I'm intimately familiar with embarrassment. I've been embarrassed by not knowing the answer. [1] I've been embarrassed by something I said. [2] I've been embarrassed by something I wrote. [3] And I've been embarrassed by failure and poor performance. [4]
None of these experiences were pleasant. They were all, in the moment, quite dreadful. But they were also extremely valuable--and I've come to appreciate the importance of embarrassment and what it can teach us, particularly when we're in a leadership role. And it's when we're acting as a leader that our embarrassment is most visible, most painful and most useful.
The eminent sociologist and social psychologist Erving Goffman offers a concise explanation of the cause of embarrassment that's relevant here: "It occurs whenever an individual is felt to have projected incompatible definitions of himself before those present." [5] Psychologist Robert Edelmann provides further context: "The crucial condition necessary for embarrassment to occur is that an individual behaves in a manner inconsistent with the way in which he or she would have wished to behave." [6]
These points aptly describe my own experiences. I'm not always embarrassed by not knowing the answer, or by saying something thoughtless, or by writing something inaccurate, or by failure and poor performance. I was embarrassed in the situations noted above because my intended self-presentation was at odds with my actual self-presentation. And in most cases my wish that I had behaved differently was heightened because I was in a leadership role.
If you're a leader, you probably experienced something similar in the situations in which you've felt embarrassed. You showed up like someone who knew the answer, and everyone expected you to--but you didn't. You showed up like someone who chooses their words carefully, and everyone expected you to--but you didn't. You showed up like someone who succeeds, and everyone expected you to--but you didn't.
I'm sure that these experiences of yours, like mine, were unpleasant. And I'm not suggesting that you should go out of your way to embarrass yourself or pretend to ignore the unpleasantness when it occurs. But embarrassment is a natural and even desirable aspect of social situations. As Goffman makes clear, "Embarrassment is not an irrational impulse breaking through socially prescribed behavior but part of this orderly behavior itself." [7] Further, embarrassment likely played an essential role in our evolutionary history, as noted by psychologist Christine Harris:
In the view of a number of theorists, embarrassment evolved to help undo the damage in situations where a person has unintentionally violated a social norm. The basic premise is that those who experienced and expressed distress over concerns with others' impressions of them were more likely to survive as reproductive members of the group than those who acted with disregard for others' opinions. Not caring about others' reactions might have led one to be ostracized or banished, perhaps even killed... Embarrassment likely evolved to regulate social behaviors in a way that aids the welfare of the person embarrassed. [8]
So our embarrassment is a signal that we've violated a norm by "projecting incompatible definitions" of ourselves in a given situation, and we've been given an opportunity to make things right. This has special significance for leaders, who don't merely make decisions and allocate resources, but also serve an essential symbolic function. [9] When you feel embarrassment as a leader, the others present are likely confused by the mixed messages they're receiving about you and uncertain how to respond. And at that moment, you have a choice to make: You can acknowledge and address your embarrassment, or you can pretend that nothing happened and everything's fine.
In almost all circumstances, if you act as if nothing has happened the others present will collude with your pretense, and you'll collectively enact what management theorist Chris Argyris calls a defense routine: "Whenever human beings are faced with any issue that contains significant embarrassment or threat, they act in ways that bypass, as best they can, the embarrassment or threat." [10] This isn't necessarily nefarious--it's an expression of empathy, as Argyris notes: "These defensive routines are rewarded by most organizational cultures, because the routines indicate a sense of caring and concern for people." [11]
But while the impulse to pretend that nothing has happened is understandable, it carries a cost: You may actually heighten your embarrassment and distress. You foster ambiguity and confusion about the situation. You allow "incompatible definitions" of yourself to persist, leaving others confused about who you really are. And you model a counter-productive response to unwelcome events--ignore them, suppress them, don't talk about them. Instead, by acknowledging and addressing your embarrassment, you simultaneously address all of these challenges:
1. You diminish your embarrassment and the resulting distress.
Recent neuroscience research provides an explanation for a powerful dynamic that we've all experienced: Talking about negative feelings lessens their intensity and makes them easier to manage. [12] As neuroscientist Matthew Lieberman has written, "Putting feelings into words activates a region of the brain that is capable of inhibiting various aspects of immediate experience, including affective distress." [13] This need not be a time-consuming or complex process--in some situations simply saying, "Whoops! That's embarrassing!" is sufficient.
