I started teaching MBA students 17 years ago. Sometimes I run into my students years later. And when I run into them, a funny thing happens. I don't remember just their faces; I also remember where exactly in the classroom they were sitting. And I remember who they were sitting with as well. This is not because I have any special superpowers of memory. The reason I can remember them is because they are creatures of habit. They are sitting with their favorite people in their favorite seats. They find their twins, they stay with them for the whole year.
Počela sam da predajem MBA studentima pre 17 godina. Ponekad naletim na svoje studente godinama kasnije, a kada ih sretnem, smešna stvar se desi. Ne pamtim samo njihova lica; takođe pamtim gde su tačno sedeli u učionici. I pamtim sa kim su sedeli, takođe. Ovo nije zato što imam bilo kakve super moći vezane za pamćenje. Razlog zbog kog mogu da ih se setim je taj što su oni stvorenja navike. Sede sa svojim omiljenim ljudima na svojim omiljenim mestima. Nalaze svoje blizance, ostaju sa njima tokom cele godine.
Now, the danger of this for my students is they're at risk of leaving the university with just a few people who are exactly like them. They're going to squander their chance for an international, diverse network. How could this happen to them? My students are open-minded. They come to business school precisely so that they can get great networks.
Sada, opasnost u svemu ovome za moje studente jeste što oni rizikuju da odu sa univerziteta sa svega nekoliko ljudi koji su potpuno isti kao i oni. Proćerdaće svoju šansu za međunarodnom, raznolikom mrežom. Kako bi ovo moglo da im se desi? Moji studenti su otvorenog uma. Oni su izabrali poslovnu školu iz razloga da mogu da ostvare sjajnu povezanost.
Now, all of us socially narrow in our lives, in our school, in work, and so I want you to think about this one. How many of you here brought a friend along for this talk? I want you to look at your friend a little bit. Are they of the same nationality as you? Are they of the same gender as you? Are they of the same race? Really look at them closely. Don't they kind of look like you as well?
Sada, svi mi smo socijalno ograničeni u našim životima, u našoj školi, u poslu, pa bih želela da razmislite o sledećem. Koliko vas ovde je povelo prijatelja sa sobom na ovaj govor? Želim da malo pogledate svog prijatelja. Da li su iste nacionalnosti kao vi? Da li su istog pola kao vi? Da li su iste rase? Dobro ih pogledajte. Zar ne liče malo i na vas?
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
The muscle people are together, and the people with the same hairstyles and the checked shirts.
Mišićavi ljudi su zajedno, i ljudi sa istim frizurama i kariranim košuljama.
We all do this in life. We all do it in life, and in fact, there's nothing wrong with this. It makes us comfortable to be around people who are similar. The problem is when we're on a precipice, right? When we're in trouble, when we need new ideas, when we need new jobs, when we need new resources -- this is when we really pay a price for living in a clique.
Svi mi radimo to u životu. Svi mi radimo to u životu i, u stvari, ništa nije pogrešno kod toga. Prijatnije nam je da budemo okruženi ljudima koji su nam slični. Problem je kada se nađemo na rubu propasti, zar ne? Kada se nađemo u nevolji, kada nam trebaju nove ideje, kada nam trebaju novi poslovi, kada nam trebaju novi izvori, tada zaista plaćamo cenu toga što živimo u malim grupama.
Mark Granovetter, the sociologist, had a famous paper "The Strength of Weak Ties," and what he did in this paper is he asked people how they got their jobs. And what he learned was that most people don't get their jobs through their strong ties -- their father, their mother, their significant other. They instead get jobs through weak ties, people who they just met. So if you think about what the problem is with your strong ties, think about your significant other, for example. The network is redundant. Everybody that they know, you know. Or I hope you know them. Right? Your weak ties -- people you just met today -- they are your ticket to a whole new social world.
