Laura Morgan Roberts has recently left the Harvard Business School to join the faculty at Georgia State University
KARL MOORE: This is Karl Moore, talking management for The Globe and Mail. Today, I'm speaking to Laura Morgan Roberts, who's recently left the Harvard Business School to join the faculty at Georgia State University. Good afternoon, Laura.
LAURA MORGAN ROBERTS: Good afternoon, Karl.
KM: You've been working for a while on this idea of positive identity. What is a positive identity?
LMR: Well, that's been at the centre of my research, trying to answer that very question. What does it mean to have a positive identity? I've been exploring that in a variety of different ways. What I've focused on a lot, recently, is positive identity at the level of the individual. But we can also talk about what it means for a team to have a positive identity, what it means for an organization to have a positive identity, what does it mean for a society to have a positive identity. Let me talk a little bit about what it means for an individual in an organization to have a positive identity.
KM: So you focus, primarily, on the context of an organization rather than [on the]family or in the neighbourhood, whatever - your focus has been primarily in the organization.
LMR: With respect to the question of positive identity, really focusing on what does it mean to have a positive work-related identity. But let's acknowledge that it's really important to have positive dynamics taking place in all aspects of life to be able to construct a positive work-related identity as well. So, there is some interchange between the domains of life, but we're really focusing on work-related identities.
And one of the exciting projects that I'm working on, as I mentioned, is trying to understand how organizational scholars have talked about, examined and studied positive identity so that we can understand more about how positive identity itself can be a tool or mechanism for generative change and action in organizations.
So, in that work, my colleagues Jane Dutton and Jeffrey Bednar and I have found that - we talk about positive identity in four different ways that depict different sets of assumptions that we have about the very question you asked - what does it mean to be positive?
So, one of the ways that you can think of a positive identity is from a virtue perspective. So, if you have a positive work-related identity, it means that the core, the content of your identity contains character strengths and virtues - courage, humility, authenticity, integrity - you know, the various character strengths and virtues [that]have been highlighted by many scholars for years - theological scholars, philosophers.
Recently, in the domain of positive psychology and positive organizational scholarship, we've tried to understand more about character strengths and virtues and their relevance for our lives in organizations. So, one of the ways that an individual can see themselves as positive or construct themselves in a positive way, is by really defining and understanding the character strengths that are unique and central to their self and, then acting in accordance with those character strengths and virtues.
KM: So, one of the organizational challenges is to help people and allow people to do that.
LMR: Absolutely.
KM: And not, again, in the way of having them act in an inauthentic manner at work because that goes against their positive identity.
LMR : Absolutely, so, one of the sets of practices that we've identified, that can help to cultivate a more virtuous identity, are pro-social practices in organizations - practices that allow individuals in organizations opportunities to participate in helping, [to behave generously and compassionately]and see that their actions are having an impact on others. You know, once they start to see themselves behaving in these ways, and they identify with the organization that is sponsoring - providing the resources, the support and the context for them to do this work - they also start to understand more about who they are in a virtuous way. So, that's one way to tie in an authentic link to a virtuous identity.
Another way is through an exercise that we've developed through the Centre for Positive Organizational Scholarship at the University of Michigan that's called the Reflected Best Self Exercise. The Reflected Best Self Exercise is designed to help individuals understand more about who they are at their best. And we've learned from our research thousands of executives, thousands of MBA students, and even thousands of undergraduate students have taken this assessment.
The assessment involves gathering feedback from other people. They give you different stories and reflections of times when they saw you at your best. And then, you analyze those stories and feedback to understand more about your character strengths and virtues and how people experience you when you're using those strengths in a way that's constructive and generative for them, as well as an experience that gives you some sense of gratification and joy.
So, that's another example of how an organization can provide a set of practices or experiences for individuals to be able to see themselves or cultivate their identity in more of a virtuous way.
But there are other ways that we can think about an identity being positive in organizations and, some of the practices that I've just mentioned can help to cultivate positive identity in those ways too.
KM: What are the other three?
