The work on Leadership is derived from “Tribal Leadership: Leveraging Natural Groups To Build A Thriving Organization”.

Organizations behave to the highest level of competence as their leadership allows. A lower level leader within an organization will prevent their direct reports from behaving at a higher level due to the lack of understanding of the behavior of the more highly evolved employee. Thus, for an organization to evolve, the management must first evolve to allow higher order behavior to exist within the organization. Contrarily, a more highly evolved subordinate will behave to the highest level allowed within the constraints of their leadership creating situations where highly evolved individuals behave at one or two stages below their capability.

Leadership within the organization is the primary driving force for the success or failure of an organization with regards to its performance and general self-fulfillment. Leadership must provide the environment for the individual to behave.

Tribal Leadership

Figure a. (Logan 2008) Tribal Leadership

Alienated

The individual does not seem attached to anyone, the organization, or to the world at large. Their relationships with other people do not exist. In groups, they present despairing hostility. They do not collaborate with anyone. Their mental state is “Life Sucks”.

Everyone knows a “Life Sucks” person. They are the types of people who are simply unreachable. A cloud always around them, they find the negative in everything. Eeyore from the Winnie the Pooh series represents the personality type of an Alienated individual.

Separate

Individuals in stage 2, separate, are disconnected from others in the organization, but they realize that not everyone thinks this way. Their group behavior is as an apathetic victim and they maintain loose contact with others. Their individual mental state is “My life sucks.”

Personal

Individuals in stage 3, the personal stages build self-serving connections with others in the organization. In groups they are lone warriors building dyadic connections with others to serve their needs. They guard their relationships from others and protect their Rolodex. Their individual mental state is “Me” and “I’m Great.” Highly paid sales people are typically healthy stage 3 individuals.

Donald Trump is the personification of the stage 3 leader and individual contributor. Everything he does represents further evidence of how he is great, even when hiring or firing others. A combination of fear of termination prevents true dissension within his organizations preventing his companies from ever performing at their highest levels.

Partnership

Individuals in stage 4, partnership, are connected to others and view relationships with others as critical to organizational and individual success. They know that 1+1 > 2. Their group behavior revolves around tribal pride and they maintain strong triadic contact with others. They share their Rolodex with the team because it will help the team to perform better. Their individual mental state is “We” and “We’re Great.”

Partnership leaders tend to disappear from the lime light. Employees will proclaim with pride “we did it on our own”.

Team

Team leaders form groups of triadic relationships bringing together ad hoc teams of people to solve specific problems. In groups, they behave with innocent wonderment. Higher causes drive their enthusiasm. Their individual mental state is “World” and “Life is Great.”