Mark Granoveter, sociolog, ima poznati rad, „Snagu slabih veza“, a on je u tom radu pitao ljude kako su dobili svoje poslove. I shvatio je da većina ljudi ne dobija poslove putem jakih veza - njihovog oca, majke, partnera. Umesto toga dobijaju poslove putem slabih veza, od ljudi koje su upravo upoznali. Pa, ako razmislite o tome u čemu je problem sa vašim jakim vezama, razmislite i o vašim partnerima, na primer. Mreža je suvišna. Svakoga koga oni znaju, znate i vi. Ili, ja se nadam da ih znate. Zar ne? Vaše slabe veze, ljudi koje ste upoznali danas, vaša su karta ka celom novom društvenom svetu.
The thing is that we have this amazing ticket to travel our social worlds, but we don't use it very well. Sometimes we stay awfully close to home. And today, what I want to talk about is: What are those habits that keep human beings so close to home, and how can we be a little bit more intentional about traveling our social universe?
Stvar je u tome da imamo neverovatnu kartu da putujemo našim društvenim svetovima, ali je ne koristimo dobro. Ponekad ostajemo užasno blizu kuće. I danas, ono o čemu želim da pričam je koje su to navike koje drže ljudska bića tako blizu kuće i kako svi mi možemo da sa malo više namere putujemo kroz naš društveni univerzum.
So let's look at the first strategy. The first strategy is to use a more imperfect social search engine. What I mean by a social search engine is how you are finding and filtering your friends. And so people always tell me, "I want to get lucky through the network. I want to get a new job. I want to get a great opportunity." And I say, "Well, that's really hard, because your networks are so fundamentally predictable." Map out your habitual daily footpath, and what you'll probably discover is that you start at home, you go to your school or your workplace, you maybe go up the same staircase or elevator, you go to the bathroom -- the same bathroom -- and the same stall in that bathroom, you end up in the gym, then you come right back home. It's like stops on a train schedule. It's that predictable. It's efficient, but the problem is, you're seeing exactly the same people. Make your network slightly more inefficient. Go to a bathroom on a different floor. You encounter a whole new network of people.
Pa, hajde da pogledamo prvu strategiju. Prva strategija je da koristimo nesavršeniji društveni pretraživač. Pod društvenim pretraživačem podrazumevam način na koji pronalazite i filtrirate prijatelje. I zato mi ljudi uvek govore: „Želim da mi se posreći putem mreže. Želim da dobijem novi posao, veliku priliku.“ Kažem im: „Pa, to je zaista teško zato što su vaše mreže u osnovi tako predvidive.“ Mapirajte svoju svakodnevnu pešačku zonu i ono što ćete verovatno otkriti je da je započinjete kod kuće, idete u školu ili na radno mesto, možda se penjete istim stepenicama ili liftom, idete u kupatilo, isto kupatilo istu WC šolju u kupatilu, završite u teretani, zatim se vraćate pravo kući. To je nalik stanicama u voznom rasporedu. Toliko je predvidivo. Efikasno je, ali problem je u tome što viđate uvek iste ljude. Napravite svoju mrežu malo više neefikasnijom. Idite u kupatilo na različitom spratu. Srešćete se sa potpuno novom mrežom ljudi.
The other side of it is how we are actually filtering. And we do this automatically. The minute we meet someone, we are looking at them, we meet them, we are initially seeing, "You're interesting." "You're not interesting." "You're relevant." We do this automatically. We can't even help it. And what I want to encourage you to do instead is to fight your filters. I want you to take a look around this room, and I want you to identify the least interesting person that you see, and I want you to connect with them over the next coffee break. And I want you to go even further than that. What I want you to do is find the most irritating person you see as well and connect with them.
Druga strana toga je način na koji mi zapravo filtriramo. A radimo to automatski. U trenutku kada upoznamo nekoga, gledamo u njih, upoznajemo ih, inicijalno vidimo: „Ti si interesantan.“ „Ti nisi interesantan.“ „Ti si bitan.“ Radimo ovo automatski. Čak ne možemo tome da se odupremo. Želim da vas ohrabrim da se umesto toga borite sa vašim filterima. Želim da razgledate po ovoj prostoriji i želim da identifikujete najmanje interesantnu osobu koju vidite i da se povežete sa njima tokom sledeće pauze za kafu. Želim da odete čak i dalje od toga. Želim od vas da nađete i najiritantniju osobu koju vidite i da se povežete sa njom.
