Cutting down tall poppies is a social habit, and it's far older than Australia. In small groups it had a real job.
Among the Ju/'hoansi of the Kalahari, a hunter who came home with a big kill got insults, not praise. Too scrawny. Barely worth the walk. A Ju/'hoan man explained why to the anthropologist Richard Lee: when a young man kills a lot of meat, he starts to think of himself as a big man and everyone else as his servants. "This way we cool his heart and make him gentle."
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It worked because everyone had already seen the hunt. In a group of 30 around a fire, the teasing couldn't erase the win. Everybody knew what he'd done.
We don't live like that anymore. In an organisation of 3,000, most wins go unseen, and someone has to say them out loud, on purpose. We kept the habit, but it now costs teams in ways it never used to. Here are five.
1. Aiming high gets punished
The first lesson tall poppy syndrome teaches is simple: aim high and you might pay for it.
When Jo Kirkwood interviewed 40 New Zealand entrepreneurs, many described staying under the radar and deliberately holding back growth to avoid attention. A later NZ survey of 297 people, run with Rod McNaughton, heard the same thing at work. As one respondent put it: "Don't push the envelope and don't push for growth or expansion..."
That survey in 2022 also found the cutting down mostly didn't come from strangers online. It happened in person, and colleagues were the most common source.
And the person cut down isn't the only one who learns. Research on social learning shows people can learn to fear something just by watching it happen to someone else. The same can be true in teams: one cutting remark about someone's ambition teaches everyone watching to aim a little lower.
2. We learn less
Sharing a win is often about more than the result. It also uncovers the effort, the challenges, the new ways to do something. Hide your win and the learnings get hidden too.
Some of the NZ respondents had stopped offering themselves as mentors or role models. "I don't feel comfortable to show my ability or opinions," one wrote. The researchers' suggestion is to talk about the journey, not just the result.
3. We miss a chance to build resilience
Psychologist Albert Bandura found that our own past successes are the strongest source of self-efficacy: the belief that we can handle what's in front of us. When we hide wins, even to ourselves, it's harder to remember them the next time something hard lands on the team's plate.
4. We miss the lift
Shelly Gable and colleagues found that telling someone good news was linked to better mood and wellbeing, over and above the good news itself. The lift was even bigger when the listener responded with real interest, and couples who usually did had closer, more satisfying relationships.
In a team, how you reply - especially as a leader - will be remembered the next time someone thinks about sharing a win.
5. How can a team share failures if it can't share wins?
My take: both tell people the same thing, which is what speaking up will cost them here. If a win gets a cutting remark or silence, people are likely to find it even harder to share a failure or a mistake.
So what can you do?
Keep a record for yourself. A running note of what you did and what changed because of it. It works even if nobody else ever reads it.
Talk about the journey, not just the result. The effort, the highs and lows, and what you learnt along the way, as recommended by the research in NZ.
If you lead a team, make room for small wins. Not just the ones that make the quarterly report.
Give people a moment to celebrate their win. Not sure why they're sharing it? Get curious and ask about it: "What was the hardest part of getting that done?" "Is there anything you'd do differently next time?
Sources: Lee (1969), Eating Christmas in the Kalahari. Kirkwood (2007), Tall poppy syndrome: implications for entrepreneurship in New Zealand. Kirkwood and McNaughton (2022), Tall Poppy Syndrome in New Zealand, a self-selected survey of 297 people. Olsson and Phelps (2007), Social learning of fear. Bandura (1997), Self-efficacy: the exercise of control. Gable, Reis, Impett and Asher (2004), What do you do when things go right?
