According to a recent book The Geography of Bliss by former New York Times reporter Eric Weiner the British rank among the least happy people on earth. Weiner writes: "In Britain the happy are few and suspect. For the British happiness is a transatlantic import. And by transatlantic they mean American. And by American they mean silly infantile drivel."
Now I will confess that I have sometimes felt a bit self-conscious in Britain about my general state of optimism. I once had a distinguished City banker advise me to stop smiling so much because investors and analysts would find it incongruous with the weak state then of Reuters. However I have also known some hugely positive optimistic subjects of the Queen. In Britain it seems to me that individuals can be quite positive but there is a social dynamic that compels them to veer to the negative when they form groups. In part this produces a delightful self-deprecating humor and an absence of the prideful boasting to which my American compatriots have been known to fall prey. However unchecked group negativism can undermine performance.
There is now a substantial body of scholarship which supports the seemingly obvious point that people are attracted to high-energy positive individuals and that a positive attitude can be demonstrated to improve performance. See Positive Leadership: Strategies for Extraordinary Performance by Kim Cameron. In medicine the placebo effect is well documented. However the power of positive suggestion can perhaps be seen at its strongest in sports. Does the coach instruct his promising pole vaulter to envision herself failing to clear the bar as she runs down the approach? When the star athlete is in "the groove" does she imagine that she can never achieve her objective? Of course not. The same principle can be seen in business. So for example few great salesmen boost their confidence before a key client meeting by reminding themselves that the product they are selling sucks and that no one is likely to be interested in it.
In the British boardroom a great deal of activity seems to be focused on avoiding the negative. Required standards of corporate governance not only create a strong Chairman to oversee the Chief Executive but also a Senior Independent Director to oversee the Chairman. Why I often wonder is there not a need for a Super-SID to oversee the SID and so on? Similarly much executive compensation policy seems to focus on avoiding that cardinal sin a "payment for failure" rather than on providing a large upside to incentivize extraordinarily good performance. Could it be that business is seen as something inherently bad that needs to be constrained?
I will readily admit that US corporate governance has historically been too permissive of large exit payoffs for non-performing executives and clubby boards dominated by CEOs but this has been changing in recent years. However I think that fundamentally Americans believe that business is a good thing for society and that notwithstanding its Enrons Worldcoms and sub-prime crises it should be encouraged and not unduly restricted by rules seeking to prevent the odd abuse. Much of the debate on Sarbanes-Oxley turns on whether the US has now gone too far in seeking to constrain malfeasance.
So perhaps societies tailor their laws and attitudes to business to suit their national character. An optimistic "sky’s the limit" bravado for the Americans and a somewhat dour "avoid the worst" demeanor for the British. This might explain why the US is plagued by so many corporate scandals but also why it has the most successful venture capital industry. Each culture has much to learn from the other but it may turn out that the students are not "wired" to learn the lesson.