وضعیت ، سلطه و وابستگی

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Status, Dominance, and Affiliation

Baxter hates Truman

Baxter’s my dog. He’s a mutt, a gregarious, happy, expressive dog who manages to get along with just about every human and dog he meets.

Except for Truman.

Truman is the regal, self-assured German Shepherd who just moved in across the street. Truman’s got a loving family, he goes for walks a few times a day, and he’s driving Baxter crazy.

When Truman’s fabulous family came over for dinner, they brought Truman along. Baxter freaked out. He couldn’t control himself.

What’s up with that?

Consider the penguins in the Galápagos. They spend about two hours a day fishing, and the rest of the time organizing themselves into a pecking order. There’s an enormous amount of social grooming, of bumping, of social positioning.

And it’s not just my dog and the penguins, of course.

It’s us, as well.

It’s not irrational; status makes it the right choice

Why do people choose one restaurant over another? One college? Why drive this car and not that one?

Why did that poker champion make a bad bet? Why rent a house instead of buying one? What club do you belong to?

If you look closely at decisions that don’t initially make sense, you’ll likely see status roles at work. The decision didn’t make sense to you, but it made perfect sense to the person who made it.

We spend a lot of time paying attention to status.

Status roles: The Godfather and the undertaker

In his brilliant book Impro, Keith Johnstone helps us understand status roles, the hidden (but obvious) drivers of all elements of culture.

There’s always an alpha dog in the pack. And every litter has a runt.

Status roles determine who gets to eat first in the lion pack, and who gets to drink first at the oasis.

In human culture, status roles are everywhere that more than one human is present. They exist in dating (who picks up the check) and in the boardroom (who comes in first, who sits where, who speaks, who decides, who’s responsible).

My favorite example, one that captures the essence of Johnstone’s point, is easily found if you visit YouTube and search for the opening scene of The Godfather.

In the scene, Amerigo Bonasera, the undertaker, a washed-out, tired, small man in a nondescript black suit, comes to visit the Godfather on the don’s daughter’s wedding day.

In just a few seconds, the stage is already set.

The low-status Bonasera (how could he be lower?) comes to visit the high-status Don Corleone, a man who has spent his entire life ensuring that he is on top of the status heap.

On this wedding day, though, the tradition is that the Godfather must grant any favor that is asked.

Over the course of just a few minutes of film, the universe is upended.

Bonasera asks Don Corleone to do violence to the men who have harmed his daughter. Family ties drive him to take a huge risk, to raise his status at the expense of the Godfather. To make things worse, he even offers to pay Corleone, transforming a patriarch into a hoodlum.

Oh, the tension.

In that moment, the undertaker’s life is in jeopardy. He has gone too far. Parental pride has pushed him into a zone where the Godfather can’t possibly operate. The Godfather can’t grant this favor and maintain his status, and status is his lifeblood.

Through some remarkable directing jiu-jitsu, in just a few seconds, the normal order is restored, and the scene ends with the undertaker bowing to the Don and kissing his ring, pledging fealty.

Bonasera relieves the tension by returning to his place in the status hierarchy.

Status lets us

Status is our position in the hierarchy.

It’s also our perception of that position.

Status protects us.

Status helps us get what we want.

Status gives us the leverage to make change happen.

Status is a place to hide.

Status can be a gift or a burden.

Status creates a narrative that changes our perceived options, alters our choices, and undermines (or supports) our future.

And the desire to change our status, or to protect it, drives almost everything we do.

Case Study: Lions and Maasai warriors

How do we save the lions of Kenya and Tanzania?

Conservation biologist Leela Hazzah saw how encroachments on their environment were making it more difficult for the lions to survive. But she also knew that among many Maasai, a rite of passage for adolescent males was to singlehandedly kill a lion. This show of bravery was putting significant pressure on the lion population. It’s estimated that there are only thirty thousand lions in the region, down from two hundred thousand a generation or two ago.

All the rational arguments in the world aren’t powerful enough to change deeply held cultural beliefs, even in this community. The need for status (as a parent, as a young adult) is within all of us. Instead, Dr. Hazzah and her team worked to create new cultural beliefs built on top of basic human desires.

