herd mentality - social acceptance, conformity and opportunities

By Dinesh Singh

“Where all think alike, no

one thinks very much”

~ Walter Lippman, an American writer

and political commentator

We always look for Social

Acceptance and Conformity…..

Robert B. Cialdini writes about his

experiments with canned laughter during

comedy shows in television.

People call it stupid, obvious, phony etc.

Still, why canned laughter is so popular

with experienced and shrewd television

executives?

What is the reason of using canned

laughter during comedy shows?

Our tendency to assume that our actions

are correct if others are doing it.

Our need for a social proof and

acceptance

Where should we throw the trash?

How to board an airplane?

Force your child to be an engineer

It’s all around us

It is an influencing tool

It creates biases, which are important to resolve.

Lastly, don’t choose conformity as an easy route for yourself.

Why so many products build credibility by using statements such as “world’s largest”, “fastest growing”?

You don’t need to know about the product features if you are convinced that many others are using it.

It is an influencing tool

Next time, when you aren’t able to reach

a decision in a stakeholder meeting, think

about possible biases among

stakeholders.

It creates biases, which are

important to resolve.

It’s easy to blend in than stand-out,

but is it right?

Lastly, don’t choose conformity as

an easy route for yourself.

“Since 95% of people are imitators and only 5% initiators, people are persuaded more by the action of others than by any proof we can offer”.

Sales and motivation consultant

Cavett Robert advised sales

trainees:

It may not be such a bad idea to unlearn or

uneducated yourself from time to time to free

yourself a bit from such biases!

Take Away

Take 10 mins to think about it. You will be

able to spot many instances where social

conformity is in play. I would love to hear

your examples.

How about you?

About the author

Dinesh Singh was a strategy consultant with

McKinsey & Co. where he worked with Fortune

500 companies.

He is a graduate from IIT Kanpur and MBA from

Cornell University.

Dinesh’s areas of interest are product positioning,

go-to-market, consumer segmentation, and

microeconomics.