No offense to antelopes, lemmings, elephants or other herd animals. But they do things that we humans should avoid. Like stampede. And swiftly follow their leader when said leader is afraid. (As humans, it may have occurred to us as of late that sometimes our leaders aren't ... oh, shall we say... infallible?)
Watching a news segment about herd mentality on CBS yesterday, I learned the following. "We are mammals, just like the wildebeest in the plains of the African Savannah," asserted Andrew Lo, who studies emotions and economics at MIT. Huh, okay.
But then it gets interesting. Apparently, we turn to our mammalian brains (the autopilot stampeding impulse part) when things get rough, and Lo postulates that we have little choice. We react to fear like animals do, kinda. Fight, flight, panic. All that good stuff.
I don't like it.
Let's take a hypothetical (cough, cough) example. A client just skidded to a halt on a useful marketing project this morning, and did so for one reason only. It looks like time for a slowdown. So they will cut their outreach to customers. Take flight with everybody else! The cloud of dust is thickening and we hear the pounding of... oh, never mind.
Maybe I got separated from the herd at birth, but I can't help but wonder... how about counting to ten, twenty or thirty before following the trends?
One older motivational business book I like is Stephan Schiffman's Make It Happen Before Lunch. Among other jewels (yes, I mean that) Schiffman shares his theory of "living off peak" - contrary to the impulses of the mammalian brain (my reference, not his) he urges us to do as others don't. From going to work before anyone else hits the road to gliding down the wide aisles of the supermarket at 10 pm when others are home watching TV, the applications are many. Another expert I trust (and why the heck not?) is the great Warren Buffett, who neatly summarizes one aspect of how he buys and sells investments: "Be fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful."
How un-antelopelike.
I also shop at 10pm sometimes! The only bad thing about late-night grocery shopping is that what's left of the broccoli crowns have wilted a bit. But you can work around that with a little strategic planning. Just like business.
ReplyDeleteDoesn't Buffet also say "buy at the funeral, sell at the wedding?"
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