
Tug of War between sailors and Marines in Vera Cruz, ca. 1910-1915. The earliest known study of social loafing is research by Max Ringelmann, published in 1913 ("Recherches sur les moteurs animés: Travail de l'homme", in Annales de l'Institut National Agronomique, 2nd series, vol. 12, pages 1-40.) The experiments he performed involved rope pulling, as in a tug of war. What became known as the Ringelmann Effect is the phenomenon in which individual members' efforts decline steadily as group size increases.
The photo is by the Bain News Service, from the George Grantham Bain Collection of the U.S. Library of Congress.
Holding back — choosing to restrain one's own efforts toward group goals — is one of the many causes of disappointing team performance. It occurs when one or more team members exert less effort toward achieving a team objective than they would have exerted in analogous situations, if working as individuals. In team-oriented workplaces, where holding back can create significant budget and schedule issues, understanding the causes of voluntary restraint of effort and learning how to control it can be steps on the path to superior organizational and personal performance.
The literature of group performance includes studies of many forms of holding back. Their definitions vary, and some authors distinguish among them on the basis of differences in motivation-related causes. Here's Part I of a catalog of forms of holding back. These first three are among the more thoroughly researched.
- Social loafing
- Social loafing happens when a group member exerts less effort toward a shared objective than he or she would have exerted working alone. In some virtual environments, it assumes a form known as tele-shirking.
- Although the conventional definition makes no distinctions with respect to motive, the first investigations of social loafing related to efforts in which all contributions to achieving the shared objective were similar in kind. That is, one could not easily determine by observation which team members were engaged in social loafing. In some cases of social loafing, one cannot even determine whether it has occurred, other than by examining the aggregate effort. These conditions distinguish social loafing from free riding and the sucker effect, described below.
- Free riding
- Free riding is holding back because of the belief that others will compensate for the effort withheld.
- Some have defined free riding to require that the free rider receive some kind of benefit while exerting zero effort. But the essential element of this form of holding back is the perception on the part of the free rider that the efforts of others will compensate for the free rider's choice to withhold effort.
- The sucker effect
- Another form Choosing to restrain one's own
efforts toward group goals is
one of the many causes of
disappointing team performanceof holding back, known as the sucker effect, occurs when group members perceive — accurately or not — that other members are holding back, for whatever reason. To avoid being seen (and possibly seeing themselves) as "suckers," they reduce their own effort to a point at which they feel sufficiently less likely to seem to have been exploited. The sucker effect might also have anticipatory forms in which a team member curtails efforts because of a belief that another team member is likely to withhold, even when there is no objective evidence of any current withholding. - Here the identification of those who hold back is essential — it is the central reason for withholding effort.
We'll continue next time, examining some less-well-studied mechanisms of holding back. Next in this series Top
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Related articles
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Nasty Questions: II
- In meetings, telemeetings, and email we sometimes ask questions that aren't intended to elicit information.
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two of a catalog of some favorite tactics.
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See also Workplace Politics and Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness for more related articles.
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- When we assess the costs of different options for solving a problem, we must take care not to commit a variety of errors in approach. These errors can lead to flawed decisions. One activity at risk for error is comparing the costs of two options. Available here and by RSS on January 27.
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Beware any resource that speaks of "winning" at workplace politics or "defeating" it. You can benefit or not, but there is no score-keeping, and it isn't a game.
- Wikipedia has a nice article with a list of additional resources
- Some public libraries offer collections. Here's an example from Saskatoon.
- Check my own links collection
- LinkedIn's Office Politics discussion group