As we learned from the quarter-inch drill bit, the action isn’t always obviously connected with the desired emotion. In the case of the Maasai, the cultural goals are to bind the community to each other, to create feelings of empowerment and possibility, to inculcate bravery and patience, and to have a significant rite of passage. To raise the status of the boy as he becomes a man.

None of these goals are directly related to killing a lion. That was simply a historical artifact.

Working with and within the Maasai cultural systems, Dr. Hazzah and her team introduced a new rite of passage and built cultural influences around it. Instead of demonstrating bravery and patience by killing a lion, the young members of the culture now demonstrate those skills by saving one.

In their words, “Wildlife conservation has traditionally focused on wildlife, not people. At Lion Guardians, we take the opposite approach. For almost a decade, we have worked with local communities to protect lions and improve . . . community conservation by blending traditional knowledge and culture with science.” Now, the Maasai find and name lions, track them, and use radio telemetry to perform a census. Protecting a lion has become as much of a rite of passage as killing one used to be.

The status dynamic is always at work

Once seen, it can’t be unseen. Say a cop pulls over a motorist for running a stop sign. Who has status in that situation?

That same motorist goes on to the office, where he barks orders at the receptionist. Who has status?

A clash of status roles happens in any bureaucracy that only knows how to measure today’s status changes.

The roles we easily adopt at school—the class clown, the big man on campus, the A student—are status roles. And remember how hard we defended those roles, even when we had a chance to change them.

When the marketer shows up with her new idea, her opportunity, the offer to make change happen—every time, it’s a challenge to our status. We have the choice to accept (and move up or down, depending on the story we tell ourselves) or to turn down the offer and live with the tension of walking away.

It’s a mistake to believe that everyone wants to make their status higher. In fact, few people do. It’s also a mistake to believe that no one wants to make their status lower. If you’ve been conditioned to see yourself in a certain status role, you might fight to maintain and even lower your status.

The smart marketer begins to realize that some people are open and hungry for a shift in status (up or down), while others will fight like crazy to maintain their roles.

Status is not the same as wealth

In some circles, a Pulitzer-winning columnist has far more status than I do. A doctor in charge of a prestigious hospital might have more status than a wealthy plastic surgeon. And the penniless yogi in a little village in India has more status than the richest man in town, at least to some of his peers.

In the last few decades, we’ve gotten lazier in our nuance of awarding status, preferring it to be related to either the dollars in a bank account or the number of followers online. But status continues to take many forms.

Six things about status

Status is always relative. Unlike eyesight or strength or your bank balance, it doesn’t matter where you are on the absolute scale. Instead, it’s about perception of status relative to others in the group. 6 is bigger than 4, but lower than 11. There is no highest number.

Status is in the eyes of the beholder. If you are seen as low status by outsiders but as high status in your own narrative, then both things are true, at different times, to different people.

Status attended to is the status that matters. Status is most relevant when we try to keep it or change it. For many people, status is upmost in our minds in every interaction. But it only matters when the person we’re engaging with cares about status.

Status has inertia. We’re more likely to work to maintain our status (high or low) than we are to try to change it.

Status is learned. Our beliefs about status start early. And yet the cohort we are with can influence our perception of our status in very little time.

Shame is the status killer. The reason that shame is used as a lever is simple: it works. If we accept the shame someone sends our way, it undermines our entire narrative about relative status.

We adjust our status constantly, intuitively playing with it based on the situation. And when you bring your work to the market, nothing is considered before status roles.

Frank Sinatra had more than a cold

Frank Sinatra lived two lives, deeply in conflict with one another. As chronicled by Gay Talese, the outside world saw him at an apex, the definition of suave and sophisticated. He was a high-status power broker, a serious man, the one and only.

When Frank looked in the mirror, though, he saw a low-status skinny kid, disrespected, barely holding on to what he had. He surrounded himself with yes men and sycophants, but still managed to have self-sabotaging tantrums and a miserable life that belied his fame, fortune, and good health.

