The people I work with often ask questions about how to approach different situations in an ethical way. And I think we, as leaders, need to have a continuous process of analysis, observation and self-observation and continuous improvement. That’s why questions like this and the debates they generate I believe are pure gold. I really like to see people I work with willing to be good leaders: to behave ethically, fairly and in a way that generates performance. That they genuinely want to support their team members.
One of the questions received is about competition.
“I have an internal dispute about competition at work. Is it good or bad? When is it good, when is it bad? Especially when you’re working with numbers, when there’s a clear model for evaluating everyone’s output (not effort), is it still bad? I have noticed that some are motivated by competition, others are indifferent. What is the best option?”
What I have noticed is that there are different contexts, different times and different people – competition can be good or bad depending on certain factors.
FACTORS
1. Personality patterns and personal preferences
- There are certain types for whom competition is a catalyst: dynamic people, focused on achieving results, types with extroverted tendencies, who thrive on comparison with others, those who “activate” from human interaction.
- There are also patterns where competition is neutral or even perceived negatively: people with tendencies towards a structured approach, more introverted, those who measure themselves against themselves or against a well-defined standard, those who are more collaborative and supportive of others, the shy ones. For them, competition can even have the opposite effect – de-motivating and discouraging.
- The leader needs to assess the tendencies and preferences of the team to gauge whether and what kind of competition is appropriate.
2. Visibility of progress in competition
- Motivation studies show that one of the key enablers for autonomy and self-perception is visibility of progress – being able to measure my own intermediate results and compare myself transparently and fairly with my competitors.
- Many teams use different dashboards. It is one of the most useful ways to bring transparency and fairness.
- It is useful to update this dashboard as frequently as possible to show the real-time picture.
- The indicators tracked in the dashboard need to be accurate and relevant – both to the team and to the bottom line.
3. Effort versus result
- One of the common pitfalls of management and leadership is the difficulty of putting the right emphasis on the connection between effort and result. Specifically, we need to appreciate and encourage effort, but the reward should be placed on the specific result achieved.
- From a business perspective, if the results are not achieved (the necessary profit is not generated) there is no budget to allocate the financial rewards from. Only the result brings in the money. So the healthiest way is to reward the result.
- But effort is the precursor to result, so we need to support (morally, physically or with resources), appreciate and encourage effort.
- Sometimes people make a lot of effort, just not in the right direction. They have good intentions, invest time, effort and energy and still don’t achieve results. Here the leader’s role is to support the effort and appreciate it. We want to preserve and perpetuate the attitude. And clarify the direction and expected outcomes.
- What the leader needs here is positive feedback for the progress and a careful analysis: how they can make it happen.
4. Competition for continuous improvement
- In effective teams, the competition has a the purpose of continuous improvement. Colleagues enter into “friendly” competition because the need, the motivation is to get better and better – it does not generate negative feelings, but mutual admiration and learning.
- The leader’s role is to observe deviations from this direction. Appreciate the positive attitude and stop harmful competitive behaviors.
5. Team status
- We have to take into account the team’s background:
- emotional – is their state of mind one of self-confidence or are there members with low confidence? Are there conflicts in the team? How many failures and successes have they had lately?
- different levels of competency – if we have very beginners and very experienced people, a competition can deepen this discrepancy and generate frustration.
- The leader’s role is to correctly assess the state of the team, to estimate the impact of the competition and, once started, to accompany the process: to observe, to appreciate progress and positive behaviors and to stop harmful behaviors.
CONCLUSION
Competition has many nuances and implications. We need to look at each individual situation properly, because there is no universally valid recipe. The finesse and quality of leadership comes from adaptability:
- in-depth analysis of each situation
- building a fair and visible process for the competition
- assisting and supporting positive competition along the way.
Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels