Don't scorn your Introverts!

There's a minority group that gets so little respect most people don't even know they exist. Yet there are 85 million members of this group in the US alone. Members of this minority are everywhere, quietly going about their business, living privately even in the most public of careers. You may be married to one and not even realize it!  I'm not talking about gays or AIDS sufferers or blacks. I'm not talking about the homeless or the depressed, though they too are often invisible to the vast majority of Americans. I'm talking about America's most despised minority, the introverts. 

This despised sub-class makes up 25% of the population, yet in the world of business, gets 1% of the respect. And businesses lose out by scorning the introverts in their work teams. So for just a moment, consider the plight of the introvert.

 Because three fourths of the population are extraverts who think a liking for privacy is suspicious, even sick, introverts are routinely steamrollered in the normal course of life. Their needs for downtime, breathing space, and quiet are ignored. The need for privacy is rarely if ever respected, let alone understood.

 In one team-building session I remember, folks were asked to draw two circles, one depicting what they wanted in life, the other what they felt they had now. Then all were asked to find someone they hadn't met and explain their drawings to that person. Many of the extraverts in the room found this exercise fun, stimulating, and a chance to really be with others in a significant way. But for many introverts, it felt like a terrible invasion of privacy. Worth doing, perhaps, but excruciatingly painful — especially if the drawings had been honest.Extraverts don't see what the problem is with introverts.

Extraverts wonder why introverts can’t scream and cheer and stomp like us. Of course, extraverts can indulge in hair-pulling on TV reality shows, and that's just fine. They are the ones who do the Wave and enjoy line dancing. Introverts, by contrast, would rather have a root canal than do the Funky Chicken in public.

Introverts just rub extraverts the wrong way. From the extravert's point of view, people who would rather sit quietly than dance the Macarena have something wrong with them. So introverts get labels like these:

• Party poopers
• Loners
• Antisocial
• Stiff
• Stand offish

In the worst cases introverts get misread as arrogant, supercilious, and snobbish, when all they really are is focused inward.

In the work place, introverts often get branded as bad team players, non-leaders, uninspiring, and bad communicators when in fact none of these labels may apply. What's being taken for deficient skills or abilities may simply be introversion. But then, guess who probably wrote the evaluation. Odds are it was an extravert.

Introverts can wear public faces. Many introverts have had very visible careers as actors, singers, politicians, diplomats and preachers. Alec Guinness, Abraham Lincoln, Gandhi, were all famously introverted yet very successful in public engagements. Introverts often have a sort of switch they can throw which enables them to take and hold center stage and mix it up with the rest of the party. But introverts burn out if they're on stage too much. Being with others, focused on others, attentive to others all day long exhausts them. They may be able to do it, but they pay a high price. Exhausted, they go back to their hotel rooms for a quiet dinner and maybe a little reading before tomorrow's conference, lecture, demonstration, performance.

Introverts may be quiet, but they definitely bring something to the social world. Sometimes being quiet lets you listen more effectively. Sometimes stepping back from the fray not only restores the introvert’s spirit, but lets them participate more effectively when they do speak up.

Introverts may be brilliant, creative, intuitive, reflective, steady and supportive. They may be investigators, social workers, psychiatrists, historians, plumbers, naturalists – you name it. But if you’re a manager or business owner and you tromp on your introverts despite their talents, you’re losing out on real contributions from some very strong people.

Introverts provide the world with many things that extraverts also give. But the special value of introverts in group or team settings is to put the steadying rhythm into the music of the group. Music without breaks, meaningful and measured silent spaces, is a drone or a hum or the roar of traffic on the interstate. But put in those moments of silence, and you get structure, meaning, and a satisfying sense of completeness. Introverts provide the meaningful intervals of quiet to keep the world's yammer from becoming overwhelming.

 So please, all you extraverts, give the introverts among you a little respect. They can do a lot for you. If you'll just back off and let a few quiet moments pass, you'll find out what that contribution can be. Just don't assume their differences make them bad companions or bad corporate citizens. Introverts are your other half, your inward self. Get to know them and they’re not so bad. Get to know them, and they’re a lot like you.