorporate these strategies into your own creative development to improve the level of innovation within your organization.

Go With the Trends, but Against the Flow

According to Merriam Webster, innovation is “the introduction of something new. A new idea, method, or device.” By this definition, much of the innovation that receives greatest promotion and coverage in the media and in our society is simply clever imitations or iterations of products or services already on the market.

So what does it take to truly innovate? Wayne Gretzky, one of the greatest hockey players of all time is purported to have said, “A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be.” In the same way, a good entrepreneur creates value where the trends in the market are. A great innovator sees the trends and creates solutions where the trends are going to be.

A great innovator is the person who recognizes the trends in the market, but recognizes that the greatest opportunity lies at the point in the future where the trends are leading. A true innovator instinctively goes against the flow because he recognizes where the flow is going and creates a strategy to move there more quickly and more creatively.

Think Like an Innovator

If you are not a natural innovator, that is okay. All human beings are creative. And all of us can harvest that creativity. If you want to become a better innovator, first of all you must become an observer. Next, you must ask questions. Finally, seek out different opinions?

Be smart. Surround yourself with intelligent people you trust and respect who think differently than you do. If you are a creative mind, find some analytical colleagues. If you are an MBA, hang with some MFA’s (Master of Fine Arts).

People of differing socioeconomic, cultural and religious backgrounds have different worldviews. They recognize different problems. They seek to solve these problems in different ways. This is where true innovation happens.

In his little-known play, Back to Methuselah, George Bernard Shaw wrote, “You see things; and you say ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were; and I say ‘Why not?’”

At the end of the day, the true innovator develops the vision to dream of things that “never were.” The great innovator has the confidence to not only ask, “why not?” but to take action to prove whether those things are possible. And when he finds that what was never dreamed of is, in fact, possible, our world changes. Those types of innovations are written language. The printing press. The cotton gin. The steam engine. They shape the foundations of our society and it is transformed by them.