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My wife and I attended a chamber orchestra concert last weekend. Now, lest you think me a high-society type, it was all she could do to get me to realize there were more options for music than just B.B. King and Creedence Clearwater Revival. Personally, I don't know the difference between Handel and a door handle. Come to think of it, The Doors playing Handel might be interesting, but I digress.
As I looked around the theatre I saw 1900 people all glued to the stage (except the nine-year-old girl who obviously didn't think Haydn's Oboe Concerto was a sorry replacement for Justin Bieber). It struck me that, since there was no actual performance other than the musicians playing, the entire evening could have just as easily been played on a radio or sound system. What was it about sitting and watching musicians play music that caused people to shell out $40.00 per ticket? Then it happened. The concert ended and the nearly two-thousand person audience stood to applaud. Shouts of "Bravo" echoed from balconies and box seats. It hit me; we were all experiencing the same thing, at the same time, in the same space.
A good friend of mine is a theatre professional and we discussed why people still have an innate need to gather for concerts, theatre, sports, and the like. He said, "Humans are a social creature. All of our validation comes from being with others and sharing experiences. We go through life worried that we are dorks; not as good as the next guy, always thinking about our inadequacies. We also get caught up in the mundaneness of everyday life. The more isolated we are from others, the worse those feelings become. Then you go see a play. You see an actor portraying a character that is just as big a dork as you are. You leave feeling like maybe your life isn't so bad. Maybe you fit in after all. Or you attend a concert where the music has you so riveted that you don't realize two hours have flown by. Everyday life seems more elevated knowing you are a part of that experience." He also said something I thought to be quite profound. He said, "Every now and then people need to be in a space where they realize they are all breathing the same air."
When I go into places of business I can instantly tell if the employees breathe the same air or if they are isolated. Offices in the '50s used to be places buzzing with activity. One big room would house a dozen desks. People would be typing (on actual typewriters), talking on the phone, and walking around the room to confer with co-workers. Now you have mini offices divided by cubicle walls. What used to be considered healthy activity is now referred to as noise; distraction. Spontaneous gatherings around the water cooler have been replaced by tightly scheduled breaks and lunch periods.
Employees need moments where they realize they are all breathing the same air. When a human needs to reconnect with others and isn't allowed to, the result is isolation, frustration, and poor mental and physical health. He or she rarely knows why they feel frustrated, but the body is signaling that something is out of whack. Connecting with other people is often all it takes to regain the balance.
Earlier I used the phrase "buzzing with activity." One of my hobbies is beekeeping and I like an office that feels like a beehive. Bees are arguably the most productive and socially efficient animals on the planet. The queen lays thousands of eggs a day. Worker bees tend to the larvae, clean the hive, protect against invaders, gather nectar and pollen, and process the nectar into honey. And they do all of this without cubicles! In fact, each bee comes into contact with the queen and most of the other bees throughout each day.
When a foraging bee returns to the hive with nectar or pollen, she doesn't deposit them into the comb herself, she hands it off to hive-bee who takes it to the appropriate cell in the comb. If a bee hive were run like most businesses, each bee would gather its own nectar, deposit it into a cell, process it into honey, then get a plaque for Best Bee in the Hive at the end of the year. It is the constant contact with others in the colony, the breathing of the same air, that allows bees to remain focused and productive. In fact, most bees don't even sting in order to defend themselves; it is to defend the colony. Wouldn't you like your employees to have the same attitude? No one protects a cubicle.
The famous dog trainer, Cesar Millan (the Dog Whisperer) knows the behavior of a pack animal, and both dogs and humans are pack animals. If a dog needs to have good behavior re-established, Millan takes her to his dog compound. The 30-40 dogs living at the compound accomplish the task for him. Cesar always notes that "dogs teach each other how to behave." After a very short time of living amongst the pack, the patient is back to normal. The other dogs have helped re-establish mental balance simply by acting as a group. People are the same. Much of our behavior comes from what psychologists call a cued response. Rare is the case where a human decides how to act solely on his own. We act based on the behavior of those around us. How others react to a certain situation gives us the cues on how to properly behave. This can't happen unless we have constant contact with others.
We also need group experiences to lift ourselves from the everyday. The standing ovation at the concert was as much for the audience as it was for the musicians. It was a way of saying, "Hey! Didn't we all just experience this together?" Group experiences aren't a way of getting away from doing the laundry, they make doing the laundry okay again. Companies that have removed parties and celebrations because of budget cuts are going to spend a lot more on replacing employees and lower productivity than any party ever cost. These are companies focused in the next quarter instead of the next quarter century.
How do we breathe the same air if that air is divided by cubicle walls? In some cases, take them down. There are many companies that have moved back to open workspace designs and have discovered the joy of seeing the faces of fellow co-workers again. Perhaps you can you have walls only in front and behind the desk, but leave the side walls out so there is more open space. Create a hive system where people come into contact with each other more throughout the day, if even for a brief moment.
I was approached recently by a handful of prospective clients for workshops to improve company spirit and productivity. When I asked what they had done to address the problem I found it coincidental that each company said something akin to, "We've done some team-building stuff, but nothing too important." They responded as if building team spirit, in and of itself, was not important enough to justify the time or expense. It seems to me that so many companies are afraid of making the bottom line that they forget what really affects it.
When the psychologist Abraham Maslow developed his Hierarchy of Needs model, he placed basic needs such as food, shelter, and safety as the foundation. As soon as those needs are met, however, Belonging to a Group and Affiliation with Others is the next necessity. Our need to belong does not simply affect how satisfied we are with our surroundings, but determines how well we perform in that group and how long we choose to remain. No matter how "fluffy" a group activity may seem, the benefits are deep, lasting, and should never be undervalued. To lift us up from the mundane, reaffirm our self-worth, and re-establish our foundation for work, we must all breathe the same air. Just don't bring a nine-year-old to a chamber orchestra, that's just cruel.
Stevie Ray is a nationally recognized corporate speaker and trainer, helping companies improve communication skills, customer service, leadership, and team management. He can be reached at 612-825-1832 or stevie@stevierays.org.
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