https://swimmingintheflood.libsyn.com/100-match-their-enthusiasm
Imagine you are Steve Jobs (and you are still alive). You are Steve Jobs and you step on the stage of an Apple new product launch. Let’s say it’s the iPad. You are ready to unveil the iPad. Your team worked for years on this product. Thousands of hours maybe hundreds of thousands of hours have gone into its development and today is the day you are going to release it to the world. Got the image in your mind? Good. You are wearing your traditional black turtleneck and jeans. You slink around the stage like a panther ready to pounce. It’s your moment. Then, suddenly, someone in the crowd screams, “What song is it you want to hear?”
The staid and stoic crowd immediately rises and in unison screams, “Freebird!” How do you think Jobs would react?
(Music) Welcome to Swimming in the Flood; a podcast where develop the resilient leader’s mindset by navigating difficult currents in business. My name is Trent Theroux.
We all have sat in dozens of audiences throughout our lives, in school auditoriums, convention centers, churches, and funerals. Each of us has some level of appreciation for the venue in which we are sitting and what is expected of us. My grandmother pleaded with me one time in advance of going to church to limit my fidgeting. Limit. A little fidgeting was okay in church as long as it was a little and quiet. The point is we each understand the social norms of an event before we enter.
The Steve Jobs example is a little different. Sometimes, the tenor of the crowd changes for some reason or the crowd may be tough to read. Ralph Turner put forth the Emergent Norm Theory which is the idea that norms emerge from within the crowd. Emergent norm theory states that crowds have little unity at their outset, but during a period of milling about, key members suggest appropriate actions, and following members fall in line, forming the basis for the crowd’s norms.
Last Saturday, I was scheduled to speak for the Boy Scouts of America at Fort Adams in Newport, Rhode Island. The organizers asked me if I would give the young scouts some words of wisdom or a relatable story. My answer was…sure. That’s what I do. I Develop Resilient Leaders and I’m willing to start when they are months out of the womb. The organizers told me that I was schedule to follow United States Senator Jack Reed on stage. During the week leading up to the performance, I prepared a poignant and mildly humorous story that delivered a touching ending about honoring our scout masters. During my five-mile run the morning of the show, I rehearsed my timing, hand gestures and stage blocking. I visualized the speech and the responses I would get at certain delivery points. Cooling off after my run, I was ready and sure that I would deliver to the event organizers a performance that the young scouts would remember and tell their parents about.
Fort Adams is a 19th century fort designed to protect the City of Newport, Rhode Island and its strategic harbor. The stage was set in front of the 30-foot-high stone walls and illuminated in a recessive purple hue. On each side of the stage was a 25’ high screen ready to display the events on the stage for the over 2,000 scouts, leaders and dignitaries in the audience. The was a great open-air venue on a gorgeous October evening and I was ready to kill it.
The energy of 2,000 plus people singing to the house music was palpable. I waited in the rear of the lawn watching the opening acts as I had over an hour to wait before my stage call. It felt wrong when I looked at my watch and only twenty minutes had passed before the speaker three in front of me was called to the stage.
The stage manager was exasperated at me for showing up late as the next act was called to the stage. I asked where Senator Reed was and the manager told me that Reed only sent a 20-second video message, essentially, I was next.
The gentleman on the stage was in his very early twenties. He laughed with his entire shoulders hunching while talking with the crowd. I thought that I met him while he was bagging my groceries at Stop and Shop last week. Yet, here he was explaining to the crowd that he was going to sing a song and when he yelled “Sock!” The crowd should repeat.
The bag boy on stage started singing a rock n’ roll song with lyrics about having dirty clothes and doing laundry. Then came the chorus. “I lost a sock, SOCK!” Wait a minute. He’s doing a Twisted Sister cover song about losing a sock in the dryer. “I lost a sock, SOCK!” My mind quickly pivoted to how I was going to go on stage next and attempt to tell a touching story about honoring our mentors and a dying scoutmaster and I’m going to follow this goofball who lost a sock, SOCK! This was not going to be good for me. This new Weird Al had the crowd going. It was exactly what scouts from eight to eighteen wanted. A sing along rock concert. Lord help me. I’m going to face the largest live audience of my career. Kids amped up on Snickers, Coca-Cola and 80s anthem rock waiting to tear me alive. How am I going to navigate this.
I am now going to give you my unscientific, non-peer reviewed, resilient leader theory on addressing a rowdy crowd. Are you ready? Got your pencils out? Here’s it is. Match Their Enthusiasm. You heard it. Match Their Enthusiasm.
Gustave Le Bon writes in The Crowd: A Study of the Popular mind, “Under certain given circumstances and only under certain circumstances, an agglomeration of men presents new characteristics very different from those of the individuals composing it. The sentiments and ideas of all the persons in the gathering take one and the same direction, and their conscious personalities vanishes. A collective mind is formed, doubtless transitory, but presenting very clearly defined characteristics.” In other words, Gustave is saying that crowds get rowdy. They feed off each other. If you don’t believe me watch some tape from January 6th and you will see a bunch of regular folks who thought they were going to have a peaceful rally end up walking into the Capital building and ultimately being arrested.
I got on stage and felt a buzz from the crowd. I could hear the last remnants of the applause they gave the chucklehead before me. They were waiting…waiting. Rapidly in my mind I started cutting my story. I started telling the story without my normal pauses, without a lilt in my voice and without some of the story’s heart. I could feel I was losing the audience. This is a story I’ve told on stage a dozen times, that has made grown men cry and I felt like I was speaking into a black hole. I was waiting for someone to yell, “What song is it you wanna hear?” But this crowd’s parents may not have been born when that line came out.
Quickly, I thought that I needed to create some energy on the stage. I needed to give the scouts more of what they were thirsting for. I needed to Match Their Energy. In my mental rolodex of scout campfire songs, there is one beyond all else that can get a crowd clapping their hands and stomping their feet. It’s called The Rooster Song. The song is about a farmer who has a series of problems that his wife complains about. On the farm, there is a rooster who slyly fornicates with each of the people or problems and the result is a pun relating to something half chicken and half-other. Against my better judgment, here is one verse to help you understand.
Please note that I can’t carry a tune in a bag. But on this night, I let my freak out. I hee-hawed and hoot-hooted with the crowd. They yelled the lines back to me. They clapped. They stomped. And they roared with applause when the song was over. A somber story was not what this ravenous crowd wanted or expected. I met their enthusiasm, and we were both better off for the experience.
Folks, thank you for listening to Swimming in the Flood. Resilient leaders face challenging currents, and it is tough navigating, but with one tack or another we can get there together.