Heard of Pygmalion? Pygmalion was a talented sculptor who crafted a statue of a woman. He labored long and carefully, exerting all of his considerable skill. The work grew more beautiful each day.
Eventually, Pygmalion succeeded in creating a statue that was extraordinarily life-like. He grew to love the statue and attempted to fool himself that she was real by treating her as a living woman.
Pygmalion couldn’t keep this up for long, so he prayed to Venus, asking that he might meet a woman like his statue. Venus granted his request by bringing the statue to life. Pygmalion named her Galatea and Venus graced their wedding with her presence.
In essence, Pygmalion had a vision of what the statue could be and bent his will and effort to make that vision a reality. It was a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Great story. You probably remember it from fourth grade. But what’s it doing in a post on a leadership and organization development website?
The answer to that question begins with an ethically dubious study conducted by two psychologists in 1965.
In the study, Rosenthal and Jacobson told a group of teachers they were specifically selected to teach children who had scored at an exceptional level on an intelligence test. The students took a test at the beginning of the school year and again at the end. Test scores significantly improved. The thing is, the teachers were not selected. They were chosen at random. And the students were not exceptional. They too were selected at random.
But their study did demonstrate a Pygmalion-like phenomenon – a teacher’s expectations could influence a student’s behavior.
High expectations and support influence performance in a positive direction, while low expectations and support influence performance in a negative direction.
This became known as the Pygmalion Effect.
Contemporary psychology has found a parallel in workplace leader-follower relationships. McNatt and Judge tested the theory by having managers set high expectations and provide positive attention and support to their employees. The result was improved performance. Employees felt their leader had confidence in them. This in turn led to higher personal expectations, motivation, effort, and performance.
The opposite is also true. If a leader has a negative opinion of an employee’s capabilities, she will likely set lower expectations and not provide positive support. The employee may struggle.
For example – Teena is a new supervisor. She has been told Joe is a high performer and Bill is a low performer. Teena is likely to have higher expectations of Joe than Bill and treat each accordingly – such as giving more challenging tasks to Joe and providing him with more support. As a result, Joe may perform well and Bill poorly.
It’s important to be aware that there’s a component of the Pygmalion Effect which can make it, in part, an unethical practice.
It would be dishonest for a manager to tell a new supervisor that all employees are high performers if that is not the case. The supervisor would likely discover this to his detriment once he got to know his employees. A wise manager would not state an opinion one way or the other. A wise manager would let the supervisor draw his own conclusions.
Practical Pygmalion
How can you use the Pygmalion Effect to support higher performance in your organization?
- Know thyself. If you’re a leader, it’s extremely important to become aware of your unconscious beliefs about your employees. Do you view one employee as a low performer. Ask yourself why. Do you have good reasons for believing this?
Unearthing your hidden motives and beliefs is an essential leadership quality.
In the story of Pygmalion, Galatea didn’t actually have a personality. Pygmalion imagined this in his own mind. We do the same – often making judgments about others with limited information. - Start with trust and confidence. Although telling a new leader all of her employees are high performers is unethical, it is perfectly ethical and reasonable, for that new leader to choose to consciously begin from a basis of trust and confidence in those employees. This is a more positive view of employees and one more likely to yield higher performance.
You may argue that some of your team members ARE low performers. That may be. Your job as a leader is to understand why. Is it possible that treating them as high performers may lead to high performance? It’s worth a try and it provides a standard for coaching. - Set high expectations, but also provide support. High expectations and difficult goals have been shown to facilitate motivation, performance, and goal achievement. However, this is based on the employee’s self-efficacy – their own belief about their capabilities. You can support self-efficacy to a point by ensuring your employees understand you have confidence in their abilities.
Therefore, in order to utilize the Pygmalion effect to enhance performance and goal attainment, you should not only set specific, challenging goals, but also express confidence that the employee is capable of achieving the goal.
This practice, along with feedback and support throughout the process, will likely yield high performance as well as build a positive relationship that is essential to lasting success.
