When William Muir wanted to study productivity, he used chickens, because it’s easy to count eggs. He divided the chickens into two groups. The first was the average flock – nothing special about them, and no one chicken significantly outperforming any of the others in egg production. The second flock contained only the chickens that were the best, most prolific egg producers.
Muir culled the highest producers of each generation, and put them with the second flock. After six generations had passed, Muir took stock of the flocks. The egg production of the first flock exceeded expectations.
In the second flock of “superchickens,” as business consultant Margaret Heffernan calls them in her May 2015 TED talk about Muir’s experiment and its implications, only three were left alive. They had pecked each other to death.
In her talk, Heffernan explained that we’ve all been told that to succeed we need to compete and become superchickens by getting into the right school, get the right job, win at all costs, etc.
She said, “And the result has been just the same as in William Muir’s experiment: aggression, dysfunction and waste. If the only way the most productive can be successful is by suppressing the productivity of the rest, then we badly need to find a better way to work and a richer way to live.” So, having a superchicken in a group is toxic because they must have their own way at the expense of everybody else.
Thankfully, there is a better, richer and more fulfilling way to succeed as a group. Jesus demonstrated it after the Last Supper, when he assumed the posture of the lowliest servant and washed his disciples’ feet (John 13:1-17).
When he had finished, Jesus said, “So if I, the Master and Teacher, washed your feet, you must now wash each other’s feet. I’ve laid down a pattern for you. What I’ve done, you do. I’m only pointing out the obvious. A servant is not ranked above his master; an employee doesn’t give orders to the employer. If you understand what I’m telling you, act like it—and live a blessed life” (John 13:14-17, Message).
Jesus shows us we should not aspire to be a superchicken, but rather we should see and serve each other as equals, no matter what our status.
Are you more concerned with where you are in the pecking order than how you can serve others?