Early Positive Campaigning protects against attacks even shortly before election day

It does matter when and which information we receive as voters prior to elections. The earlier we get positive information about the person of a candidate, the more sustainably this important first impression establishes our opinion and influences our evaluation of political combattants. The impact of political attacks – even of those which are launched shortly before election day – falls flat to a high extent. This is why early Positive Campaigning is so overwhelmingly strong and protective.

Negative Campaigning on the contrary works the best short-term: because on one hand negative information gets worn out over the entire time span of an campaign and on the other hand because it stays for temporarily more accurate in the memory.

And: we as the electorate remember personal information – positive and negative one alike – much better than political goals and strategies or even more detailled political agendas.

This is the outcome of a recently conducted experiment of the University of San Diego, in which the author points out that political content will still continue to have its importance for voting decisions. But they are far less staying on us than person- related news.

How quickly we selectively forget: Experimental Tests of Information Order on Memory and Candidate Evaluation. Goggin, Political Psychology, vol. 40, nr. 1, February 2019, S 125 – 145.

From the practice:

What we learn upfront and in the end, we remember best. That´s why start and closing of any meeting and any presentation is key. Exciting that this principle is also valid for campaigns in total and not only stands for moments like TV-statements or speeches of candidates.

And interesting, too, that Negative Campaigning apparently unfolds ist hightest impact not before the very final days before election. This makes hope that this kind of knowledge furtheron decreases campaigns which are from top to toe full of attacks onto the political opponent.

Still, due to the experiment of San Diego, we as the electorate have to be aware of the fact that – in case a candidate fails to have been communicated within a personal Positive Campaign – each of us is keen to negative information shortly before the voting. Only a proper check of origin and sort of the accusations seems to be an adequate recipe for securing a qualified poll.

For my collaborration with politicians this means a) together with the client to personalize content = to integrate personal aspects like experiences, ideas or values into the scheduled appearances of the campaign, b) to train even more than before these appearances prior to the kick off of the campaign and c) to reflect and discuss particularly for the second half and the end of the campaign the active and reactive handling of political attacks.

Crucial influence on deal-making detected

Shaking hands at the beginning of a meeting delivers a lot more meaning than just politeness or knowledge about a ritual: Handshakes affect decisively deal-making outcomes – particularly in mixed-motive interaction. In 2 studies and 5 experiments with executives, MBA student and undergraduates a group of researchers from Berkeley, Chicago Booth and Harvard have not only detected this context, but also identified the underlying psychological mechanism:

Who receives handshaking in advance, ascribes his/her interlocutor a higher intent to cooperate. This triggers on the other hand one´s own cooperative behavior and finally both parties end up with a positive committment. Thus according to the academic conclusions better joint outcomes can be accomplished, regardless whether the situation is difficult or not.

This is even more interesting as the experiment shows 57% (!) socalled experienced negotiators who did avoid handshaking in the beginning of their respective meetings.

Having this in mind there seem to be huge potential for better joint results in negotiations and therefore for more sustainability in deals.

Handshaking promotes deal-making by signaling cooperative intent. Schroeder/ Risen/Gino/Norton, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2018, Advance online publication.

From the practice:

Shaking hands at the beginning of a meeting is in Europe doubtlessly more common than in the US where the study has been performed. And still there are some specific settings even with us where a lot of people feel pretty much uncomfortable when reflecting the question „Handshake yes or no?“: at court when encountering the opposing party in the aisle, at hearings when you as the candidate are called into the room and are faced with the jury and finally at a press conference when you as the speaker are observing journalists from selective media.

My recommendation is repeatingly the same: in dubio pro handshake.The current study confirms the experience of my clients in similar situations.

How do I explain these phenomenons? Well, physical contact creates emotional connection you can never entirely escape from. First because in our culture handshaking stands for respect in general – you need to fear less any bad treatment or foul play. And secondly because approaching proactively people and shaking their hands who are not friends by definition tells us something about your courage and your apparent or actual self-confidence. Reducing your opponent´s willingness to attack at least to a certain extent may be crucial in legal proceedings, in recruitement procedures and in challenging press events.

Concluding: there are only few possibilities how to hurt someone in a decent way more than neglecting or even rejecting this person´s offered handshake.