LMR: Evaluative, okay? That's, how do I feel about myself? Do I regard myself in a positive, favourable way because of who I am as an individual, unique from other people in the environment? That can be one source of self-esteem or self-efficacy. I can also evaluate myself in a positive way because I feel proud of the organization to which I belong and the identity of the organization, and that can enhance my sense of self.
The third dimension is developmental perspective. You know, I see myself in a positive way because I understand, from a developmental perspective, that I am in a process of maturing or evolving in a way that involves me becoming stronger, better, wiser, more mature in some way.
The fourth way that an individual can be positive in an organization or construct a positive identity in an organization is probably the most complex because it really speaks to the structural perspective on identity - the fact that, the structure of my identity involves lots of different parts.
From a social identity perspective, I have different roles that define who I am. So, I am an academic, which means I'm a scholar, it means I'm a teacher, it means I'm an author, it means I'm a mentor, it means I'm a protégé, it means I'm a learner, it means that I am a member of a particular department. I also have other identities as a mother, I have an identity as a wife, I have an identity as an African-American woman and all of these different identities that I hold. For my identity to be positive, these different categories need to be in harmony in some way so that I have an experience of integrity as opposed to an experience of fragmentation.
So, oftentimes, individuals will come to work and feel like they have to check a part of their identity at the door. That's kind of the lay language - are you bringing your whole self to work or are you feeling fragmented, inauthentic at work because there are parts of your identity that you really value that you're not able to bring into work … and expressing in ways that could be valuable and productive.
It doesn't mean that you necessarily need to express everything about your identity in order to have a positive identity at work or a positive experience. But it's just that the aspects of your identity that are valuable and most important to you and that can actually offer you some opportunities to make unique and valuable contributions in the organization - that you're having regular opportunities to be able to do that.
KM: This has been Karl Moore, talking management for The Globe and Mail. Today, I've been speaking to Laura Morgan Roberts, formally from Harvard Business School, now with Georgia State University.
AFTERTHOUGHT: This week, I am continuing an experiment where I have asked two McGill MBAs to join me in reflecting on the preceding interview and giving our two cents' worth. This week, I would like to thank Parisa Beheshti and Mike Ross for their input as I prepared the following comments:
We are fans of positive psychology. One outgrowth of this movement in the business school is appreciative inquiry (AI). One of the key ideas of AI is that managers should not always focus on problems, where we are falling short of targets, etc., but managers should also seek out positive deviations and understand where we are enjoying success. When we spend a day on executive programs on AI, it is inevitably well received and an idea that often is raised in major papers done by executives.
It is an idea that seems resonate particularly well with experienced, practising managers. Too often as managers, we found that we were constantly looking for solutions to problems. All day it seemed it was problem, solution, problem, solution. AI encourages us not just to seek out problems but also to seek out, understand and celebrate new approaches, innovations and better ways of doing things.
With this interview it is the first time we really focused on the notion of a positive identity in the workplace. On the topic of value alignment, one of the things that many of the CEOs we have heard from say is that you must find a company whose values align with yours. The difficulty is that, these days, most companies state values that are in line with those that Prof. Roberts identifies as being highlighted by scholars for years. As a consequence, it is very rare to see the type of car-crash misalignment that she discusses these days, but much more common to see the insidious slow deviation from one's core truths as managers, partners and colleagues nudge you in a generally accepted direction. In other words, death by a thousand cuts.
For MBAs and undergrads in the midst of interviewing this time of year, the alignment of values that she discusses is something an individual needs to do prior to engaging a future employer. One of the guest CEOs in our class told us how, early in her career, when she realized that the new ownership of the company where she worked expressed values that did not align with her own, she quit. Good on her. Should someone consider working for a company whose values they are not already aware of? We see it is an individual's responsibility to ensure their values and any potential employers' align or they are doomed before they even begin in their efforts to form a positive identity. Positive identity strikes us an idea which is particularly relevant for the generation under 35. We hope it is an area that senior managers give credence to in the next decade. Karl Moore