Tribal leadership – improving your business culture part I
…continues from the last week’s blog “Does your business focus on meaningless details and micro management?“.
In the beginning I am going to remind you about the motivation behind tribal leadership. The motivation is simply following:
“The research done by the authors Dave Logan & co proves that over a longer period of time the higher stage always outperforms the lower stages. The most interesting thing to know is that globally 75% of the businesses are on the stages 1,2 and 3 and only 25% on the stages 4 and 5. In the other words, there is plenty of potential for improving your bottom line by focusing purely on your company culture and without touching your products and services at all.”
Tribal leadership stages
The five tribal leadership stages are following. They are named according to the typical “feeling” within the tribe or individual member of the tribe.
Stage 1: “Life sucks”
Stage 2: “My life sucks”
Stage 3: “I am great (and you are not)”
Stage 4: “We are great (and they are not)”
Stage 5: “Life is great”
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Stage 1: “Life sucks”
The tribal leadership stage 1 can be described as full anarchy. One sentence to describe the life at this stage is “Life sucks”. For the people and tribes on this level the life truly sucks big time. They are stuck in very deep trouble (drugs, violence, blackmailing, large debt and similar) and there really is no way out. It is all about living or dying in the literal meaning of the words. People see that their life is hopeless and everyone is their enemy. There is absolutely no feeling of security and there is no better future sight. Everyone is literally focused on their own survival.
Stage 1 is thankfully not very common business culture. However, shockingly maybe, still around 2% of businesses are at stage 1. (Source: Tribal Leadership/Dave Logan & co). Stage 1 is more commonly present in prisons, gangs and criminal organizations.
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Stage 2: “My life sucks”
The tribal leadership stage 2 can be described as being a victim of circumstances. One sentence to describe the life at this stage is “My life sucks (and the unspoken part of it: because of someone else).” However, in comparison to stage 1, it is only not the whole life and world but only their own lives that are miserable. The people and tribes at this stage have given up trying. They are not very motivated to do anything else than the very minimum. Their life is somewhere else than at work or maybe they have no real life at all. A good example of a working place like this is a stereotypical Public Administration Office (in German: Amt and in Finnish: Virasto). As you may imagine at stage 2 there is nearly zero proactivity and absolutely no new ideas or innovation. People behave sarcastic towards the business, handle customers in rude way and often blame the management and co-workers. There is also no initiative to make it better. The management style is hierarchical “command and control”. The only thing that may connect the people is the common enemy: the management or the system.
Stage 2 is more common than you could imagine. It represents around 25% of the businesses. Yes, really 25%! (Source: Tribal Leadership/Dave Logan & co).
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In the coming blogs I am going to introduce you to the stages 3, 4 and 5 and their characteristics in detail. After that I am going to give you tips how to help your company culture to advance to higher levels.
STAY TUNED!
TO BE CONTINUED!
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