#INBOUND12, the world’s largest inbound marketing conference, featured some great keynote speakers that were loud and energetic. However, the one that silently caught people’s attention was a successful woman named Susan Cain. Susan Cain, author of “QUIET: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking,” has been reading books since she went camping as a little girl. Campers believed in camp spirit and being outgoing. However, Susan grew up an introvert where she didn’t need to scream the camp cheer. Susan grew up with a rabbi grandfather in Brooklyn who read many books. It was there that Susan knew home best and realized she was an introvert–and that’s ok.
“Power of Creativity.”-Phillipe Stark
Did you know that 1/3-1/2 of the human population is introverted? Introverts are cooperative people that we need to better learn to work with. Extroversion is an appealing personality style to most. Introverts are stimulated when they are in low key situations as compared to extroverts who are stimulated by situations where more people are. Introverts do better when background music is lower. Open client offices sometimes make people sick, more hostile, anxious, create more distractions, and allow people to not talk as deeply. We need to have a group think for creative ways to appeal to introverts in order to benefit from their full potential.
“It’s not that I’m so smart, it’s that I stay with a problem longer.”-Albert Einstein
After better understanding the psychology of introverts from watching the Asch Experiment, one can better understand how to wage a quiet revolution of introverts in three simple ways according to Susan:
- Office Space. An office space needs to be designed as a casual unplanned experience for introverts. Office spaces should be more balanced by private spaces. Susan pointed to Google New York as an inspirational design with nooks and crannies. Transcending into different places allows you to take a walk into different moods.
- Rethink Leadership. Introverts are not the best for those that also have something to say. Introverted leaders are usually categorized as level 5 leadership. These leaders tend to have a sense of will, are shy, humble, and modest.
- Rethink meetings. Individual brainstorming is good for introverts. Stop and let people think problems out. Then come together as a group to see what people came up on their own to open a public brainstorm. Finally, let the group go home for electronic brainstorming. Electronic brainstorming removes distortions of having to talk to people.
Final Thought: “This is the social revolution with big diversity issues. The power of introverts needs to be harnessed.”