You’ve heard that one bad apple can spoil the bunch, but Will Felps at the Rotterdam School of Management proved it. Dr. Felps conducted experiments looking at what he called three “bad apple” behaviors:
- Being pessimistic
- Slacking off
- Being a jerk
He created groups and assigned them simple tasks. The groups were paid more based on their success. However, in each group was an actor exhibiting a specific bad apple behavior.
The experiments proved that the bad apple who is excessively negative, takes cell phone calls during meetings, or eats their lunch loudly while everyone is trying to work can cause the groups’ performance to decrease up to 40 percent. This study caused Dr. Felps to ask himself, am I a bad apple? He concluded that he is sometimes and started to change his behavior.
Hearing about the study made me ask myself the same question in a slightly different way: if I’m a work shifting jerk, would I even know it?
In the office your coworkers’ body language and behavior help you figure out if you’re being a jerk. Did she just sneer a little when I walked by? Did he just leave the room because I walked in? You see the signs in the office, but not over the phone or email.
Bad Apple Check List
Work shifting gives you new opportunities to act like a bad apple without realizing it. There are some ordinary things you might not realize you do that drive your teammates crazy. Here are nine common bad apple behaviors and some very simple ways to fix them.
- Being unclear about your status. Let your team know if you’ll be away so they’ll know you aren’t just ignoring them.
- Multitasking on phone calls. Some people can multitask well on the phone, other people can’t. Know yourself well enough to stop reading that email if you can’t keep talking while you do it.
- Leaving people in the dark about your project. It’s easy to be a work shifting lone wolf, but it doesn’t help. Let your team know what you’re working on and how it’s going. No news from a workshifter is usually (or always) interpreted as bad news.
- Ignoring instant messages. We all get busy and you shouldn’t always stop your work to help someone else, but if your IM status is Available don’t ignore someone. Let them know you are busy and change your status.
- Finishing an IM chat without saying goodbye. Don’t leave the other person waiting and wondering if you’re done. When you’re finished chatting end with a clear goodbye.
- Sending very short emails. It’s fine to send “Thanks” or “All Done,” but asking someone to do something for you in a super short email is terse and rude. Show them enough courtesy to write a couple of sentences.
- Cutting people off. Conference calls make it easy to cut someone off without realizing it. Take a deep breath, let the other person finish, and then say what you want to say.
- Conference call background noise. After you listen to something for a while you stop noticing, but your barking dog, playing kids, or that overly friendly barista are a real interruptions. Use your mute button.
- Kiss-up, kick-down. Being nice to your superiors and rude to your coworkers is one of Stanford professor in organizational behavior Robert Sutton’s signs that you might be a bad apple. It is really easy to kiss-up, kick-down over IM and email so take time to think about your behavior and make sure you’re treating everyone well.
Work shifting makes it easier to be a bad apple. Small slights become big issues when people don’t know you well. The extra time and care required to make sure you treat everyone politely and fairly will make you more successful, more productive, and your team will be happy to let you keep work shifting.