Part of the social network phenomenon is the open sometimes not so subtle competition we all feel. We frequently check our web site’s SEO ranking and our blog ranking. We now have tools to rank our Twitter success. Talk to any regular contributor to Twitter for more than a few minutes and eventually they will tell you how they struggle to offer that next uniquely clever Tweet that others will find inspirational and will “retweet”. We even get Tweets from those who claim they can increase our followers by 1,000 nearly overnight. Really? And once all fun Facebook, is now starting to feel a little competitive. Gee, I have more friends than you!
If you watch TV it is hard to miss the multitude of reality shows. At the core of each is competition: the Bachelorette picks from a herd of bachelors, people get thrown off an island, and some people even get fired. And recently we witnessed a hot dog eating competition.
So go ahead and confess you feel competition is everywhere.
So what is next? How will the competition evolve? Will we actually devolve a bit now? We already see the goals of social networking being sacrificed a bit because people are growing less interested in sharing completely. Sure they will share their feelings on a news subject, or some nifty technology, but are people less willing to share the really good stuff they feel separates them from the competition? There is growing evidence more people will not. Perhaps they see everyone as competition for a limited numbers of top spaces or fame. This represents an attitude of scarcity vs. one of abundance.
There still are shining examples of truly open sharing. Our Group 19 web site is one example. However, the sales profession may be one of the best examples of competitive behavior and one of the worst examples of sharing. Indeed sales people are competitive and many have an insatiable appetite for new material, tips, and techniques to grow more competitive. Yet those same sales people who consume volumes of material rarely produce any.
If we are regrettably destined to compete let’s do it civilly and with respect for one another. Let’s try to avoid creeping competition into all spaces of our lives. There are just some things ill suited for the score board.
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