Well the Thanksgiving holiday is again upon us with its yearly promise of turkey, football, and absolutely absurd number of Black Friday commercials. And once again, the actual story of the first Thanksgiving is lost in the constant background noise of consumption originating from our loving media who are quite happy to submerge sensible thinking underneath the constant drumbeat of buy, buy, buy.
As I’ve written elsewhere, the real story of the Pilgrims is one more deeply rooted in what modern economists would call game theory and behavioral psychologists the equity theory of motivation. The story starts with the contractual agreement that the Pilgrims entered into in order to have their voyage to the New World funded. That agreement required them to share the production and support of the new colony communally. This forced socialism led to almost complete disaster and scarcity was the order of the day. Only after they abandoned shared farming and allocated individual plots of land for each family did they thrive rather than just survive.
In his account of the Plymouth Colony, Governor William Bradford cites the various interpersonal frictions caused by how one colonist viewed another. The old felt that they didn’t get the respect they deserved when forced to work the same ‘mean’ chores as the young. The strong felt indentured by the weak who could not work as hard. Bradford goes on to chide the vanity of Plato for recommending the abolishment of property rights and the establishment of a commonwealth.
What Bradford observed first hand is that people measure their happiness in relation to what others do. When standing on his own, each Pilgrim felt entitled to his bounty, took satisfaction in his attainments, and lowered his resentment to his neighbors. Bradford is perhaps the first adherent to equity theory.
Now despite what passes for common knowledge in certain circles, the same type of concerns that dominated that early colonial life in the 1620s are also at play in our technically advanced world nearly 400 years removed. The saga of Gravity Payments shows clearly how unearned attainments by some can be viewed as an insult or even a threat by others.
But what brought all of this much closer to home was the recent departure of a co-worker to greener pastures. I had the privilege before he left of being able to sit down to speak frankly with him about the reasons he was leaving. His primary reason for calling it quits was the fact that he viewed his effort as being unrewarded in relation to his peers. He didn’t quite phrase it as concisely as that but that was the gist of it. From his point-of-view, his efforts were undervalued by a management who couldn’t actually articulate their set of expectations.
Of course, no one should be rewarded simply for working hard; regardless of the effort put forth, a worker must produce. But likewise a business can’t simply hope that by promoting some workers over others that the entire work force will be able to infer a set of expectations. Management must be able to articulate what they prize and be able to give clear rules by which the employees can measure their own output in relation to their peers. Fairness is a central concept in human behavior and it governs how people perceive an activity as worthwhile or worthless. By stating a set of objectively measured criteria for promotion, businesses can expect to keep a larger percentage of the work force willing to stay and work, even for lesser wages. It is when the management of a business is thought to be arbitrary and capricious that friction ensues with departures following shortly.
Unfortunately, the business my friend was leaving seems not to have learned this message. His departure is one of many in the past year and more are likely. It seems that the Pilgrims story still has a lot to teach us if only we would listen.