Action Influencer 5: they believe they are following someone with authority
Throughout much of history, people were ruled by Kings and Queens – though western tradition of primogeniture was heavily biased towards the first born son giving daughters a pretty poor run of things. On the ascent of a new heir to the throne, either as a result of the old monarch passing away or being killed, the first thing the new ruler would do is assert their authority. ‘The King is dead, long live the King,” etc. The main tool in any new monarchs arsenal was to point to the family line. ‘My father was King, so I am now King.’ And for some reason that worked. Old Kings could be thoroughly disliked lunatics – many were – but they were King and so their son should be the new King. The aristocracy tolerated absolute madmen on the throne for years simply because they were King or Queen because Kings or Queens were in charge and because that’s just the way it was.
On those rare occasions where everyone finally did get so fed up with a leader that they forcibly removed them – usually terminally – the first thing a new ruler typically did was try to assert their authority by pointing to their family tree and saying ‘I’m the legitimate heir to the throne because I’m related two generations back to the same family’. If they also needed to kill off any other rivals with equal claims of family lineage and thus the throne then that was just part of the process. But simply murdering the King because he was awful and installing yourself as a new leader with no real claim was generally not accepted. In the English Civil war Oliver Cromwell tried this for a few years until eventually they decided to reinstall a new King from the old royal line family. Authority was vested through the authority that came before.
I’m sure we’ve all heard this used in our professional careers too. ‘Jane [the CMO] said we have to do x so can you do it for me,’ carries far more weight than ‘can you do x for me please’. Hopefully less fratricide is involved in these encounters, though. I’m not vehemently anti-royalist by the way, but history does not paint a positive picture of most Royals as being much more than chancers and bullies.
In the early 1960s, US researcher Stanley Milgram ran a series of now infamous experiments on the impact of authority on decision making. Milgram conceived the study as a way of investigating the horrors of genocide, specifically the psychology of the Nazi atrocities in the Second World War. The question he aimed to answer was whether the perpetrators of the atrocities were ‘just following orders’ as the defence had claimed.
The experiment involved three participants:
The Leader – the de facto head of the experiment who wore an official looking lab coat
The Subject – in reality an actor that pretended to be a volunteer participant, but who was secretly aligned with the experimenter
The Learner – the true subject of investigation behind the test. The learner was led to believe they were being briefed by the experimenter on how to conduct the test on the volunteer Subject.
On the day of the test the Subject and the Learner would arrive at the same time, ostensibly with no guarantee of the role they would be playing since their roles had not been confirmed in advance. It was explained by the Leader that they would be paid regardless of the outcome of the experiment and they were then ‘randomly’ allocated to a role – again, the Subject and Learner roles were secretly pre-defined, but the Learner never knew this.
The Subject would be summarily strapped to a chair in an adjacent room with electrodes attached to them by the Leader. The Leader would then return to the room with the Learner and would direct the Learner on how to run the test. The Learner was required to read out a ‘word pair’; if the Subject correctly paired the words the Learner would read out the next word pair, and if incorrectly answered the Learner would apply a small electric shock to the Subject. Each time an incorrect answer was given the voltage of the shock would increase by 15 volts. Initially the voltage started low, but with increasing mistakes would build and build. In reality, the actor playing the Subject was acting out the experience of pain and no shocks were made, but to the Learner, directed by the close-at-hand Leader dressed in an authority-figure white lab coat, the pain they were administering was very real. The shock generator that the Learner controlled was labelled with markings that ranged from ‘Slight Shock’ to ‘Danger’.
As the sounds of protest from the Subject increased in intensity, so typically would the reticence of the Learner to continue the experiment. As howls of protest and pleading to end the experience grew from the Subject, the Leader was equipped with verbal prods to motivate the Learner to continue. "Whether they like it or not, you must go on until he has learned all the word pairs correctly, so please go on.” Only if the Learner refused to continue after the verbal prods or if they had applied a 450v shock three times in a row would the experiment be classed as complete.
The results made uncomfortable reading. Quoting from Milgram’s later 1974 article: “with the participants' [Learner’s] ears ringing with the screams of the victims [Subjects], authority [Leader] won more often than not. The extreme willingness of adults to go to almost any lengths on the command of an authority constitutes the chief finding of the study.” In summary, when told to do something by an authority figure – even something apparently heinous – more people than resisted complied. This probably says something about corporate culture too.
Since it was first run, the experiment has been repeated in different ways all with similar outcomes. People are willing to follow authority to great lengths and, in fact, frequently place far greater confidence in the authority than it deserves. Why on the cover of the book that I read on looking after a baby when my wife was pregnant is there a quote from the author of the book Freakonomics? I love Freakonomics, but has the author had many children? Are they a qualified medical professional or specialist in childcare techniques? Or do I not care and just see their name and that they wrote a good book themselves in Freakonomics as just conclude ‘wow, this must be a good book.’ Even though we’re talking about something as important as how to raise a human child, it’s the latter.
Why are social media influencers given so much credibility? Do they have knowledge and experience beyond the average person, or are they just an expert at building an engaged audience? It can be hard to tell sometimes. But because they have an engaged audience they are perceived to be an expert, thus they are treated as an expert and they accumulate a greater audience.
Scientists in lab coats are more likely to appear knowledgeable than those in plain clothes. People with impressive job titles are more likely to be believed than people without. And celebrities that are seen has having been successful are more likely to be expected to be successful in the future. There can be little evidence behind any of these assumptions but perception drives belief and belief shapes reality. I believe therefore it is. This trait manifests itself because people have a natural reticence towards questioning authority. Authority drives behaviour because it is the authority on the right things to do. So people follow.
Organisational authority
Organisations try to build their authority in many ways. Thought leadership, as we’ve already discussed, can be a powerful tool – if executed correctly. A clear strategy to build and leverage authority in a particular market space can drive significant returns. Apple, regarded by many as the leader of mobile telephony, has many times been years behind its competitors on launching a new technology to market. Because Apple is seen as an authority on quality design and user experience, however, the narrative changes from being one of a lack of innovation to one of the technology not being ready until they have perfected it, or sometimes even not having been invented until they invented it. Authority influences by shaping perceptions.
Individual authority
In many organisations key individuals are promoted as being the authority in their field. Industry experts, people with deep subject-matter expertise or leaders of high-performing business functions. External blogging programs can be run to build their profiles so that in customer engagements they are seen as leaders worthy of listening to or following. Be careful what happens if they leave though: the authority leaves with them.
Referred authority
Third-party organisations like analysts, review sites and industry awards all have their own authority value. Analysts that rate you as a ‘leader’ sell this referred authority by allowing organisations to use their name to promote their leadership. XYZ says we are a leader; you respect them therefore you should listen to us. Review sites that label products as ‘best sellers’ or ‘top rated’ lend their authority to build your brand. And industry awards can provide validation from peers and users of experience and quality. All of these referred authority examples leverage both the authority and the independence of third-parties, both the strength of the basis that they are willing to use their authority to provide a recommendation, and that it is done voluntarily.