You not only need friends, though; you also need networks, both inside and outside of work. Adam Grant, a professor of Industrial Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, talks about the importance of networks in his book, Give and Take:
By developing a strong network, people can gain invaluable access to knowledge, expertise, and influence. Extensive research demonstrates that people with rich networks achieve higher performance ratings, get promoted faster, and earn more money. (2013)
Interacting in networks (or teams) involves giving and taking, and Grant states that there are three different styles of reciprocity: giving, taking, and matching. Each of these has a different type of network. A “taker” likes to get more than they give to a network or relationship. A “giver” (admittedly a rare breed in the workplace) prefers to give more than they get, and a “matcher” strives to preserve an equal balance of giving and getting.
Our personality is 50% the result of nature (or evolution, which equals genetics) and 50% the result of nurture (or the interaction of our genetics with our environment). However, where Grant takes these types as a given, Kurzban and Houser used experiments to establish that evolution has created a relatively stable mix of these three reciprocity styles (2005). According to Kurzban and Houser, this is the breakdown:
Table 2.1. Kurzban and Houser Reciprocity Styles
Kurzban Type Name Percent Grant Type Name
Cooperators 17% Givers
Reciprocators 63% Matchers
Cheaters (Free Riders) 20% Takers
Not Classified 3%
I do not think I can stress enough how important Kurzban’s and Houser’s work is to how we can understand and develop professional networks. For example, if you have to work on a randomly assembled team, you will encounter a mix of cooperators, reciprocators, and cheaters. Grant reports that each of these reciprocity types deal with their networks in different ways:
Givers give a lot more than they receive. This is a key point: takers and matchers also give in the context of networks, but they tend to give strategically, with an expected personal return that exceeds or equals their contributions. When takers and matchers network, they tend to focus on who can help them in the near future, and this dictates what, where, and how they give. Their actions tend to exploit a common practice in nearly all societies around the world, in which people typically subscribe to a norm of reciprocity: you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. (2013)
However, Grant reports that even though takers and matchers get ahead, givers end up creating the widest network and become the most successful (as long as they do not end up as doormats for takers). If you are a giver, gossip once again comes in handy; matchers and other givers do not appreciate takers and will share this information widely among their co-workers.
Unfortunately, takers are fakers, and that can make them hard to identify. Everyone talks like they are a good member of the team so be sure to watch closely and remember that being agreeable is not the same as contributing.
Of course, sometimes you cannot avoid working with a taker. To help you understand what strategy you should use, we need to acquaint you with some economic game theory, specifically a strategy called tit for tat. This is usually a matcher strategy, as it requires you to match what the other player does. It will maximize your gains if you are dealing with a giver or matcher and minimize your losses if you are dealing with a taker. Thus, it is a max/min strategy.
To understand how this strategy works, we can talk in terms of cooperating with or not cooperating with your teammate. The strategy works like this:
- In the first round, you presume goodwill and cooperate with your teammate.
- You see if your teammate reciprocates by cooperating in the first round.
- If your teammate does not cooperate in the first round, you stop cooperating until the teammate cooperates.
- Then you return to cooperating.
- If the teammate again does not cooperate in any round, you then do not cooperate in the next round.
Another way to look at this is that you (assuming you are a giver or matcher) begin by cooperating and then copy your teammate(s)’ strategy from the previous round.
Here is how it might look in a series of rounds:
YOU YOUR TEAMMATE
Cooperate Not cooperate
Not cooperate Not cooperate
Not cooperate Not cooperate
Not cooperate Cooperate
Cooperate Cooperate
Cooperate Not cooperate
Not cooperate Cooperate
How does this translate to the real world of work? Well, imagine that a fellow worker comes to you to ask for advice or help with a project. You are a giver or a matcher and you help them. Then, you need to help yourself and that person has excuses or does not answer your emails. Obviously, your natural tendency is to not help them the next time they ask. We can also humanize the strategy to make it feel more familiar:
- Tit for tat is generous in that it starts out cooperating in the first round.
- Tit for tat has a strong sense of fairness in that it punishes the teammate by not cooperating in a subsequent round if the teammate does not return favors.
- Tit for tat is forgiving because if the teammate starts to cooperate, you will return to cooperating.
- Tit for tat is non-envious because by cooperating, both of you are gaining and you are not competing and striving to get ahead of your teammate.
Are these not characteristics you want your children to have? There’s also a good chance that many of us already use this in our personal interactions.
However, tit for tat is not the only strategy. Grant reminds us that givers are the most successful people in the workplace since they develop the widest and strongest networks. Citing Martin Nowak’s book, Super Cooperators Grant says that the best strategy for givers (or wannabe givers) is the generous tit-for-tat. This is because Nowak found that it is more advantageous to alternate between giving and matching in personal interactions As with regular tit-for-tat, you begin by cooperating, assuming good will on the part of your teammates. If your partner does not cooperate but rather competes, you continue to cooperate. Specifically, you want to cooperate once every three complete rounds. In other words, for every three times your teammate competes, you compete two of the times in response and cooperate one time in response. Another way to put it is that instead of competing every time the other player competes, you compete only two-thirds of the time.
According to Nowak, “Generous tit for tat can easily wipe out tit for tat and defend itself against being exploited by defectors” (2011). It achieves the desired goal of encouraging givers and punishing takers, but it is not too punitive. It can also be called a “Trust but verify” strategy. According to Grant:
Generous tit for tat achieves a powerful balance of rewarding giving and discouraging taking, without being overly punitive. It comes with a risk: generous tit for tat encourages most people to act like givers, which opens the door for takers to ‘rise up again’ by competing when everyone else is cooperating. But in a world where relationships and reputations are visible, it’s increasingly difficult for takers to take advantage of givers (2013).