Huge differences between open and denied responsibility

Decisions of leaders who want to be liked are based on different criteria to those made by leaders who do not care about their popularity among employees: whereas the first ones intend to make the whole staff happy the second ones focus on increasing the performance of the team.

Managerial decisions materialize in either ways – in the end it depends how openly leaders have to take responsibility or not. 5 recent experiments at the Universities of Michigan and Florida brought up convincing evidence: leaders who want to be liked do make performance-oriented decisions, too, if they can hide behind somebody else as the alleged decision-maker and pretend it was not their fault that the specific decision went that way. In case an unpopular decision would get stuck with them under all circumstances, these leaders prioritize sometimes against better knowledge a decision agreeable to the employees.

The researchers point out that leaders who want ot be liked do behave here similarly to politicians. It´s not the quality of work which dominates decision-making but the opportuniity better or worse to increase one´s own popularity.

To lead or to be liked: When prestige-oriented leaders prioritize popularity over performance. Case/Bae/Maner, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2018, 115(4), 657-676.

From the practice:

Any leader knows: unpopular deicsions are part of the game and necessary – for instance if beloved traditions which are nowadays not justifiable anymore have to be left behind although the majority of voters, party hacks or employees would never change them.

Having worked with so many clients in so many different fields my observations tell that politicians are more successful with delaying decisions or denying responsibility. In politics where performance is not typically defined and evaluated by numbers it attracts much less (if even) attraction when decisions are based primarily on the rule of popularity. In the economy, though, often leaders of the second level solidarize with their teams and lay the blame on the top amangement for controversial decisions.

I have identified 2 potential hazards which could be a dilemma for you as a leader: 1. If you are more friend than superior and 2. if you are not able to communicate changes motivatingly. In the first case you need coaching, in the second one communication training.

To be liked as a leader is nothing bad after all and does not contradict in general to performace increase oder the implementation of new routines. But to avoid sustainable measures just to become or stay everybodys darling can jeopardize a lot. Please keep that in mind.

Expectations and context are most important influencers on people´s attention

The more information deviates from the expected and the customary the higher the attention it is getting. Being more positive or more negative, though, is for these extraordinary pieces of information irrelevant. This is the conclusion of an recently published study by the famed UCLA in collaboration with the University of Michigan. The common saying „Only bad news are good news“ has been proven to be wrong, indeed.

Furtheron: Expectations and things which are considered to be „customary“ change constantly. Whether right now positive or negative information stand out and succeed depends on the context. Based on analyses of economic data, media coverage and opinion surveys the authors proposed a mathematical formula which is to predict these dynamics and correlations but meaning in general: in an optimistic context negative news get more easily into the headlines whereas on the contrary in economically weak times or at war positive news are more significant. However, are the surroundings outstandingly positive, negative and positive announcement are equally effective – the negative ones because they disappoint so much, the positive ones because they motivate even more.

A Model of Attentiveness to Outlying News. Lamberson/Soroka. Journal Of Communication 68 (2018), 942 – 964.

From the practice:

In almost every single mediatraining participants are subtly trying to bash journalism. Their complaints: constructive mediawork is useless since these people in the media are definitely not interested in positive developments of any organisations. „only bad news are good news“, that´s it.

In these cases it is my task to clarify: this is not true as such. Positive news do trigger interest, too, but they have to be relavant. And relevant from the recipient´s perspective means: deviation from the norm when particularly many people are involved, wehne the results have not been expected at all, when new developments are unique, when there are unprecetented consequences, etc.

Yes, we thankfully do live in an era where most of us still have a good living standard meaning that according to the study mentioned above positive news have a difficult time. Yes, certainly there are biased journalists, business partners and employees, too and yes, pretty often some people tend to listen more carefully to negative news. But frankly speaking: just a soften I perceive during my work socalled positive information by companies or parties as being too complicated, too uncritical, too predictable or too irrelevant.

Take this classic example: You are talking about x more members or revenue, but fail to communicate proactively how this number has to be evaluated: is it the best, second best or otherwise somehow exceptional – perhaps even negatively? It does not help: for having me getting the relevance of any information you as the messenger have to work out the deviation from the expected and the usual.