2. You clarify the situation, restore consistency to your self-presentation, and reduce others' anxiety.
Functional social situations depend upon a set of norms, most of which are implicit and unspoken, as well a shared understanding of those norms among the participants. [14] An embarrassing incident involves a violation of a norm, and when you as a leader pretend not to be embarrassed--and others inevitably collude in that process--some important questions are raised but not answered: Are you aware that a norm has been violated? Do you care? If not, what norms are still in effect? How should we proceed? The inability to answer these questions can leave others uncertain and apprehensive.
In addition to rendering the overall situation ambiguous, an embarrassing event creates a degree of ambiguity about you, which is highly problematic when you're acting as a leader. And again, when you pretend not to be embarrassed important questions are raised and go unanswered: Are you aware that you're presenting multiple--and incompatible--versions of yourself? Does this matter to you? Which version is "real"? Who are you?
But when you acknowledge and address your embarrassment, you initiate what Goffman calls a "corrective process." You signal your awareness that a norm has been violated, and you unify your self-presentation, which in turn reduces everyone's anxiety and confusion. As Goffman notes:
The [embarrassed] person thus shows that he is thoroughly capable of taking the role of the others toward his activity, that he can still be used as a responsible participant in the ritual process, and that the rules of conduct which he appears to have broken are still sacred, real, and unweakened. An offensive act may arouse anxiety about the ritual code; the offender allays this anxiety by showing that both the code and he as an upholder of it are still in working order. [15]
3. You role model a productive response to unwelcome events.
One of the toughest challenges leaders face is creating a culture in which people are willing to be direct, speak candidly, and share bad news. Everyone says they want this, but in many organizations there are few incentives to actually do it--and lots of reasons not to. And here's where some leaders fail to appreciate that they're under a spotlight at all times and that their behavior will always have a greater impact than their rhetoric. As I've noted before,
Every action [leaders] take is scrutinized and measured against their statements--and any gaps between the two are observed carefully (and often held against them.) This derives from the symbolic role leaders play--they’re not simply individuals fulfilling a set of responsibilities. For better and for worse, we view leaders as embodiments of our organizations and institutions, and as a result we expect them to act in alignment with the culture they claim to represent. [16]
So every embarrassing moment you experience as a leader is an opportunity to impart a lesson--one way or another. I learned this first-hand during the decade that I facilitated groups in Stanford's "Interpersonal Dynamics" course. [17] As a fledgling facilitator I was anxious to appear competent, and when I inevitably made my first misstep in a new group I would keep quiet about it, hoping that no one would notice my inadequacies or my embarrassment.
What I failed to realize was that everyone noticed everything, including my silence, and that group members would reliably collude with the pretense. Eventually it dawned on me that instead of teaching people to be direct and speak candidly--one of the primary aims of the course--I was teaching them to stay silent to support the leader's ego. At that point I began to look forward to my first embarrassing moment in a new group, because I knew that if I could muster the will to approach it differently, to acknowledge my embarrassment, everyone would benefit, including myself. And by practicing when the stakes were low, I gained sufficient experience to be able to do the same in more fraught circumstances, with more to lose--and more to gain.
Footnotes
[1] Ignorance, Embarrassment and the Power of Not Knowing
[2] See the following:
[3] Dan Oestreich Interviews Me
[4] See the following:
[5] Embarrassment and Social Organization, page 264 (Erving Goffman, American Journal of Sociology, 1956).
