Friend and Foe: When to Cooperate, When to Compete, and How to Succeed at Both (7 page)

To understand why hierarchy has evolved to be the most dominant form of social organization across all species, including humans, it helps to look at one of its simplest forms: the beehive. The beehive is a well-known symbol of cooperation; it is even emblazoned on the Utah state flag to represent the state's commitment to social harmony. A beehive's members work so seamlessly together that the beehive has been described as its own living, breathing organism, as “a mammal in many bodies.” Each member of the hive has its specialized tasks to complete—some clean, others build, some forage, others guard. But together, the bees' individual actions produce a symphony of coordinated activity.

It is this precision of coordination and seamless integration that has earned the beehive a rare distinction: It is considered to be a
superorganism
. Species that evolve into superorganisms are extremely rare, but once they emerge, they are extraordinarily successful. In fact, no species that has achieved superorganism status has ever gone extinct! Superorganisms are so successful because they are quintessentially hierarchical. Within a superorganism, every group member performs a role in synchrony with others, and any individual competitive desires are suppressed for the betterment of the collective.

As the beehive so elegantly demonstrates, hierarchy creates a division of labor. In humans, this division of labor is often attentional, as leaders and followers direct their focus in different directions. Leaders view the forest while those with low power focus on the trees. A general needs to consider broad and abstract questions of readiness and strategy, and not get entangled in the intricacies of how to operate a tank or jet engine. The CEO needs to consider a firm's financial standing while the accountants crunch the numbers. And U.S. presidents are supposed to focus on the big issues of the economy and foreign affairs and not get lost in the details of something as trivial as managing a tennis schedule (which President Jimmy Carter apparently did). This division of labor allows all necessary tasks to be distributed and accomplished.

The invisible hand of hierarchy also allows for coordination among group members. Hierarchy helps people know who does what, when, and how. These rules promote efficient interactions by setting clear expectations for the behaviors of people of different ranks. Essentially, hierarchy facilitates social interactions by simplifying them.

Google thought they could succeed by creating a hierarchy-free workplace. They were wrong. Early on, Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin conducted what they thought would be a revolutionary experiment: They eliminated managers and created a completely flat organization. The experiment was indeed eye-opening, but only because it was a failure. The lack of hierarchy created chaos and confusion, and Page and Brin quickly realized that Google needed managers to set direction and facilitate collaboration. As they learned, even Google needs some hierarchy.

As we saw in the last chapter, it is good to be the king. As a result, hierarchy functions as an incentive system and creates motivation. Since those with greater rank receive greater rewards and face fewer threats, we have an incentive to work hard and contribute to the group in order to rise up the hierarchy and reap the accompanying rewards—a raise, a better job title, the bigger office, the closer parking space.

This reasoning suggests that cooperating and contributing to a group today can lead to a higher rank tomorrow. Indeed, Robb Willer of Stanford University has found that cooperative members of a group rise up the hierarchy more quickly: Those who sacrifice for the good of the group have greater influence and receive more social rewards. Deferring to and cooperating with high-ranked members of the organization indirectly benefits low-ranked members by promoting group success. When a team succeeds, everyone shares in the rewards. Thus, cooperation can lead to competitive benefits.

So now we can see why hierarchy governs two places—the military and the Catholic Church—where humans sublimate their own desires for the betterment of the group. The military epitomizes self-sacrifice for the collective; its members willingly risk their own lives for the sake of their group. Similarly, in the Catholic Church, members of the priesthood sacrifice their most individual desires—sex, family—in service to the Church. The Catholic Church is the longest continuously running organization in human history, and the Church's intense commitment to hierarchy helps to explain why.

Hierarchy offers one other benefit to humans, but this one is purely psychological. To appreciate this benefit, think about a time when you wanted your group to have a clear hierarchy, when you just had to know who was in charge. What made you crave a well-defined hierarchy in this situation?

If you are like most people, you embraced hierarchy when you were trapped in a threatening situation, or felt little control over your environment. In these situations, people desire a sense of order and control. Hierarchy offers much-needed structure. Thus, when we lack control, hierarchies become psychologically appealing because they offer clarity in the face of chaos. In a project led by Justin Friesen from York University, we found that when people don't feel in control, they are more likely to endorse hierarchy as the most appropriate form of social organization. In these situations, people want to be led, and willingly follow.

This makes sense when we look at political history. It explains why, in the terrifying days after the attacks of September 11, 2001, many Americans were willing to give more authority to the government. On an even larger scale, it also helps to explain the rise of authoritarian states in Germany and Italy during the period of great economic uncertainty after World War I.

