You get exactly the behaviour you... celebrate? Taking pride in pride

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By Duncan Anderson. To see all blogs click here.

Reading time: 5 mins

Summary: You find what you are looking for. Be the change you want to see. 

  • If you are looking for things to be proud of you'll do more things you are proud of. 

  • If you aren't proud of your work then IMO it's likely not going to be high quality work. 

  • If you aren't proud of your work then then IMO it's hard to enjoy doing the work. 

  • Jingle: IMO publicly celebrating a unit of pride… is something I’m proud to celebrate! 


Route out bad performance, celebrate good performance. 

  • People will often do quality assurance for bugs and removing downside. 

  • IMO people should also quality assurance for something that they think is worth celebrating (they the maker is proud of and / or the reviewer things is neat). 


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Details


You get exactly the behaviour you allow

  • Poor behaviour cannot stand else it'll be everywhere. 

    • You can’t let low quality work to stand else people doing high quality work will be annoyed AND your customers will be unhappy! 

    • You don't let people take an excessive amount of time. Money doesn’t grow on trees, you need to spend resources as wisely as possible. 

  • But IMO a well functioning society and company doesn’t just remove downside, it fosters and celebrates in a positive sum way upside. 


You get exactly the behaviour you foster

  • Not doing a bad job ≠ doing a good job. 

  • The absence of bad doesn’t mean something is good, it just means it’s not bad! 

  • IMO work you are proud of = quality work

  • IMO work you are proud of = possibility of being enjoyable work

  • If you are not proud of the work you are doing are you doing work wrong? 

  • Hope is not a strategy. IMO ideally one is proud of the work one does. 

  • Can you foster pride in your company? IMO yes. 

  • IMO one should privately celebrate a unit of pride per unit of work. 

  • IMO one should publicly celebrating a unit of pride per unit of work (in a positive sum way): 

    • Yourself:

      • 1. Inspires you to do good work

      • 2. Helps make work enjoyable

      • 3. Provides the opportunity for others to appreciate what you have done thereby making you feel appreciated

    • Others:

      • 4. Inspires others to do good work

      • 5. Shares good ideas


You find what you are looking for

  • IMO if you are looking for things to be proud of you find things to be proud of. 

  • I often find half the problem is knowing what to look for. Once I know what to look for normally I start to find more and more of it. 

  • However if I’m not looking for something I almost never find it. 

  • Looking for problems to solve = interesting. 

  • Looking for things to be proud of = … fun! 

  • Looking for problems to solve * looking for things to be proud of when solving the problems = interesting fun! 


IMO a well functioning society removes downside while allowing and fostering as much upside as possible

  • You need to have laws, police, courts and jails otherwise you’ll have eg way more crime than if no police. 

  • But you also want to create the space for people to do great work, where they can start a business and succeed. They can have financial success, personal recognition and help the common good. 


IMO a well functioning company removes downside while allowing and fostering as much upside as possible

  • Let’s say you are making lessons for a textbook. 

    • You need to have a lesson done with no factual errors and you need to check for this (factual correctness quality assurance) - downside quality removal

    • You need to have a lesson done in a reasonable amount of time. 

    • You should also look for upside quality addition, AKA something you are proud of :). 

  • After a unit of work IMO one should look for something one is proud of. One should then share this with one’s team in a positive sum way. 

  • In summary: 

    • You don’t allow factual errors.

    • You don’t allow inefficient work.

    • You don’t not celebrate good work… AKA celebrate a unit of pride. 

    • IMO all parts are needed for a well functioning company! 


A tangible example of ‘celebrating a unit of pride’

  • After authoring a lesson the lesson author needs to find 1 thing they are proud of and articulate why they are proud.

    • A framework for how articulate what a unit of pride: 

      • What exactly are you proud of?

      • Why it’s delicious and nutritious?

      • Why are you proud of it?

      • Are there any possible negative 2nd order consequences?

  • In the appropriate forum (eg daily standup meeting) the author:

    • Expresses unit of pride

    • One or more other people celebrate unit of pride - explain what they think is cool

    • Unit of ‘not getting high on our own supply’ - one or more other people see if there might be unintended 2nd order consequences from the cool thing. 

  • IMO this can be done in a team forums (eg daily standups, weekly team meeting) or 1:1 with eg someone who is looking at the lesson or even in a Slack channel.   


Positive sum vs negative sum ‘units of pride celebration’

  • Negative sum: 

    • Used to stack rank employees

      • The point is not that one unit of pride is better than another. It’s that pride begets pride. 

      • IMO the vast majority of white collar work places are positive sum, ie there is space for everyone to do well. 

    • Is a tax vs something that helps you find cool things. 

  • Positive sum: 

    • We want everyone to do great work. Everyone doing well is good for everyone. Ie most work places are a positive sum game. 

    • We want to share good ideas. 

    • We want to give people the opportunity for a public pat on the back. 

  • If a pride celebration is a mardi gras...

    • Good pride celebration = mardi f@ck yar

    • Bad pride celebration = mardi waa