Psychologists differ on the causes of embarrassment, and while I find Goffman's explanation useful others have been proposed. In Embarrassment: the State of Research (Current Psychological Reviews, 1981) psychologist Robert Edelmann identifies five more in addition to Goffman's: 1) "loss of poise or failure of social skill," 2) "a disagreement over the definition of the situation or a failure to agree on the roles played by those present," 3) "breaches of privacy involving invasions of personal space," 4) "being made the undeserving center of attention," and 5) "an empathic reaction or vicarious embarrassment...being embarrassed for someone else." [page 127]
Yet Goffman's definition seems to lie at the root of these other causes in one way or another. For example, we're embarrassed when we lose our poise because our actual self-presentation (someone who lacks poise) is incompatible with our intended self-presentation (someone who possesses poise). Regarding Edelmann's final cause, "vicarious embarrassment," it appears that we experience this feeling when someone else's actual self-presentation is at odds with what we assume to be their intended self-presentation, such as, Edelmann notes, "when watching an extremely bad comedian." [page 127]
Edelman offers a summary that is at least consistent with Goffman's explanation: "While it is possible to recognize six separate categories, it should be emphasized that a common thread runs through each: the transgression of a social rule, with resultant failure of self-presentation and the loss of self-esteem in the presence of others." [page 127, emphasis mine]
In Embarrassment: A Form of Social Pain (American Scientist, 2006), psychologist Christine Harris discusses two of the main theories regarding the cause of embarrassment that developed subsequent to Goffman--there are numerous others--and notes that there are distinct sub-types of embarrassment:
The social evaluation model, championed by Rowland S. Miller at Sam Houston State University and others, seems closest to ordinary intuition. According to this account, what lies at the root of embarrassment is the anticipation of negative evaluation by others. In short, we become embarrassed when we perceive that the social image we want to project has been undermined and that others are forming negative impressions of us...
The late John Sabini of the University of Pennsylvania and his colleagues proposed that embarrassment is likely to arise when a person anticipates a disruption of a smooth social interaction and faces a situation without a clear sense of the social expectations governing behavior. According to the awkward-interaction or dramaturgic account, it is not that the person is worried about making a bad impression per se, but rather that he or she does not know what to do next...
Recent research suggests that a single theory probably is not adequate to account for all incidents of embarrassment and that there are at least two, and perhaps three, somewhat distinct subtypes of embarrassment...faux-pas, center-of-attention, and sticky-situation embarrassment. [pages 524-525]
Again, Goffman's explanation seems relevant to most, if not all, of these situations. While subsequent research has clearly expanded our understanding of the various mechanisms, no other explanations seem to entirely displace Goffman's fundamental idea that embarrassment derives from situations in which we have "projected incompatible definitions" of ourselves.
[6] Embarrassment: the State of Research, page 132 (Robert Edelmann, Current Psychological Reviews, 1981)
[7] Goffman (1956), page 271.
[8] Embarrassment: A Form of Social Pain, pages 526, 533 (Christine Harris, American Scientist, 2006)
[9] For more on the symbolic aspects of leadership, see the following:
[10] Overcoming Organizational Defenses: Facilitating Organizational Learning, pages 25-27 (Chris Argyris, 1990)
[11] Ibid, page 29.
[12] Talking About Feelings
[13] Why Symbolic Processing of Affect Can Disrupt Negative Affect: Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Investigations, page 203 (Matthew Lieberman, Chapter 13 in Social Neuroscience: Toward Understanding the Underpinnings of the Social Mind, Alexander Todorov, Susan Fiske, and Deborah Prentice, editors, 2011)
[14] The impact of the implicit and unspoken norms that govern social situations is one of the core themes of Goffman's work. For more, see the following:
[15] Goffman (1955/1967/1982), pages 21-22.
[16] What Do Great Leaders Do?
[17] A Brief History of T-Groups
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