Contrarian Strategy Wins in the Workplace: It Doesn't Pay to Be Nice

Everyone is familiar with the wisdom that “Nice guys finish last,” but a new study confirms that the stereotype is actually a truth, and those employees with a harder edge or meaner disposition actually get paid more and advance higher than their temperate peers.

A study, co-authored by Beth Livingston, of Cornell University, Timothy Judge of the University of Notre Dame, and Charlice Hurst of the University of Western Ontario, analyzed twenty years worth of data from multiple surveys and conducted interviews with over 10,000 employees. The results were surprising, finding that argumentative and disagreeable employees—across both genders—tend to have higher salaries than their compliant colleagues.

To be precise, disagreeable men earned 18 percent ($9,772) more than agreeable men, while disagreeable women earned 5.5 percent ($1,828) more than agreeable women. Overall, women were the big losers. According to the report, "The trick is that the premium for being disagreeable is much stronger for men than it is for women.” Disagreeable women earned less than their agreeable male cohorts, and agreeable women were at the bottom of the pile, earning the least.

Co-author Timothy Judge explained that, “The perception is that if a woman is agreeable, she gets taken advantage of, and if she is disagreeable, she’s considered a control freak or 'the B-word.’"

What constitutes being disagreeable varies. Although being downright rude probably won’t buy you much in terms of salary or prestige, being contrarian or a tough negotiator seems to earn brownie points. For a more descriptive view of the report, check out the interview video with the author here.