Good news and positive topics still have their importance and chance. It is up to us to sell them properly.

Worry about negative consequences unjustifiable

We can handle truth and clarity much better than most of us generally think of: To assume that 1. Honest communication and the avoidance of socalled bad news are less socially accepted and 2. lead under all circumstances to negative consequences, is false. On the contrary: according to three experiments that have been run in the course of a joint study by the Chicago Booth and the Pittburgh`s Tepper School of Business social relations stay at least the same and sometimes even become stronger. Medium term people even grab more meaning in life after having been confronted with truthful communication instead of whitewashed facts.

The two US-scientists admit, though, that the exact functionality of the practice of radical candor of honesty has to be explored more in detail. Still, they derive from their results and send as a message to the world of management: a) executives need not be anxious before delivering painful truths and b) particularly in conflict resolution honest communication can avoid awkward negative spirals and contribute significantly to deescalation.

You can handle the truth. Mispredicting the consequences of honest communication. Levine/Cohen. In: 2018. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 147(9), 1400-1429.

From the practice:

Frankly speaking: the whitewashed phrases, the shifty flowers of speech and all those courtesy lies suck – they do not heighten and they do not elucidate – neither professionally nor privately.

100% ok with that! The more truthful, honest or direct we want to communicate, though, the better prepared, the more sensitive we should be. Wording and timing counts in my opinion most.

Truth and appreciation are not mutually exclusive! To communicate truthfully might work more often than we think. I.e. „Sorry, may I be honest to you?“ or „I want and I have to be honest with you“ are best practise preambles which announce masterfully that you will now speak clearly your mind. Your interlocutors or your audience are emotionally prepared then and will receive the truth much better.

You might provide honest feedback to employees calm and at eye level without unleashing frustrations. You might address the truth about the serious situation of the enterprise or the party with firm voice straightforwardly without provoking panic or resolution phenomena.

In case of doubt please train prior to delivery when you are going to do some frank talking today. It is always a balancing act – but it does pay off!

Meanwhile male politicians attack female competitors as often as men, though

Quantitatively there is no difference any more: 25,7 % of all communication in political TV debates in Germany consist of attacks like policy arguments, partisan charges , individual criticism or accusations – regardless whether men debate with men or men debate with women. (The remaining 74,3% are defined as acclaim or defense)

In terms of quality females in politics can be traced pretty well: 11,8% of these attacks are actually offenses – pejorative in their wording, exaggerating or negatively generalizing. In TV debates between men, though, 19,9% of their attacks – almost double the number in the female cases – go verbally below the belt. This is the outcome of a recent study of all 42 TV debates American style broadcasted nation- or statewide between 1997 and 2016. For the first time in the German speaking market an analysis of 14.393 statements of 62 politicians (54 male, 8 female) was conducted having this very focus on the agenda. The researchers from the University Landau/Koblenz address a glimmer of hope and conclude: the more women are entering politics, the more we might expect at least in this type of aforementioned TV debates a higher level of communication quality and more courtesy in challenging different political opinions.

Maier/Renner. „When a Man meets a Woman – Compairing the Use of Negativity of Male Candidates in Single- and Mixed-Gender Televised Debates“. In: Political Communication 00. 1-17/2018.

From the practice:

Donald Trump, #MeToo and the Kavanaugh affair have demonstrated clearly how insensitively and unsympathetically some men still communicate with women.

This is why a substantial moment in my support of male politicians focuses on their urgently needed sensitivity for an appropiate demeanor towards women. And I cannot repeat enough that this is crucial not only on TV but also in the normal every day life when approaching female voters and – very important – when dealing with female colleagues and employees! Risque jokes and disrespectful communication is always out of place, never funny and with a majority of women in the electorate also strategically stupid.

That given there must not exist any taboo to attack female politicians, too, during debates – not to come across as simple, harsh, trivial, personal, prepotent or ignorant by doing this is key in political communication, though.

Hence, understandably my female clients in the political field raise frequently questions like: How can I best and without losing my face return when my male opponents deliberately or because of their incapabilities assault me rhetorically? Good news: there are actually a bunch of communication strategies how to react properly. The most important recommendation of all being: Be cool and say stop – loud and clearly!