What you are doing with this exercise is you are forcing yourself to see what you don't want to see, to connect with who you don't want to connect with, to widen your social world. To truly widen, what we have to do is, we've got to fight our sense of choice. We've got to fight our choices. And my students hate this, but you know what I do? I won't let them sit in their favorite seats. I move them around from seat to seat. I force them to work with different people so there are more accidental bumps in the network where people get a chance to connect with each other. And we studied exactly this kind of an intervention at Harvard University. At Harvard, when you look at the rooming groups, there's freshman rooming groups, people are not choosing those roommates. They're of all different races, all different ethnicities. Maybe people are initially uncomfortable with those roommates, but the amazing thing is, at the end of a year with those students, they're able to overcome that initial discomfort. They're able to find deep-level commonalities with people.
Pomoću ove vežbe prisiljavate sebe da vidite ono što ne želite da vidite, da se povežete sa onima sa kojima ne želite da se povežete da biste proširili svoj društveni svet. Da bismo ga istinski proširili, treba da se suočimo sa našim smislom za izbore. Treba da se borimo protiv naših izbora. Moji studenti mrze ovo, ali znate šta radim? Ne dozvoljavam im da sede na omiljenom mestu. Pomeram ih okolo od mesta do mesta. Prisiljavam ih da rade sa različitim ljudima tako da ima više slučajnih prepreka u mreži gde ljudi dobijaju šansu da se povežu jedni sa drugima. Upravo ovu vrstu intervencije smo proučavali na Univerzitetu Harvard. Na Harvardu, kada pogledate u grupe u sobi, a imate brucoške cimerske grupe, ljudi ne biraju svoje cimere. Oni su svi različitih rasa, različite nacionalnosti. Možda je ljudima u početku nelagodno sa ovim cimerima, ali neverovatna stvar je da, na kraju godine sa tim studentima, oni uspevaju da prevaziđu tu početnu nelagodnost. Mogu da pronađu duboke nivoe sličnosti sa ljudima.
So the takeaway here is not just "take someone out to coffee." It's a little more subtle. It's "go to the coffee room." When researchers talk about social hubs, what makes a social hub so special is you can't choose; you can't predict who you're going to meet in that place. And so with these social hubs, the paradox is, interestingly enough, to get randomness, it requires, actually, some planning. In one university that I worked at, there was a mail room on every single floor. What that meant is that the only people who would bump into each other are those who are actually on that floor and who are bumping into each other anyway. At another university I worked at, there was only one mail room, so all the faculty from all over that building would run into each other in that social hub. A simple change in planning, a huge difference in the traffic of people and the accidental bumps in the network.
Tako poruka odavde nije „samo izvedi nekoga na kafu“. Malo je suptilnija. To je više nalik „idite u prostoriju sa kafom“. Kada istraživači pričaju o socijalnim petljama, ono što ih čini tako specijalnim je da ne možete da birate; ne možete da predvidite koga ćete sresti u tom mestu. Zato je sa tim socijalnim petljama paradoksalno i veoma interesantno da, da biste dobili slučajnost, to zahteva, zapravo, malo planiranja. Na jednom univerzitetu gde sam radila postojala je soba za poštu na svakom spratu. To znači da su jedini ljudi koji će naleteti jedni na druge zapravo oni na tom spratu i koji ionako naleću jedni na druge. Na drugom univerzitetu gde sam radila postojala je samo jedna prostorija, tako da su svi sa fakulteta, iz svih delova zgrade, naletali jedni na druge u toj socijalnoj petlji. Jednostavna promena u planiranju predstavlja veliku razliku za saobraćanje ljudi i slučajne susrete u mreži.
Here's my question for you: What are you doing that breaks you from your social habits? Where do you find yourself in places where you get injections of unpredictable diversity? And my students give me some wonderful examples. They tell me when they're doing pickup basketball games, or my favorite example is when they go to a dog park. They tell me it's even better than online dating when they're there.
