I recently went on a couple dates with a super friendly, happy, sociable guy I’d known for a few years. On our second date, he said he had a confession to make: he was actually an introvert.
The confession surprised me, partly because I had a different image in my head of what an introvert was like, but mostly because it made me sad that he thought of it as a confession.
I consider myself an extrovert, drawing energy from the people around me, and I hadn’t really thought about the barriers in our society both personally and professionally for people who just want a little more space to reflect inward.
Why did he feel like he had to apologize?
Based on a recommendation from an introverted co-worker, I looked up Susan Cain, a self-described Introvert. In both her book, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking and her TED Talk, she describes how American society became increasingly extroverted in the 20th Century due to the rapid growth of cities where people needed to constantly network and prove their worth to strangers.
This trend has only intensified in the 21st Century.
Our modern workspaces favor open seating to foster better communication. Promotions are often received based not just on the quality of work, but also on how well you can present to large audiences. In Lean In, Sheryl Sandberg specifically advises women to raise their hands and make themselves heard in order to become leaders.
Meetings fill up each day of the work week. Brainstorming is frequently a group exercise. And companies often require employees to be in the office during core hours to demonstrate productivity. In 2012, the CEO of Yahoo, Marissa Mayer, created a policy banning telecommuting.
Those constant extroverted activities can drain the energy out of an introvert, and it’s debatable whether they improve productivity for everyone. Thinking and working alone can help people enhance skills, discover new ideas, and create something from nothing.
As an extrovert myself, I know that working alone can sometimes be draining, but I also know that it’s the quiet moments when I’m left alone that I can be most productive (writing this piece, learning to code, choreographing dances).
The world needs introverts too.
Is your work environment good for both extroverts and introverts?
At Keen, a lot of people work remotely, so we try to make it easy to work from home (using Slack to communicate, Google Hangouts for video calls, and GitHub for pulling and pushing requests).
Right now, we can’t control our physical environment completely because our office is in a co-working space, but we will soon be moving into a new space that will have different rooms with varying degrees of isolation and noise levels.
Our organizational structure is flat, which means that being comfortable presenting to large audiences doesn’t enable you to move up; it just puts you in a role that’s best suited for your comfort level.
We also have regular book clubs and writers workshops to bridge the divide between quiet reflection and outward communication, which can both be important parts of ourselves.
What can extroverts learn from introverts?
Susan Cain talks a lot about how an introvert often has to act like an extrovert in order to interact within our society. Perhaps extroverts should also practice acting like introverts.
Keen encourages everyone to work remotely for at least one solid week (#remotematters challenge), but I haven’t done that yet. It may be something to try, not only to better understand what it’s like for remote folks, but also to isolate myself from the buzz in the office.
I once saw a TED Talk by Jason Fried on productivity that encouraged people to have at least one day a week in which talking was not allowed. That would also enable introverts to relax, knowing there wouldn’t be any forced group interaction that day, and enable extroverts to turn inwards on projects best done in solitude.
Interruptions can stress out introverts and decrease productvity
Perhaps I should bring this to my personal life, too. I could disconnect from the internet each night for a week. I could periodically practice Shavasana or some other form of meditation. And probably most importantly, I could make sure to listen to the quiet introverted people in the room.
My extrovert resolution
I want to be more inclusive of introverts because I value what different perspectives can bring and genuinely believe that you need both introverts and extroverts to be able to create and communicate new ideas and projects.
But also, I really like that guy. I don’t want him or others like him to feel that they are confessing a secret. They shouldn’t feel the need to apologize for being introverts just because our culture is one that can’t stop talking.
