Let me tell you the story of poor Kitty Genovese.
Kitty was a young woman who was stabbed to death in New York City back in 1964 (I first heard about her in Malcolm Gladwell’s book, The Tipping Point).
Over the course of half an hour, she was attacked three times on the street as neighbors watched from their windows.
There were 38 witnesses to the horrific event, yet not a SINGLE person called the police during the attack.
The case caused a huge outcry in the news, and prompted psychologists to conduct a series of studies to understand why this happened.
They came up with a term for that phenomenon: the Bystander Effect.
The Bystander Effect is the idea that in an emergency, the greater the number of bystanders, the less likely that anyone will help.
This means that if you’re in the middle of a crowded area walking by yourself, and you get a heart attack, then chances are that no one’s going to help you out.
Side note: if that ever happens to you, the best way to survive is to point at someone specifically and tell them to call 911 because you think you’re having a heart attack
This is closely related to the “diffusion of responsibility” concept, where everyone’s responsibility is no one’s responsibility.
For Kitty, this means that if there were fewer witnesses, then she would have probably survived the ordeal.
So how does this relate to assigning responsibility in teams?
If people are not willing to take action to help someone who is dying due to the bystander effect, then they will probably not take responsibility for assigned tasks in groups.
This is particularly true for teams that are virtual.
As a matter of fact, the bystander effect is compounded even further in virtual teams because of the lack of face-to-face interaction.
So to avoid the bystander effect in your team, it is important to assign the responsibility of tasks to specific people.
Here are two tips to do this right.
#1: Use Direct Language
First, you want to use direct language. This means using straight-to-the-point language that tells people exactly who is responsible for getting things done. This avoids confusion and ambiguity.
For example, if you say “David, I think we should work on this task,” you’re using indirect language because the words “think” and “we” makes it seem like you’re only alluding to the fact that David needs to work on the task (which David might not pick up on).
However, if you say “David, I need YOU to work on this task,” you would be using direct language and avoiding any confusion about the fact that you want David to work on the assignment.
#2: Assign to Individuals
The second tip is to make sure you assign to individuals, and NOT to groups.
Assigning tasks to more than one person will still create a bystander effect within that small group.
If a task requires more than one person to work on it, then assign the primary responsibility to a specific person, and the secondary responsibility to others.
So instead of saying “David, Jessica, and Steve will be responsible for completing this task,” you should say “David will be responsible for completing this task, and both Jessica and Steve will help him out”
Hope this helps!
Cheers,
Hassan
P.S. I published a Kindle book called “Influencing Virtual Teams” where I share more cool tactics like this one. Check it out by clicking here.