Evo mog pitanja za vas: šta radite da se odvojite od svojih socijalnih navika? Gde se pronalazite na mestima gde dobijate injekcije nepredvidive raznovrsnosti? A moji studenti mi daju neke predivne primere. Kažu mi da je to kada igraju košarku ili, što je moj omiljeni primer, kada idu u park za pse. Kažu mi da je čak bolje od onlajn upoznavanja kada su tamo.
So the real thing that I want you to think about is we've got to fight our filters. We've got to make ourselves a little more inefficient, and by doing so, we are creating a more imprecise social search engine. And you're creating that randomness, that luck that is going to cause you to widen your travels, through your social universe.
Dakle, zapravo želim da razmislite o tome da treba da se borimo protiv naših filtera. Treba da postanemo malo neefikasniji a tako stvaramo neprecizniji socijalni pretraživač. Stvarate te slučajnosti, tu sreću koja će izazvati proširenje vaših putovanja kroz vaš socijalni univerzum.
But in fact, there's more to it than that. Sometimes we actually buy ourselves a second-class ticket to travel our social universe. We are not courageous when we reach out to people. Let me give you an example of that. A few years ago, I had a very eventful year. That year, I managed to lose a job, I managed to get a dream job overseas and accept it, I had a baby the next month, I got very sick, I was unable to take the dream job. And so in a few weeks, what ended up happening was, I lost my identity as a faculty member, and I got a very stressful new identity as a mother. What I also got was tons of advice from people. And the advice I despised more than any other advice was, "You've got to go network with everybody." When your psychological world is breaking down, the hardest thing to do is to try and reach out and build up your social world.
Ali, u stvari, tu postoji više od toga. Ponekad zapravo kupujemo sebi kartu druge klase za putovanje našim socijalnim univerzumom. Nismo hrabri kada prilazimo ljudima. Dozvolite mi da vam dam primer za to. Pre nekoliko godina, imala sam godinu prepunu događaja. Te godine sam uspela da izgubim posao, da dobijem posao iz snova u inostranstvu i da ga prihvatim. Dobila sam bebu sledećeg meseca. Veoma sam se razbolela. Nisam mogla da prihvatim posao iz snova. Tako, u narednih nekoliko nedelja, na kraju se desilo da sam izgubila identitet kao član fakulteta i dobila sam veoma stresni novi identitet kao majka. Ono što sam takođe dobila je tona saveta od ljudi. A savet koji sam prezirala više od bilo kog drugog je: „Treba da se umrežiš sa svima.“ Kada se vaš psihološki svet ruši, najteža stvar koju treba da uradite je da pokušate, posegnete i sagradite svoj društveni svet.
And so we studied exactly this idea on a much larger scale. What we did was we looked at high and low socioeconomic status people, and we looked at them in two situations. We looked at them first in a baseline condition, when they were quite comfortable. And what we found was that our lower socioeconomic status people, when they were comfortable, were actually reaching out to more people. They thought of more people. They were also less constrained in how they were networking. They were thinking of more diverse people than the higher-status people. Then we asked them to think about maybe losing a job. We threatened them. And once they thought about that, the networks they generated completely differed. The lower socioeconomic status people reached inwards. They thought of fewer people. They thought of less-diverse people. The higher socioeconomic status people thought of more people, they thought of a broader network, they were positioning themselves to bounce back from that setback.
Zato smo proučavali upravo ovu ideju na mnogo višem nivou. Posmatrali smo ljude sa visokim i niskim socioekonomskim statusom, a posmatrali smo ih u dve situacije. Posmatrali smo ih prvo u osnovnim uslovima, gde su se osećali prilično sigurno. I otkrili smo da naši ljudi sa nižim socioekonomskim statusom, kada su se osećali prijatno, zapravo su dopirali do više ljudi. Mislili su na više ljudi. Takođe su bili manje ograničeni u tome kako se umrežavaju. Mislili su na više različitih ljudi od ljudi višeg statusa. Onda smo ih pitali da razmisle o tome da možda izgube posao. Ugrozili smo ih. I kada su počeli da razmišljaju o tome, mreža koju su stvorili kompletno se promenila. Ljudi sa nižim socioekonomskim statusom povukli su se ka unutra. Mislili su na manje ljudi. Mislili su o manje različitim ljudima. Ljudi sa višim socioekonomskim statusom razmišljali su o više ljudi, na širu mrežu, pozicionirali su se tako da mogu da odskoče iz te postavke.
