Prestige Runaway

Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist (1849-1936), is credited as being the first to describe the idea of classical conditioning. In the 1890's Pavlov investigated the gastric function of dogs by externalizing a salivary gland so that he could measure and analyze the saliva and the response it had to food in different situations. He noticed that dogs tended to salivate before food was actually delivered to their mouths and went on to research to investigate the phenomenon. In his experiments he manipulated the stimuli occuring before the presentation of food and established the basic laws for 'conditional reflexes' and learned behaviour.

Allow me to relate learned behaviour to our everyday lives. Our society is quite homogenous in terms of what is popular to wear, what slang to use and how to style your hair. We are obsessed with showy displays of wealth. There are very few leaders and innovators because established trends are well established and trigger the stimulus -> reaction response in all of us. For instance, when you see a woman wearing a very expensive dress and a shiny necklace at a cocktail party you immediately have an impression of her. Thoughts such as "she must have money" or "she must be important" may come to mind.

We are all guilty of this 'prestige runaway' to some extent. We get caught up in brand buy-in and focus far too much on materialism and the shallow things in life. Consider these two examples:

• Rex is on steroids, has a nice fake tan, blonde streaks in his hair, a bunch of tatoos, drives a Hummer and wears a $300 Ed Hardy t-shirt that cost $3 to manufacture.
• Stacey wears tons of make up, has hair extensions, fake breasts, wears hair extensions and 6 inch heels every single day.

How on earth could these attributes ever become popular? They are expensive, can cause health problems and may be very uncomfortable. In my opinion people perceive that having a certain image will somehow make them successful. They pick cues from others' images and adopt them as their own, in turn creating a feedback loop that increases the importance of the cue. We need to understand that it's not the cue (such as big breasts or muscles) that create success for an individual. True leaders understand this and have the ability to blend in while being very different from the rest. On the surface they may look like everyone else but it's the intangibles that you should pay attention to. Look at the things that they do which others aren't doing. Today, I challenge you to examine a great leader and identify what truly makes them successful.