The collective frustrations behind some successful LinkedIn posts

I have always questioned how things work in Social Media. Some simple triggers can make people move their finger and just press "like" or assume the idea and "share" it. This works the same even on a professional network like LinkedIn. Being already popular always helps. But what is the mechanism? 

Let’s take this example. A simple truism posted by a LinkedIn influencer gathered +1.3 M likes. I am following Oxford (my University), HBR, MIT, Bain and McKinsey among the others. They are heavyweights, big time influencers that provide superb insights, however they cannot enjoy this kind of audience reaction. And is not only driven by subject, because they have also a large pool of followers, who are interested in the subject matter. Giving a like to HBR or sharing their polished articles can also help people looking smart and improve equity among peers. But people seem not to be that interested in smart rational stories, even in a professional network.

Instagram works on visual dreams, LinkedIn seems to do a great job expressing indirectly the employees frustrations.

I imagine that the majority of the ones that liked the post, did it because they felt inside their soul that they resonate with the same issues. Being miss-treated and unappreciated at their work place.

Freeze, Fight, Flight

Probably a lot of people are still in Freeze phase. They cannot express the sentiments freely and directly inside their company, but at least is safer to give a "like" to someone who can voice indirectly their frustration. A "like" on this kind of post acts as a distress signal. The victim of his own company or boss is too afraid to face the aggressors or to take any action (fight or flight) to improve his own life. Instead just releases a Mayday signal, at least to release some of the internal steam. Perhaps things could be different if companies would hire psychologists in order to improve self-awareness and self-management for both managers and regular employees.

Marketing is about connecting emotions

The challenge in Marketing is about how to best connect a brand by using the lens of an idea with the right customers and their right emotional space. The market is not where the supply meeting the demand, but rather the place of a joint dream or ambition. Or in this case, the safe harbour of a joint fear or deception.

Technology works brilliantly segmenting people based on their hopes or anxieties, just knowing what did they like. Inside their bubble, emotions and drama are building up and augmented by comments and shares. Regular people feel empowered when they see that many others resonate with their own issues.

In my case, I like to write articles upon human emotions and biases and how these impact important management decisions. Perhaps these are my own frustrations after working in different companies with different great or not so great managers. I write significant fewer articles about what worked well and far more about my past miseries. I still try to understand what is the mechanism that transforms a regular nice person into a despot, only because it becomes intoxicated with power. Or how a decent guy becomes an autocrat acting like a violent parent with his kids, just because he needs control. The future is unpredictable and some people perceive that using strong power can bring a better chance to survive (and keep also his position). A supra-compensatory mechanisms.

What I find amazing in writing my articles about managerial biases, is not that the people that LIKED (an active action), but the ones that READ* the articles came in vast majority from companies with epic managerial issues.

Even in the case of these popular pop posts like the two displayed here, despite being plagued by truisms, could help people understand better that their own issues are not singular. They could have an important role to distill and manage the freeze phase. Hopefully some of those people will eventually move into fight or flight mode.

Another post with 3oo K likes:

*LinkedIn provides these analytics