Chad Silverstein explains Solomon Asch's 1950s line-length experiment, where 75% of participants gave wrong answers just because confederates did. He argues the same pressure works in modern boardrooms and hiring meetings, where a vocal minority can silence correct dissent.
Chapters
In the 1950s, a guy named Solomon Asch did an experiment where he had people come into a room with other people who were already in on the experiment, and they showed everybody in the room a slide of 3 lines and then another slide with 1 line, and they wanted to see if people could, you know, see which lines were the same length. And they had individuals in the back of the room go first, and they purposely gave the wrong answer. And long story short, what they found as a result of this experiment were that individuals who heard the wrong answer being said 3 times, minimum 3 times, 75% of the people who were in the study conformed and agreed with them, knowing the answer was wrong. And when you think about that result and you think about the power behind what 3 people's influence can do to a boardroom, to a team meeting, to an interview process. It's unbelievable. It means that we will consciously and unconsciously say the wrong answer, knowing it's the wrong answer, simply to fit in, simply to not stick out. And that is just a shame, and it's just not the way it's supposed to be. And I think, you know, having a really strong core and being able to stand alone by yourself when you know the answer and you just don't care what people think. It is just hard. It's rare. And that experience really exposed a lot of the power behind influence, the power behind numbers. And you have to be really tuned in and aware of it if you run a company and you're building teams and you're in these meetings with people that, that is happening, going on, and you're not even aware of it.
