While most of us would undoubtedly like to think that it is what we say that counts, research tells us that those who speak the most tend to receive the highest leadership ratings, known as the ‘babble hypothesis’.
The research
MacLaren and colleagues conducted a test of the babble hypothesis. Thirty-three, student groups of 4–10 participants ( total number of participants was 256), worked together to solve a problem in a computer simulation environment. In their groups, students spent some initial time individually exploring the simulation game prior to starting to work in their group. As a group they had 10 minutes to plan how they would complete the task and 60 minutes to attempt the task. The planning conversation and task were recorded and the amount of speaking time for each participant was noted. At the end of the task, participants were asked who they would vote for as emerging as the leader during the task (leader emergence).
The researchers found that it takes an average of 39 seconds of speaking to earn another leader emergence vote. Being a male participant was associated with approximately an additional expected vote and was equivalent to about 45 seconds of speaking – nearly as much as the average speaking time for all participants across the data set. Overall, they found that participant features that may reflect speech quality appear reduced in importance when compared with speech quantity.
Implications for inclusion
Research such as this has important implications for inclusion. If we know that individuals will rate those that speak the most in meetings and those who are male as exhibiting leadership qualities (regardless of what is being said), then what does it mean for more reflective thinkers who often speak less during meetings, genders other than male and those from minoritised groups (perhaps the only one from that group in the meeting) who may not speak as much during the meeting? The data suggests that these individuals are less likely to be viewed as leader
How to chair inclusive meetings
However, there is a simple step that can help to counteract the babble hypothesis. When chairing meetings, the chair can ensure that each participant has the opportunity to speak equally. By setting the ground rules at the start of the meeting and outlining the objective that it is important that everyone’s voice is heard, the chair can manage each participant’s ‘air’ time, ensuring that everyone has the time to speak without fear of interruption. Simply by taking a proactive approach to managing contributions in meetings will significantly enhance inclusion by minimising the babbly hypothesis.
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