When we bring status into our marketing, we are walking on very thin ice. We don’t know if the person we’re engaging with appears to have high status (and doesn’t believe it) or actually believes and wants to increase his standing.

But it’s not clear that we have much choice . . . because every big decision is made based on our perceptions of status.

Learning to see status

The idea of status isn’t nearly as simple as it appears. Consider, for those you seek to serve, their external status (how they are seen by their chosen community) and their internal status (who they see when they look in the mirror).

Next, work through how they maintain or seek to change that status. Do they belittle others? Seek approval? Help in selfless ways? Drive themselves to achieve more? What sort of wins and losses do they track? Consider the following two XY grids.

People in the top-right quadrant (a) are rare indeed. This space belongs to people who are seen as powerful and who also see themselves as able to handle it. I’d put Oprah Winfrey in this category. This is the person who is able to choose, not the one who is waiting to be chosen.

The top-left quadrant (d) is more common, since people who end up with high status often doubt themselves. This can turn them into divas. The best stories about Frank Sinatra are about the juxtaposition of his perceived royalty status with his own need for affirmation. Impostor syndrome lies here.

The bottom-right quadrant (b) is for people who see themselves as far better than the rest of the world does. This is where you can find artistic drive and a willingness to strive for better. But over time, it can also lead to bitterness.

And finally, the bottom-left quadrant (c) is where we categorize people who see themselves as undeserving (and the world agrees). While this appears to be a sad place, it’s also a consistent one, which is why we’ve embedded this role in the hierarchical culture. This is Cinderella before the ball, never expecting a chance for more. This is the coal miner, fighting to keep a dangerous, low-paying job.

Before we do the analysis, though, there’s one more grid:

In many interactions, people seek to change their relative status—either to adjust themselves up in comparison to their peers, or to seek safety by giving up and moving down.

Moving down creates safety because there’s more room and less threat. Fewer people jostle here for a better view or the chance to eat lunch first.

People are intensely aware of their relative status. We can move up or down. We can do that by helping/pushing others up or down. We can open the door for others and enable them to increase their status, or we can spend time denigrating others or increasing our own status.

In quadrant 1, we see the philanthropist, the committed teacher, and the social justice proponent. She seeks to improve her status with others by demonstrating the power to focus on those with low status instead of herself. This is certainly how Superman came to be understood by us. He could rob banks, but he saves lives instead.

In quadrant 2, we see similar behavior for a different reason. This is the person who not only lets other people ahead in line but doesn’t even bother to try out for a role, because others are more deserving.

Quadrant 3 is the antisocial character who presents a noxious, infantile narcissism to the world. He’s angry, he knows he can’t measure up, but he’s going to take down everyone around him. O. J. Simpson and Martin Shkreli are here.

And quadrant 4 is the hard-charging selfish person who desperately wants to win every engagement, and who is willing to do it with a combination of creating value and tearing down the competition.

Different stories for different people

We each have our own narratives. The noise in our head, the worldview that is unique to us, the history and beliefs and perceptions that shape who we are and what we choose. And sonder is the generous act of accepting that others don’t want, believe, or know what we do—and have a similar noise in their heads.

But in order to bring our change to the world, we need to make some assumptions about what others believe. We can’t hear the noise in their heads, but we can watch what they do and make some guesses.

There is a schism in our culture. In various moments, there are two sides that tell themselves very different stories and act them out in different ways: 1) the populations that default, in certain settings, to dominion, and 2) those that seek affiliation.

Affiliation and dominion are different ways to measure status

Every search on “nicest guy in Hollywood” brings up a picture of Tom Hanks. And every search on “The Godfather” brings us a picture of the fictional Don Corleone.

Tom Hanks cares about affiliation. Don Corleone measured domination instead.

Seeing the difference unlocks an understanding of our world, our political landscape, and how your customers might see things. This section of our journey is filled with personas, narratives, and exaggerations about each worldview.

Affiliation:

The questions that someone who cares about affiliation asks himself and those around him: Who knows you?

Who trusts you?

Have you made things better?

What is your circle like?

Where do you stand within the tribe?

