Surrounded by idiots- An honest review
Since its release, the book has sparked wide discussion. Many readers have praised it for being simple and relatable, while others have debated its approach to human behaviour as overly broad, few even calling it pseudoscience, giving rise to quite a large share of controversy around this book.
So let’s see what this bestseller is about, why it’s so famous, and if this really is your perfect next read. (With no spoilers!)
What It’s Really About
Thomas Erikson argues that many misunderstandings at work, in families, or even in politics happen not because people are “idiots,” but because we all have different communication styles.
“Surrounded By Idiots” is a book that aims to delve deep into how humans communicate and perceive the people around them, and how everyone does this differently, also showing how important it is to understand different kinds of people.
The book introduces us to the DISA system, which serves as a model that can help us communicate with different kinds of communicators by dividing them into four major colour-coded categories (Red, Blue, Green and Yellow).
Take a look at this figure to get a slight glimpse- you might’ve seen this somewhere online as well.
The book shows how these personality types influence how people speak, listen, make decisions, and handle conflict. Erikson emphasises that recognising these differences helps us adapt our own communication to be clearer, more effective, and less frustrating.
So, is this book for you?
“Surrounded By Idiots” intends to be a guide to communicate well in every sphere of life, including interpersonal relationships with friends and family. However, the book’s main focus is towards communication in work environments and in business.
It’s quite focused on situations where you need to get work done and co-ordinate as a team, in the process, learning how different types of people with different perspectives and skill sets can be invaluable if we know how to communicate effectively.
The book revolves around the four “colour coded” personality types; Red, Blue, Green, and Yellow, and that’s how we get introduced to different people with different traits. This model has seen quite a bit of praise because of its simplicity in terms of explaining behavioural traits and communicating effectively; but has also met quite a bit of criticism with many regarding it as a system that brings labelling and bias to the workplace and beyond, oversimplifying behavioural phenomena, and lacking important social context.
However, as a reader, I think leaning towards either of these perspectives would give an incomplete picture, which is why this next section will definitely help you a lot.
Personal thoughts, as a reader
Why Context Matters
Context something thing which I felt was not explored adequately throughout the course of the book, especially while dealing with the different personality types in detail, even though the second chapter of the book deals with this (Core values, traits, etc).
In the subsequent chapters, we don’t actually see much about how this introductory chapter relates to anything else in the book, so there really isn’t much to say here.
Colour Coded Personalities- What Do They Really Mean?
On one hand, colours seem to be an interesting way to look at various different personality types, because it’s easy to understand and easy to remember. But, to be frank, it just seems a lot like we are considering four different and somewhat distinct individuals and categorising everyone into these four archetypes.
The author does mention that most people may be a combination of two colours, and if their behaviour seems difficult to interpret, they may be a combination of three colours. It’s also quite obvious that nobody stays the same over a long period of time, everybody changes and develops different traits and behaviours over time.
However, in many places in the book, especially when we’re simulating different situations, we only see personalities with distinct colour-coded traits, instead of looking at the more tricky- and common situations where we see many distinct kinds of traits in one person.
Personally, I think that even though what I wrote above is true, the entire purpose of having the four personalities is just to showcase different kinds of traits, because truly understanding a person in their complexity doesn’t just come down to red, blue or green. A few behaviours are inherently opposite to each other, like dominance and submission. The entire point is to see how these behaviours affect our interactions and how we deal with them.
Conclusion
So, long story short, we’re not really looking at personalities here, just various different behaviours and why we need different kinds of thinkers to interact and improve; each trait has a certain value it brings to the group, and each has a drawback. Different thinking processes are all important to a group and so it’s really important to learn how to interact with people who think differently and have different perspectives and different solutions to problems.
Even though it does have certain limitations, “Surrounded by Idiots” is a good book to get started with if you want to connect people better. Personally, I found it quite engaging as well, so I’ll give it an easy
7/10
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