Why we care so much about promotions

Source: Photopin

I work at Google, which as a general rule, has a lot of "over-achievers" from their previous lives at fancy schools and with past employers.  We just had performance reviews last week, and it's fascinating to watch the anxiety leading up to these numbers (now boxes), which determine a person's status within the organization.

Google pays pretty well; therefore, no one necessarily needs to be promoted after hitting $75,000 per year (yes, I realize this # is above the median household income).  At that salary milestone, incremental dollars do not make a person any happier.  Regardless of this fact, I've seen people (including myself) cry, breakdown and compulsively fret over these rankings, which can range from incredibly accurate OR incredibly arbitrary of a person's actual performance.  I mean, it's all based on perception anyways, right?  

It makes wonder what happened along the way.  

As a child, we often found something we were good at -- whether it's school or sports, drama or drawing.  Although grades were an important ranking system, it wasn't necessarily the only one.  In fact, the academic ranking usually was in conflict with the social ranking system in high school (i.e., being a nerd wasn't cool).  But, as an adult, I've seen the ways you can "succeed" shrink.  This may seem narrow-minded, but it seems like you can either be: rich, success or attractive, and in an ideal world, you'd be all three.  We leave less room for being "really good" at other things.

So, why is this?

I think it all goes back to Status Anxiety.  One of my favorite modern day philosophers, Alain de Botton, wrote a book by that exact name.

He says that:

"We cannot, it seems, appreciate what we have for its own merit, or even against what our medieval forebears had.  We cannot be impressed by how prosperous we are in historical terms.  We see ourselves fortunate only when we have as much, or more, than those we have grown up with, work alongside, have as a friend or identify with in public realm."

The problem with this human response is that we'll *always* struggle with comparison because as we rise up the social or work ladder, we are faced with other (more successful) people to compare ourselves to.  Therefore, it's not really enough that I work at Google, a company that accepts 0.3% of applicants; I need to perform as well as or better than my peers.

Alain addresses this point eloquently:

"We envy only those whom we feel ourselves to be like.  We envy only members of our reference group.  There are few successes more unendurable than those of our ostensible equals."

And, although we often think of the move from aristocracy to meritocracy a good thing, it's actually heighten this problem of Status Anxiety:

"In a stroke, it transformed American Society from a hereditary, aristocratic hierarchy -- a sphere in which upward mobility was restricted and a person's status depended exclusively on the lineage and distinction of his or her family -- into a dynamic economy in which status was awarded in direct proportion to the (largely financial) achievements of each new generation."

One solution to this anxiety problem is to remove yourself from the situation, i.e., "ceasing to care."  William James, a professor of psychology at Harvard, believed:

"We are not always humiliated by failing at things, he suggested; we are humiliated only if we invest our pride and sense of worth in a given aspiration or achievement and then are disappointed in our pursuit of it.""

"With no attempt there can be no failure; with no failure, no humiliation."

As the adage goes, self esteem is equal to success divided by pretension. 

Therefore, you can either:

1. Over-achieve
2. Change what you want to achieve
3. Have very low aspirations

"To give up pretensions is as blessed a relief as to get them gratified.  There is a strange lightness in the heart when one's nothingness in a particular area is accepted in good faith.  How pleasant is the day when we give up striving to be young and slender.  'Thank God!' we say, 'those illusions are gone.'  Everything added to the self is a burden as well as pride."

Unfortunately, it can be pretty challenging to go against the grain and change the denominator.  There's so much propaganda around us at work that reinforces the somewhat arbitrary performance system or goals that we might not really care about (i.e., Do I need to be a thought leader?  I mean, how about just getting my work done accurately and quickly).

Regardless of the difficulty, I think the key to ultimate happiness is to have a goal that you're fully bought into, so at least you're chasing the right thing.  When you care, you tend to do better anyways and end up with a result that means something, not just another rung on the symbolic ladder.