Software reveals language markers in personal narratives

Prominent psychological patterns can be detected by automated recognition better and better: according to a recent paper by the university of Ulm, presented last week at the Interspeech2018 in Hyderabad, researchers succeeded in detecting language markers of narcissism and depression. The task for 220 participants in the experiment was to describe in a written form within 10 – 20 minutes their personal experiences of 2017 and expectations for 2018. Interesting: Narcissists showed a very limited use of numbers and of family, future or anxiety related words.

The authors explanation: a) the lack of self control typically related to narcissists hinders long term projects – therefore „future“ per se is for them associated with fear. B) the egocentrism of narcissists impedes interpersonal relationships – so „family“ is being seen critical. C) anxiety of anxiety is with narcissists significantly high due to their low self esteem.

Additionally remarkable with those with narcissistic patterns was how often they correlated emotions negatively while in contrast those with depression symptoms showed generally a higher use of negation in their personal narratives.

How do you like 2017? Detection of language markers of depression and narcissm in personal narratives. Rathner/Djamali/Terhorst/Schuller/Cummins/Salamon/Hunger-Schoppe/Baumeister, on Interspeech2018.

From the practice:

To make my point crystal-clear: due to my experience a minimum of narcissistic attitudes is not only positive for, but key to professional success. Positive for since narcissism in small doses ensures to a certain extent a self determined life and key to particularly some jobs and functions in the limelight. Just think of actors/actresses, top athletes, female and male politicians or managers, the latter ones having to hold their grounds in a competitive internal environment.

It is the dose that counts, though. Profound narcissists having increasingly difficulties in getting hired – rarely they find in decision making the balance between taking too little and too much risk, often they show huge limitations when it comes to crisis management because of their bias to blame always others and barely they promote top talents since they consider themselves to be superb enough.

According to my observations in almost 20 years most people are not aware if and what insights into their personalities they might disclose inadvertently by their utterances and their choices of words.

So what I frequently have to do in supporting my clients – and what no AI will ever be capable of – is to find ways to decrease narcisstic and depressive indications in their communication and to elaborate on more balanced but still authentic modes of expression.  With this my clients are equipped for their D-Days of any kind at the best – that´s what I am standing for.

Immediacy: intrinsic motivation goes up, need for incentives down

Whoever gives quickly gives twice – this old saying has now been confirmed academically: you do increase intrinsic motivation significantly, if you reward someone´s activity immediate and don´t wait for whenever.

Also crucial: by giving early rewards you are not only motivating, but saving money indeed. So for making people follow their targets with more passion and a more positive attitude you have to reward as early as possible instead of praising and honoring your employees not before the next annual meeting, the company´s Christmas dinner or the New Year´s cocktail in January. It´s the timing which counts in the perception of the staff.

That´s at least what a sophisticated study based on 5 detailed analyses and 2 additional surveys at Cornell University and the University of Chicago has found out.

The two female scientists argue that prompt rewarding leads to a direct and unmisinterpretable connection between the respective activity and the target to achieve. By contrast, delayed rewards do not show this instant reference.

It´s about Time: Earlier Rewards increase intrinsic motivation, Woolley/Fishbach, in: Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2018, 114(6), 877 – 890.

From practice:

How many bonusses, incentives and costly team events could be avoided if executives would immediately reward their staff – regardless if the rewards are acclaim, feedback of any kind or simply attention.

Even senior employees keep reporting in countless coaching sessions and workshops: their supervisors don´t recognize either at all or with a big delay that tasks are fulfilled and targets well accomplished. These senior employees complain and feel neglected or even suffer about the little resonance their contributions are apparently producing.

The good news is: top managers are actually aware of these deficits of theirs. But: an overload of meetings, stress in various ways, individual fears or inhibitions to approach employees with non-technical comments often prevent this by far cheapest form of motivation.

These sort of deficits pop up according to my obsevations over decades more with executives in politics and arts: where performing in the limelight and in the public dominates the job agenda motivation, feedback and internal communication are usually left behind.

Motivating can be trained and exercised perfectly. It is not that difficult, frankly speaking. The problem lies predominantly in a lack of discipline on the side of top management towards their own employees.

