Working World

Some people have a different angle to problem solving: positive deviance. Jerry and Monique Sternin, co-founders of the Positive Deviance Institute, have used this model to promote social change around the world. It identifies people who have the same environmental problems as everyone else but still triumph. They are people — often lower in rank — who cope with problems that bedevil less innovative neighbors.

In the workplace, P.D. looks for people who have the same workload, the same interruptions and the same time constraints, but who outperform their peers. Instead of focusing on those who fail to deliver, supervisors look for the one who excels, the positive deviant. Then they encourage this person to teach the ones who flounder.

Researchers at the University of Michigan Business School further define positive deviance as an honorable and voluntary behavior, and it must significantly depart from the usual routine.

The P.D. strategy thrives in different settings. Its genesis was in helping solve nutrition problems in Vietnam. Hospitals now use it to solve nagging infection control issues. Corporations can implement positive deviance to remedy sales inequalities and production glitches.

So, in order to change how we think about a problem, it’s best to take a look at how these deviants act rather than stewing in our seat. Think of P.D. as the Sternins did. In a poor community with hungry kids, there are always mothers whose children are well fed. Look to those mothers for your answers.  

Prior to writing on employment issues, Elizabeth Hanink worked as a telephone operator, library aide and as a nurse.