by A. Non

Created on: August 26, 2010   Last Updated: August 28, 2010

Peer Pressure Power

It is difficult to externally motivate high level achievers such as a college professor, a professional athlete or a heart surgeon. These self motivated professionals have been performing to a goal or target throughout their careers. A college graduate student excels at research in order to earn a spot in a doctoral program. Triple-A baseball players play for a chance at the “big show”, to be called up to the majors. A pre-med student looks forward to a ten year course of such hurdles, including the MCAT, medical school and residency. How do you motivate such high achievers after they have achieved their ultimate goals?  In each of these cases, the recognition and influence of peer’s within the realm of achievement becomes the greatest motivator. Professors and surgeons submit research to peer review. Professional athletes honor one another with all-star games and halls of fame. In order to mimic this motivation in staff, management needs to provide the basic resources, a clear set of goals, and embrace the principles of peer pressure.

Management needs to provide the foundation for success before exploring methods to improve performance.  Employees must have the proper education, experience and tools to be successful. These basic requirements are the gate that must be surpassed. It will be difficult to establish a vision, if the employees lack enough experience in an industry to recognize the impact of the strategy. Most importantly, the positive effects of peer pressure exist only among true peers. Lacking this foundation, further efforts to improve performance will continue to frustrate management and employees.

A clear mission or set of goals is vital to improve performance. Although this may appear clear to the management of a business, interpretation and understanding by employees may differ widely. Vague goals can be as damaging as no goals. The high achievers have distinct goals. A college professor does not set out to write a paper, he sets out to prove a theorem. A surgeon does not set out to save lives; she sets out to cure the patient before her. Successful sports teams do not set out to win; they set goals to win their division or beat a cross state rival. Ideally, the goals of an organization are set collaboratively, rather than simply by management. A team that pledges to beat the cross state rival has a better chance than the team ordered to win.

On a practical level, high performance organizations

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