The psychological benefits of hierarchy also extend into the heavens. Stephen Sales analyzed church membership in the United States over a 20-year period (1920–1939). He divided this period into two segments: one characterized by economic certainty and growth (the 1920s) and one beset by economic upheaval and declining per capita income (1930s). Stephen then divided churches into two categories: hierarchical churches (e.g., Roman Catholic Church, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) and nonhierarchical churches (e.g., Protestant Episcopal Church, Presbyterian Church). He defined “hierarchy” according to levels of hierarchy. For example, the Roman Catholic Church has 17 different levels of authority from the layman to God, whereas the Presbyterian Church has only seven.

Sales found that in the period of economic security, people were more likely to convert to nonhierarchical churches than to hierarchical ones. However, in the period of economic uncertainty, this pattern reversed, as more hierarchical churches dominated the recruitment of members. In studies with Aaron Kay of Duke University, we found the same effects at the individual level: After people thought about a time in which they lacked control, they put greater faith in a more hierarchical God, one who is omniscient and omnipotent.

The idea of turning to hierarchy in times of threat can also explain why some countries have steeper and firmer hierarchies than others. When Michele Gelfand of the University of Maryland analyzed 33 countries around the world, she found that any force that put pressure on a society or threatened its security significantly increased the development of hierarchy. When a country historically faced the problems of population density, scarce resources, natural disasters, wars, and diseases, it tended to structure itself more hierarchically.

We have seen, in humans as in bees, that hierarchy facilitates a division of labor, increases coordination, maximizes motivation, and offers psychological comfort.

These benefits are most apparent in situations that would normally inspire conflict: when resources are scarce. Remember that scarcity is one of the foundational principles that create the tension between cooperation and competition. But hierarchy offers an easy heuristic for solving the perplexing dilemma of how to distribute scarce resources within a group: Those at the top receive the best spoils.

A series of studies conducted by Erik de Kwaadsteniet help us understand how hierarchy both facilitates social coordination and reduces conflict. These clever experiments use a stylized game to demonstrate an important point.

Imagine that you and your boss are playing a game and you have to coordinate your actions to earn money. The rules of this game—known as a Coordination Game—are such that you and your boss will each receive a monetary reward, but
only if you both choose the same option
. Unfortunately, you have to make your own individual decisions without being able to communicate with each other. There are two options in this game. Option A benefits you more than your boss. If you both pick A, you get eight lottery tickets and your boss only gets four. Option B benefits your boss more than you. If you both pick B, your boss gets eight lottery tickets and you only get four.

Which option would you choose? Option A or Option B? Remember, you only earn lottery tickets if you and your boss pick the same option.

Now, imagine playing the same game with your best friend. Which option would you choose?

Normally, most of us would prefer to play a game with our best friend more than we would with our boss. But in this game you are actually more likely to win money if you play with your boss. Why? Because with your boss, the clear status difference will help you coordinate your actions. Hierarchy dictates that you would both choose the option that benefits your boss more than you. As a result, you and your boss would coordinate your actions and both earn lottery tickets, though your boss will get a bit more.

Now consider playing the same game, but with your best friend. Here, you might pick the generous option, but your best friend might be generous too: In this case your mutual generosity would leave both of you with nothing. Or you might expect your friend to be generous, in which case you pick the selfish option. But your best friend might use the same logic and also pick the selfish option; again, you would both get nothing.

The point is that when playing with someone of equal status and power, the “obvious” option is unclear. Absent a clear hierarchy, coordination is difficult. So, in a Coordination Game like this one, hierarchy helps. It is better to be paired with your boss than your best friend.

For a similar reason, it wouldn't be a good idea for two bosses to play this game: The actions of two equally powerful people can be especially difficult to coordinate. This may be why, when Michael Eisner was recruited by Disney to be a co-CEO with Frank Wells, a former Warner Bros. executive, Eisner said no thanks. He felt being a
co
-CEO wouldn't work. He was right. As our own studies demonstrate, co-leadership is a bad idea, and we've found this to be true from fashion houses to mountain sides.

In one project led by Eric Anicich of Columbia University and Frédéric Godart of INSEAD, we collected industry-wide data on the global high-end fashion industry. We studied over 20 fashion seasons between 2000 and 2010. To evaluate the creative performance of the fashion houses, we used the industry standard: the ratings in the French trade magazine
Journal du Textile (JdT)
, which constructs its ranking by asking 70 industrial buyers to evaluate and rank the creativity of each fashion collection in each season.

The data were clear and strong: Fashion houses that had co–creative directors were consistently rated as less creative than houses with individual directors. And this isn't unique to fashion. We have found similar effects among Himalayan climbing teams: Co-led teams are more likely to have one of their members die on the mountain.

Co-leadership can kill both ideas and people, because it creates uncertainty over who is really in charge. Of course, co-led teams are not always ineffective and dangerous. But when there is not a clear division of labor among these leaders, coordination becomes difficult, patterns of deference can disappear, and conflict can erupt.

We began to wonder whether teams of superstars would suffer the same fate as co-led groups. Could more talent become too much talent?