Have you heard about the “bad apple effect”? It’s an interesting 2006 study, led by Will Felps and Terence Mitchell at the University of Washington. They wanted to show if what we’ve always suspected might be true.
We know from years of experience that its often a real struggle for managers and teams when someone in the team is acting negatively or inappropriately.
One of the reasons Brave Conversations is so popular with our clients is because people need to learn how to have difficult conversations! Anyway, back to the study. The research clearly demonstrated that just one negative team member can indeed significantly reduce both a teams performance and lower their morale.
One incredible statistic showed that a teams performance could be reduced by as much as 30-40% versus a team that didn’t contain a bad apple. 🍎
If that’s not bad enough, there’s a second scary fact to consider. In the same team two other critical skills reduced, by a whopping 50%. Those teams also declined in both creativity and problem solving. 😮 The issue with this is more complex than you think. It’s not just the bad apple you need to watch out for. The study shows that over longer periods of time other team members can in fact start to mirror those very same negative behaviours, so the answer to the question is yes. The batch really does get spoilt!
There are 3 behaviours to look out for in a team. If you spot these then you have some work to do.
Bad Apple-ism 1 – Consistently critical of the team, the work or the business and often in a disrespectful manner.
Bad Apple-ism 2 – Regular seen to disengage with workload, goals and other team members and often does the bare minimum to ‘get by.
Bad Apple-ism 3 – Always negative about goals, project outcomes or generally the team’s overall chances of achieving anything.
So, what’s the takeaway?
This important study really highlighted both the importance of carefully hiring new team members in the first place, and facing into addressing negative behaviours as soon as that start, to reduce negativity and of course, maintain harmony in the team and solid performance.
For us that means stepping up and having those BRAVE conversations. You’ll need to dare to Disagree Well, learn how to both Think and Speak effectively and make well formed, well informed Decisions.
If this post resonated with you, and you’ve got some work to do with bad apples, then give us a call.
We’d love to help.
Sara and Rhi.
