Last week, I watched The Power of Introverts, an excellent TED Talk by Susan Cain (she also has a book out on the same subject called Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking).
In her talk, which has been viewed almost two million times since it was posted last month, Susan makes a compelling case that the open, collaborative world we embrace today is not always set up to harness the best work from introverts.
As we’ve moved toward more open office plans, collaborative processes like design thinking, and into a digital world now dominated by the word “social,” Susan wonders who is looking out for the introverts? Should introverts feel guilty about wanting to do their thinking and working alone? And can introverts do great work in group settings?
I spent more than a decade working in the inherently collaborative world of open source software. I regularly lead brand positioning and strategy projects as open, collaborative, social exercises involving entire communities of people in the process. So Susan’s talk made me ask myself a tough question:
By emphasizing a collaborative, social process am I risking leaving introverts—and their best ideas—behind?
It’s no secret that I am a life-long introvert myself. I am much more comfortable writing or reading a blog post in my living room and discussing it via comments or Twitter than I am sitting and talking about it with someone over coffee or, worse, at a social gathering like a party or a conference.
So I get where Susan is coming from. Deeply.
In her TED Talk, she at one point pleads, “Stop the madness for constant group work.” When she said this, it hit me pretty hard. The first thing that came to my mind was the one gazillion design thinking ideation sessions I’ve either run or participated in over the last 7 or 8 years.
I’ve personally never had much trouble speaking up during ideation/brainstorming sessions. But I also suspect I am a relatively mild introvert compared to others I know. I started to wonder what the hard-core introverts were thinking during these sessions (and if you were one of them, feel free to tell me below in the comments).
Did they feel like they were being talked over by extroverts? Did they feel like they were out of their element, or needed more time to process their thoughts before blurting them out and having them recorded on the wall? Would they have preferred to contemplate on their own instead of thinking socially as part of a group?
Then another thought stuck me: I’ve met a lot of software engineers over the years, and while not all of them are introverts, many of them are. Frankly, I don’t think too many extreme extroverts could stand to sit in their office and stare at a computer screen all day. But for some introverted software developers, this is bliss.
Yet open source software is developed in a collaborative, social process… run in many cases by introverts.
Why does that work?
For me at least, the answer comes down to the difference between virtual and in-person collaboration. Open source software developers do much of their collaborating online. Often this is because they are geographically dispersed around the world. But I’ve also seen developers sitting two feet away from each other communicating via instant messages or email.
Online collaboration has two key advantages over in-person collaboration for introverts:
1) It allows them to avoid stressful in-person social interactions.
2) It allows them to take their time, contemplate, and think deeply before responding.
Over the past two years at New Kind, I’ve personally been doing less and less in-person design thinking ideation sessions, instead hosting more open, collaborative sessions online. Sometimes they are efforts like the hackathons I’ve run for the Management Innovation Exchange that involve hundreds of people collaborating from all around the world. Other times they are client projects where the collaborating happens via Basecamp or another online tool.
I’ve found I enjoy facilitating sessions online much more than in-person sessions, and I think it suits my personality better. Because the collaboration happens asynchronously, I can take my time crafting thoughtful responses and generating ideas. I can wait until I’m in the right frame of mind to participate, and most importantly, I can work with others, yet be alone at the same time.
I suspect some of these same advantages also translate to participants in online group sessions as well. And for this reason, perhaps many introverts are more comfortable in collaborative projects online than in person. Some of the best ideas I’ve seen emerge from online collaborative exercises come from people who usually remain completely silent in meetings.
In many cases, online collaborative projects provide the best of both worlds—you can collaborate and build off the ideas of others, but still take the time to process your thoughts before you add them (and as a special bonus, you don’t have the stress of in-person social interaction).
If you consider yourself an introvert, I’d love to hear about your experiences participating in collaborative projects online vs. in person. Do you agree with Susan Cain’s assessment that collaborative group projects are not designed to get the best out of introverts? Do you find yourself making better contributions and contributing more in online projects? Or are online collaborative groups just as bad for you as in-person sessions, and you’d rather just work completely on your own?
I’d love to hear what you think.