Can’t we all get along?

Dominion:

The questions and statements that someone who cares about dominion offers to himself and those around him: This is mine, not yours.

Who has more power?

I did this myself.

My family needs more of what we already have.

My side dominating your side means I don’t have to be in charge, as long as my leader is winning.

On the ball field, a twelve-year-old might care about nothing but winning. And not just winning, but beating the opposition. He’ll impugn the referee’s motives, stomp on toes, and hold nothing back in order to win.

That same kid doesn’t care at all about being at the top of his class, but he cares a lot about who sits next to him on the bus.

In the jazz band, someone is keeping track of how many solos he gets, and someone else wants to be sure she’s helping keep the group in sync.

The people you’re seeking to serve in this moment: What are they measuring?

If you want to market to someone who measures dominion or affiliation, you’ll need to be aware of what’s being measured and why.

“Who eats first” and “who sits closest to the emperor” are questions that persist to this day. Both are status questions. One involves dominion; the other involves affiliation.

Not simply eating first, but being on the same team as the person who eats first. And getting pleasure out of watching others eat last.

Not simply sitting near the emperor, but knowing that you’ll be in his good graces (and those of the rest of the royal court) tomorrow as well.

Which is the narrative your audience resonates with?

Learning from pro wrestling

What is pro wrestling, really, but a battle for status?

It’s not just among the wrestlers, but also among the fans. Because when your hero moves up, so do you.

If you can see the lens that pro wrestling and its fans use to see the world while they’re at a match, you can understand how some people will view your offering as well.

The alternative to dominion is affiliation

One can gain status without an oil well or a factory. And one can enjoy as much status by letting someone into the flow of traffic as they can from cutting him off.

This is the status that comes from the community. It is the status of respect in return for contribution, for caring, for seeing and being in sync with others. Especially others with no ability to repay you.

Modern society, urban society, the society of the internet, the arts, and innovation are all built primarily on affiliation, not dominion.

This type of status is not “I’m better.” It’s “I’m connected. I’m family.” And in an economy based on connection, not manufacturing, being a trusted member of the family is priceless.

Fashion is usually about affiliation

What are they showing? What is everyone else doing? Is this the season?

Within competitive markets, there is a race to be the dominant voice, but among the customers that make up that market, the position of leader works because the customers desire to be affiliated with one another.

The leader provides a valuable signal, a notice to expect that everyone else will be in sync. The goal isn’t winning; it’s being part of the group.

Sending dominance signals

Uber built its brand on dominance. The first few years of their rollout were marked by contentious relationships with local governments, competitors, and drivers. This signaling aligned with the view of some investors, employees, and users and permitted them to double down on their story and how it was told. There are some customers, partners, and employees who will respond best to a narrative of winning and losing.

What kind of company do you want to work for? People who align with one worldview often have trouble imagining why someone would choose the alternative.

Sending affiliation signals

Marketers spend an enormous amount of time and money on the simple task of sending affiliation signals. How busy is the trade show booth? Who else is at the launch party? Who blurbed the book? Are “people” talking about it (which is shorthand for “Are people like us doing something like this?”)?

Affiliation isn’t as focused on scarcity as dominion is, because affiliation admires the network effect. More affiliation leads to affiliation for everyone involved. Abundance is welcome.

The affiliated marketer seeking leverage works to prime the pump by sending the right signals to the right people, in search of a cascade. For an investment bank, that means running the tombstone ads with the names of all the “right” firms at the bottom. For a business-to-business seller, that means creating referrals. For a local craftsperson, it means hunkering down in a single neighborhood until a reputation is assured.

Dominion is a vertical experience, above or below. Affiliation is a horizontal one: Who’s standing next to me?

Affiliation or dominance is up to the customer, not you

Do you see the world in terms of winners and losers? Up and down? Or is it more about insiders and outsiders, being in sync, being part of a movement?

The way you see the world isn’t nearly as important as the worldview of those you seek to serve.

As we’ve seen, their worldview is always stronger than the story you choose to tell. The people we seek to serve have a noise in their heads that’s different than your noise.