Old Code - Revisited. Why Likeable Trumps Competence.
Dennis Moseley-Williams
Keynote Speaker & Business Consultant. Client Experience Expert helping small business owners grow. A speaker who isn't afraid to question your perspective.
In my book, I wrote about this idea that I refer to as Old Code, which is the term I use to label the lingering influence of basic instinct.
Old Code is the really old programming that runs constantly in the back of your brain, primitively and stubbornly fixated on eating, being afraid and reproducing.
I recently found a fascinating little article on Old Code that I wanted to share with you. According to Amy Cuddy, a Harvard Business School professor (a good school, I checked), when people meet you they determine whether or not they like you and can trust you within a couple of seconds. You can read about it here, but let me paraphrase the essence of it for you.
In approximately 2 seconds or less, they will ask themselves and answer these two questions:
Can I trust this person?
Can I respect this person?
Psychologists refer to these dimensions as warmth and competence and obviously you want to be perceived to have a lot of both.
Most people believe that in a professional setting, competence is the more important factor of the two, when in fact it isn’t. Warmth, or trustworthiness, is the most important factor that determines how a person will evaluate you.
We can thank millions of years of evolution for this – after all, before we had to worry about how good you might be at hunting a wooly mammoth or building a fire, we first had to determine whether or not our new friend was going to bash our head in with a rock.
Old Code dies hard.
Nothing has changed – whether you are an architect, a financial advisor, a consultant, an executive looking for a new job, or a caterer – before anyone even considers how competent you are, they first have to satisfy the issue of how likeable you are, which is directly related to how warm and friendly you are perceived to be.
It pays to be nice, and being nice is really cheap. Plus, nice guys really do finish first.
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DMW Consulting is:
Tom Frisby | @seriousshift
Dennis Moseley-Williams | @moseleywilliams