Let's consider what this actually means. Imagine that you were being spontaneously unfriended by everyone in your network other than your mom, your dad and your dog.
Hajde da razmotrimo šta to zapravo znači. Zamislite da vas iznenada ostave svi prijatelji iz vaše mreže osim vaše mame, tate i psa.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
This is essentially what we are doing at these moments when we need our networks the most. Imagine -- this is what we're doing. We're doing it to ourselves. We are mentally compressing our networks when we are being harassed, when we are being bullied, when we are threatened about losing a job, when we feel down and weak. We are closing ourselves off, isolating ourselves, creating a blind spot where we actually don't see our resources. We don't see our allies, we don't see our opportunities.
To u suštini mi radimo u tim trenucima kada nam najviše treba naša mreža. Zamislite - to je ono što mi radimo. Mi to radimo sami sebi. Mentalno potiskujemo naše mreže kada nas uznemiravaju, maltretiraju, kada nam preti gubitak posla, kada se osećamo loše i slabo. Mi se zatvaramo, izolujemo sebe, kreiramo slepu tačku gde zapravo ne vidimo naše resurse. Ne vidimo naše saveznike, ne vidimo naše prilike.
How can we overcome this? Two simple strategies. One strategy is simply to look at your list of Facebook friends and LinkedIn friends just so you remind yourself of people who are there beyond those that automatically come to mind. And in our own research, one of the things we did was, we considered Claude Steele's research on self-affirmation: simply thinking about your own values, networking from a place of strength. What Leigh Thompson, Hoon-Seok Choi and I were able to do is, we found that people who had affirmed themselves first were able to take advice from people who would otherwise be threatening to them.
Kako da prevaziđemo ovo? Dve jednostavne strategije. Jedna je da jednostavno pogledate svoju listu prijatelja sa Fejsbuka i Linkedina, samo da se podsetite na ljude koji su tamo pored onih koji vam automatski prođu kroz glavu. U našem istraživanju, jedna od stvari koje smo radili je da smo razmatrali istraživanje Kloda Stila o samoprihvatanju: jednostavno razmišljajte o sopstvenim vrednostima, umrežite se sa snažnog mesta. Ono što smo Li Tompson, Hun-Suk Čoi i ja bili u mogućnosti da uradimo je da smo otkrili da ljudi koji su prihvatili sebe prvo bili sposobni da poslušaju savet ljudi koji bi drugačije bili pretnja po njih.
Here's a last exercise. I want you to look in your email in-box, and I want you to look at the last time you asked somebody for a favor. And I want you to look at the language that you used. Did you say things like, "Oh, you're a great resource," or "I owe you one," "I'm obligated to you." All of this language represents a metaphor. It's a metaphor of economics, of a balance sheet, of accounting, of transactions. And when we think about human relations in a transactional way, it is fundamentally uncomfortable to us as human beings. We must think about human relations and reaching out to people in more humane ways.
Evo i poslednje vežbe. Želim da pogledate u inboks svog imejla i da pogledate kada ste poslednji put pitali nekoga za uslugu. Želim da obratite pažnju na rečnik koji ste koristili. Da li ste rekli stvari kao što su: „O, ti si veliki izvor“ ili „Dužan sam ti“, „Zadužio si me“? Sve ove fraze predstavljaju metaforu. To je metafora ekonomije, izbalansiranih tabela, računovođa, transakcija. Kada razmišljamo o ljudskim vezama na transakcioni način, to nam je u osnovi nelagodno kao ljudskim bićima. Treba da razmišljamo i o ljudskim odnosima i dopiranju do ljudi na ljudskije načine.
