Shape Shifters

“We think of personality as something we carry with us from one context to another. Yet we don’t express the same traits in every situation — different tendencies are activated by different situations.”

— Adam Grant, Vibe: The Secrets of Strong Connections in a Lonely World

According to Grant, these tendencies are called our ‘if-then’ signatures. The idea builds on decades of research by psychologists Walter Mischel and Yuichi Shoda, who found that people’s behavior follows consistent if-then patterns across situations. If-then signatures are the distinctive ways each of us responds to particular situations. If my idea is challenged in front of senior leaders, then I get defensive. If the same idea is questioned one-on-one, then I get curious. If I’m given a clear goal and room to run, then I’m energized. If I’m micromanaged, then I shut down. These patterns are surprisingly consistent within each of us as individuals, but they differ from one person to the next. 

It’s important to both understand our own if-then signatures and, as much as is possible, the if-then signatures of our team members. One helpful tool to understanding this is to understand ours and others’ triggers. Emotional triggers are things that act like a trip-wire that annoys or offends us. Teams that understand each other’s if-then signatures and their triggers are able to connect on deeper levels and avoid conflict land mines.

When we grow ourselves and our people through work that identifies our strengths, we begin to scratch the surface. When we work to know and understand how our strengths can become constraints when taken too far or applied in the wrong setting - we understand ourselves and others on a deeper level. When we identify our triggers and recognize triggers in our team - and if we can then avoid labels and instead get deeply curious - then our relational capacity and connection grows in ways that multiply our individual and team effectiveness and success.

In his book, Vibe, Grant uses the example of Abraham Lincoln. Most people know the story of how he built a cabinet which historian Doris Kearns Goodwin famously called a ‘team of rivals’. Edwin Stanton was one of his toughest opponents and Lincoln recruited him to become his war secretary. Lincoln trusted Stanton because he knew he had a strength - tenacity - and he shared Lincoln’s same vision for saving the Union. Ultimately, they became very close, so much so that Stanton was at his bedside when he passed. They had very different ‘if-then’ signatures; Lincoln liked to joke and have fun - and Stanton wanted nothing to do with that. Lincoln learned to keep their relationship to the shared vision and work at hand - which built a deep, respectful relationship and avoided triggering Stanton.

Lincoln and Stanton never shared the same if-then signatures, and they didn’t need to. What they shared was a mission, and a leader wise enough to work with their differences instead of against them. That’s the invitation for each of us. Learn your own if-then patterns. Get curious about your team’s. Trade labels for questions, and create the conditions that bring out people’s best. Because when leaders understand what activates the people around them, differences stop being obstacles and start becoming strengths. Shape Shifters