A key asset particularly for top performers

If you are among the tops who are going through to the final in a recruiting process you can definitely raise your chances to get the job with authenticity. The more self-verifying is part of your personality (meaning you are aware of your own strengths and weaknesses you frankly talk about your experiences and plans and you are not hesitant in articulating personal thoughts) the more recruiters develop confidence and trust that you are the one! They do so because in contrast they usually are confronted in this type of processes with exchangeable, exaggerated or intransparent, let´s say not trustable self descriptions of candidates. If you are one of the less qualified candidates, though, the findings don´t apply on you: you ought tp be much more careful with authenticity per se – actually you could even reduce your chances subsequently.

This is what three recent interrelated studies havijng been conducted from Milan in collaboration with two universities in London and the Polytechnic University in Hongkong conclude.

Concretely they have evaluated interviews in two very diverse settings – once with teachers and once with lawyers by means of videoanalysis. Secondly the scientists targetted also the language of the candidates for tracing how self verification or self reflexion is being verbally expressed in hearings.

The Advantage of being oneself: The role of applicant self-verification in organizational hiring decisions. Moore/Lee/Kim/Cable, Journal of Applied Psychology, 2017. Vol.102 , Nr. 11, 1493-1513.

From practice:

They are standard: questions of recruiters aiming at „your most important strengths and weaknesses“. And every time we – the candidate and me as the coach – have to discuss what to prepare for her/his situation best and most convincingly, but also most authentically. That´s why any hearing I am involved in is not only coaching to professionalize impression management but also to trigger self reflection and questions like these: What do I want to accomplish when getting the function I am thriving at? What do I stand for as an executive? How are my personal values corresponding with those of the company?

It goes without saying that not only content is key, but nonverbal communication and it´s consonance with the words my clients use in their interviews. It matters if you prefer „I“ and „in my point of view“ instead of the unpersonal „one“ and you can do yourself something really good by responding directly and comprehensibly to questions and comments of the hearing committee instead of answering long-windedly and contradictorily.

My credo for hearings is and was all life long: credibility = authenticity + professionalism + courage for criticism. I am more than happy to confirm the findings of this studies: 8 out of 10 of my clients get the job they have applied for.

Men-women-balance is crucial for evaluating C-Level

Women are as CEOs 50% more often under attack than their male counterparts regardless of their economic success and the financial results they have delivered. This is the key insight of a US-American study that has analysed respective attacks against CEOs of listed companies between 1996 and 2013. Cliche-like reflexes towards females in top functions are on display for the first time.
That given the scientists recommend to all stakeholders – the board, media, shareholders, clients and customers alike – to be very much aware of this latent anti-women-stereotype which is capturing the minds of people dealing even with top management.
Immediate measures to counteract these prejudices are according to the authors: a) to report more often and longer about success of female CEOs and b) to have an eye on the balance between the number of men and women within the shareholders or investors: the more men you can find in these in-groups the more frequently and the more clearly you have to expect critique in case of a woman who sits at the top.

Do women CEOs face greater threat of shareholder activism compared to male CEOs? A role congruity perspective. Gupta/Han/Mortal/Silveri/Turban, Journal of Applied Psychology, 2018, vol. 103, Nr. 2, 228-236.

From Practice:
Indeed, some of my female clients as CEO, managing director, president or chairwoman were confronted with personal attacks. I never got the impression, though, that the attackers (by the way most commonly men, but not always) did so because of their conviction women would be unsuable as top management. Moreover we could plausibly deduce: female leaders are expected not to fight back as vehemently as men. Attacks on them are therefore supposed to be more successful than those on men.
So I am recommending women at C-level in general:

1. To be clear in communication and to be in doubt more offensive than defensive.
2. To make oneself and one´s perfomance visible which means to work on one´s self-marketing
3. To apply high, but not exhausting standards on oneself. After all plenty of wonderful women tend to burn themselves out much more quickly than necessary physically and mentally.

It is regular part of my CEO-coaching, no matter if man or woman, to anticipate potential attacks from inside and outside and to develop jointly how to react appropiately. A plan for the first 100 days is almost always a very good idea in such a case since first impressions with board, C-level peers and employees count most.