Dark Matter Matters 
This is exactly right. Synchronous collaboration methods — meetings, voice calls, etc. — are single-stream by default, and benefits the extrovert. Asynchronous communication — mailing lists, IRC, etc. — are multi-stream by default, and reward the introvert. This is why the usage of IRC and mailing lists are so central to the success of open source projects, and why I push so hard for non-engineers to engage using those means.
Here’s the thing: in the right circumstances, just about *anyone* can be an introvert. In the globalized world of open source software, I deal with people all day who might otherwise be extroverts, but because they lack confidence in their English skills, they take on the characteristics of introverts. Async communications afford these people the ability to parse every sentence, in and out, and it hugely increases their ability to add value.
People are starting to figure this out, too — notably in education. A great quote from a NYT article about a digital school in Mooresville NC:
“Back in September, Ms. Higgins had the more outgoing students make presentations on the Declaration of Independence, while shy ones discussed it in an online chat room, which she monitored. ‘I’m not a very social person, but I have no problem typing on a keyboard,’ said one of those shy ones, Chase Wilson. ‘It connected me with other students — opened me up and helped me with talking in public.'”
Great topic.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/13/education/mooresville-school-district-a-laptop-success-story.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1#
Posted by Greg DeKoenigsberg | April 22, 2012, 6:16 pmI love the attention Susan’s talk is giving to all of us functioning introverts in the world.
This phrase (#2 above) in your post rings especially true for me: “It allows them to take their time, contemplate, and think deeply before responding.” I personally enjoy the collaborative process of sharing ideas and gathering information in-person but need that alone time to process it all and decide how to move forward. Indeed, at the conclusion of many such meetings, I ask for some time to figure it out.
Good stuff, as always, Chris Grams.
Posted by Shelley Bainter | April 22, 2012, 8:46 pmthanks Shelley and Greg! It never struck me until I saw this TED Talk why I felt so much more comfortable running online collaborative projects. Susan shared a link via Twitter to an article she wrote for the NYT back in January that highlights some of her thinking about online collaborative work. Not sure, based on this, that she’d totally agree with my assessment, but it is an interesting debate to have. Check out her piece here: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/15/opinion/sunday/the-rise-of-the-new-groupthink.html?pagewanted=all
Posted by Chris Grams | April 23, 2012, 11:47 amCommunication technology for those who are afraid to or never take the opportunity to speak up and share in meetings: http://www.wallwisher.com.
Posted by dannyrosin | April 23, 2012, 7:27 pmI can relate to this having worked in a very open office for the past three years. Now that i have branched out on my own i find that I’m doing my best work collaborating online on my own schedule. I do love/miss the open office environment but sometimes in bigger sessions the shy/quiet people cant always contribute as much as others. I would love to see more companies adopting the open source model using technology mixed with face to face collaboration. I could go on and on. :)
Great post!!
Posted by Ryan | April 24, 2012, 12:41 pmI learned a new word a few weeks ago: ambivert. That’s me. Exactly in the middle between introvert and extrovert. I even have the test results to prove it.
That aside, I would caution people from embracing the online asynchronys collaborative model as a solution to the “introvert” problem. Online forums can be just as, if not more, inhibiting than a face to face conversation. When I first started using online forums and having to have online discussions, it was a reluctant choice. Things I could feel out gently with a face to face conversation I had to commit to in an online forum. And my words would be permanently recorded. This is terribly frightening.
Also, beware of assumptions: I don’t know if introverts are necessarily analytical, or if sometimes we just don’t like other people. Or if it is a case of distrust or insecurity.
Things I dislike about “collaboration”: being asked for an opinion without having time to consider the question, and the implication for the answers I give. I happen to like analysis, and it drives me nuts when I get asked an important question, but I do not have the time to consider it deeply.
Things I’ve observed work well – a person to person conversation, with active and conscious listening, and the opportunity to follow up on a longer timeline. Do not interrupt. Allow for loooonnnngggg pauses. Do not argue the stated idea, but elicit clarification when needed. If you have in-person collboration meetings, find a way to talk to people who haven’t said anything on an informal basis after the fact, and privately. Just because you are an introvert does not mean you don’t benefit from hearing other people’s ideas.
Posted by Laureen | May 11, 2012, 9:20 pm