Hey there, 

Do you know that superstar at work? You instantly thought of someone; if you didn't, it's probably you :) Every organization or team has a select few individuals who do consistent, high-impact work. You'd think your organization would shoot into the Fortune 100 list if your team were full of superstars, right? Maybe not. 

Evolutionary biologist William Muir devised an experiment to increase egg production in chickens. He had an average egg-laying group of chickens; another group comprised only the most productive chickens. He called these 'super chickens.' 

After observing these two groups for two generations, he found that the chickens in the average group were healthy and had increased egg production gradually. Things were slightly different in the 'super chicken' group; the three survivors had pecked the rest to death! 

The individually productive chickens had achieved their success only by suppressing the productivity of the rest. 

A team at MIT tried to replicate this experiment to understand why some groups are more successful than others. They grouped hundreds of volunteers into random groups and gave them challenging problems to solve. 

The high-achieving groups didn't have the highest IQ members in them or the highest aggregate of IQ; the most successful groups were those with high degrees of social sensitivity. How they worked with each other proved more critical than the caliber of individuals. 

This experiment can provide businesses with a valuable lesson not only when it comes to hiring people with strong social sensitivity, but also in terms of making sure their initiatives work well together. Some companies focus so much on 'super chicken' initiatives like top-line growth or acquisition channels, sometimes at the expense of other priorities like operational efficiency or compliance. It's important to drive "social sensitivity" among your initiatives too.

High-growth businesses need a cohesive growth engine - not a couple of super chickens stealing focus - with all critical functions working in tandem. That's why our Revenue Growth Management (RGM) platform empowers our customers to drive revenue growth at all stages of the subscription lifecycle."

If our customers can drive one percent improvements across every aspect of their revenue lifecycle — from price optimization and higher converting checkout experiences to opening up more payment methods and deflecting subscribers from canceling — they unlock cumulative, sustainable growth. They say the whole is greater than the sum of its parts — and we couldn't agree more!