Here's an idea as to how to do so. Look at words like "please," "thank you," "you're welcome" in other languages. Look at the literal translation of these words. Each of these words is a word that helps us impose upon other people in our social networks. And so, the word "thank you," if you look at it in Spanish, Italian, French, "gracias," "grazie," "merci" in French. Each of them are "grace" and "mercy." They are godly words. There's nothing economic or transactional about those words. The word "you're welcome" is interesting. The great persuasion theorist Robert Cialdini says we've got to get our favors back. So we need to emphasize the transaction a little bit more. He says, "Let's not say 'You're welcome.' Instead say, 'I know you'd do the same for me.'" But sometimes it may be helpful to not think in transactional ways, to eliminate the transaction, to make it a little bit more invisible. And in fact, if you look in Chinese, the word "bú kè qì" in Chinese, "You're welcome," means, "Don't be formal; we're family. We don't need to go through those formalities." And "kembali" in Indonesian is "Come back to me." When you say "You're welcome" next time, think about how you can maybe eliminate the transaction and instead strengthen that social tie. Maybe "It's great to collaborate," or "That's what friends are for."
Evo ideje kako to i da uradimo. Obratite pažnju na reči „molim“, „hvala“, „nema na čemu“ u drugim jezicima. Obratite pažnju na bukvalan prevod ovih reči. Svaka od ovih reči nam pomaže da se nametnemo drugim ljudima u našim socijalnim mrežama. I tako je reč „hvala“, ukoliko je potražite na španskom, italijanskom, francuskom, „gracias“, „grazie“, „merci“ na francuskom. Svaka od njih označava naklonost i milost. To su božanske reči. Ne postoji ništa ekonomsko ili transakciono u tim rečima. Fraza „nema na čemu“ je interesantna. Veliki teoretičar ubeđivanja, Robert Saldini, kaže: „Treba da dobijemo naše usluge nazad.“ Zato treba da transakciju naglasimo malo više. On kaže: „Hajde da ne kažemo 'nema na čemu'. Umesto toga recite: 'Znam da ćeš ti uraditi isto za mene.'“ Ali ponekad bi možda bilo od pomoći da ne razmišljamo na transakcione načine, da eliminišemo transakciju, da je učinimo malo više nevidljivom. U stvari, ukoliko pogledate na kineskom, fraza „bu ka dži", na kineskom „nema na čemu“, znači: „Nemoj biti formalan; mi smo porodica. Ne treba da prolazimo kroz te formalnosti.“ A „kambali“ na indonežanskom znači „vrati mi se“. Kada kažete „nema na čemu“ sledeći put, mislite o tome kako možda možete da eliminišete transakciju i umesto toga ojačate tu socijalnu vezu. Možda: „Sjajno je sarađivati“ ili: „Tome prijatelji služe.“
I want you to think about how you think about this ticket that you have to travel your social universe. Here's one metaphor. It's a common metaphor: "Life is a journey." Right? It's a train ride, and you're a passenger on the train, and there are certain people with you. Certain people get on this train, and some stay with you, some leave at different stops, new ones may enter. I love this metaphor, it's a beautiful one. But I want you to consider a different metaphor. This one is passive, being a passenger on that train, and it's quite linear. You're off to some particular destination. Why not instead think of yourself as an atom, bumping up against other atoms, maybe transferring energy with them, bonding with them a little and maybe creating something new on your travels through the social universe.
Želim da razmislite o tome kako razmišljate o toj karti koju imate da putujete vašim socijalnim univerzumom. Evo još jedne metafore. To je uobičajena metafora: „život je putovanje“. Zar ne? To je vožnja vozom, a vi ste putnik u vozu i tu su određeni ljudi sa vama. Određeni ljudi ukrcavaju se na ovaj voz i neki ostaju sa vama, neki odlaze na različitim stanicama, novi se mogu ukrcati. Ja volim ovu metaforu; prelepa je. Ali želim da razmotrite drugačiju metaforu. Ova je pasivna - biti putnik u vozu, i prilično je linearna. Uputili ste se ka nekom posebnom odredištu. Zašto ne biste umesto toga razmišljali o sebi kao o atomu koji se sudara sa drugim atomima, možda razmenjuje energiju sa njima, zbližava se sa njima malo i možda stvara nešto novo na vašim putovanjima kroz socijalni univerzum.
Thank you so much. And I hope we bump into each other again.
Hvala vam puno. I nadam se da ćemo nabasati jedni na druge ponovo.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)