A Team Leader’s belief in their Team Members is a powerful force and significantly impacts a Team Member’s performance through two psychological concepts: the Pygmalion effect and the Golem effect.
Positive Belief Increases Performance: The Pygmalion effect describes how a Team Leader’s high expectations leads to increased Team Members’ performance. This is because when a Team Leader expresses confidence in a Team Member’s abilities, it ignites the following positive chain reaction:
- A Motivation Boost: Feeling valued by their Team Leader increases a Team Member’s motivation. They feel empowered to perform at a higher level and achieve or exceed expectations.
- A Supportive Environment: Team Leaders who believe in their Team create positive and supportive work environments and provide necessary coaching and encouragement.
- A Self-Fulfilling Prophecy When Belief Translates into Action: As a Team Member internalizes the Team Leader’s high expectations, they subconsciously think about how they can improve to meet them. This cycle of belief and effort leads to ever increasing improved performance.
A Team Leader can utilize the Pygmalion effect by:
- Setting Clear and Ambitious Goals: Team Leaders should not underestimate their Team’s potential. They should challenge their Team with achievable, yet ambitious, goals that push them to improve.
- Providing Specific Feedback: Regular feedback from the Team Leader is crucial. Team Leaders need to make the feedback timely, specific and actionable. Their feedback should focus on a Team Member’s strengths and offer an action plan to help Team Members strengthen their skill sets.
- Providing Opportunities for Development: Team Leaders show Team Members they believe in their future by providing opportunities for professional development, like training programs, mentoring and stretch assignments.
- Celebrating Successes: Recognition is a powerful motivator. Team Leaders need to take the time to acknowledge and celebrate both small and large, individual and Team achievements.
The Danger of Low Expectations: The opposite of the Pygmalion effect is the Golem effect. This occurs when a Team Leader’s unconsciously negative expectations lead to a decline in Team Member performance by:
- Subtle Negativity: A Team Leader’s negative bias manifests in their negative body language and comments, or their reluctance to delegate challenging tasks.
- Discouragement: Team Members quickly recognize these negative signs and become discouraged, losing the energy and focus needed to take the actions necessary for meeting expectations.
- Self-Fulfilling Prophecy : As Team Members internalize a Team Leader’s low expectations, their effort and confidence decrease. This leads to worse performance, reinforcing the Team Leader’s initial bias, creating a self-fulfilling cycle of negativity.
Team Leaders can avoid the Golem effect by:
- Being Aware of Their Bias: Everyone has unconscious biases. Team Leaders must regularly challenge their negative (and positive) assumptions about Team Members.
- Focusing on Strengths: Team Leaders need to help Team Members identify, use and improve their work skill sets.
- Offer Clear Feedback: Team leaders need to provide constructive feedback, focused on improvement, not perceived shortcomings.
Do Either Effect Work?: The research on The Pygmalion and The Golem effects is not conclusive as to the measurable impact either one has on Team Member performance.
It should come as no surprise the research shows the impact of The Pygmalion effect increases
- When the relationship between the Team Leader and the Team Member is based on trust and respect and
- When the Team Leader is a Theory Y, not a command-and-control leader.
While the impact of The Golem effect increases
- When the relationship between the Team Leader and the Team Members is based on unconscious biases and negativity and
- When the Team Leader is a Theory X, command-and-control leader.
However, since, according to Gallup, 70% of a Team Member’s level of engagement is dictated by the Team Member’s direct supervisor/manager, understanding the Pygmalion and Golem effects helps to assign accountability when measuring employee engagement and performance.
My Opinion: When Team Leaders believe in their Team, Team Members will believe in themselves, and that’s a key to achieving success together.
I could be wrong… But I’m not.
