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> Social support and accountability Reminds me of "Announcing your plans makes you less motivated to accomplish them (2009)" - https://sivers.org/zipit https:/

by diggan 3y ago

> Social support and accountability Reminds me of "Announcing your plans makes you less motivated to accomplish them (2009)" - https://sivers.org/zipit https://sivers.org/zipit - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7496923 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7496923 (74 points | March 30, 2014 | 21 comments)

Lyngbakr 3y ago
That's interesting! Although I haven't invested any thought in it, I would've assumed that announcing plans would have the opposite effect because people are now watching and know what you're trying to achieve, so you'd be more motivated to avoid losing face. Thanks for the article — I'll have to check it out!
- eloisius 3y ago
  Personally, it would make me feel a burden of shame to have announced a goal and then had a setback, which would become a greater discouragement then just facing a setback if I had not made a big deal about it in the first place.
  - breakingcups 3y ago
    That, and you've skipped ahead and gotten a bit of the social reward for the project without doing it yet. So the reward will be less too.
odyssey7 3y ago
I’ve heard about the paradox of announcing plans before. It is intriguing. In light of the need for community, talking about plans might be seen as a way to search for ideas that could have group buy-in and become something to undertake together. Failure to move forward on those plans would reflect that the group interest just wasn’t there. The mistake would have been in assuming you would have ever pursued the goal independently, the social impulse to share could have been the hint. Shared interests between friends can help individual interests and goals become collective ones. Ecclesiastes: one may be overcome (by the exhaustion of going to the gym), two can defend themselves (against lapsing on their New Year’s resolution). A three-ply cord is not easily broken.

by diggan 3y ago

Lyngbakr 3y ago

That's interesting! Although I haven't invested any thought in it, I would've assumed that announcing plans would have the opposite effect because people are now watching and know what you're trying to achieve, so you'd be more motivated to avoid losing face. Thanks for the article — I'll have to check it out!

eloisius 3y ago
Personally, it would make me feel a burden of shame to have announced a goal and then had a setback, which would become a greater discouragement then just facing a setback if I had not made a big deal about it in the first place.
- breakingcups 3y ago
  That, and you've skipped ahead and gotten a bit of the social reward for the project without doing it yet. So the reward will be less too.

odyssey7 3y ago

I’ve heard about the paradox of announcing plans before. It is intriguing. In light of the need for community, talking about plans might be seen as a way to search for ideas that could have group buy-in and become something to undertake together. Failure to move forward on those plans would reflect that the group interest just wasn’t there. The mistake would have been in assuming you would have ever pursued the goal independently, the social impulse to share could have been the hint. Shared interests between friends can help individual interests and goals become collective ones. Ecclesiastes: one may be overcome (by the exhaustion of going to the gym), two can defend themselves (against lapsing on their New Year’s resolution). A three-ply cord is not easily broken.