Better's Blinkist

What’s in it for me? Learn what defines true leadership.

Leaders Eat Last examines these questions by contrasting our modern societies – including their many technological advances and complex systems that can lead us to disarray – with the kinds of societies we would have lived in thousands of years ago. In doing so, we find that this division into "leaders" and "followers" is merely a natural consequence of our biology, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that all leaders are good. So what is it that makes a leader worth following?

17 May, 2020 09:33 Share

Our need for hierarchy and leadership is rooted in our biology.

It all comes down to hormones, which evolved over eons to help us survive by controlling our emotions and moderating our behavior, and which affect us just as much today as they did tens of thousands of years ago. The hormone dopamine rewards us with happy excitement whenever we complete a task, such as finding something we’ve been searching for or reaching our weight-loss goals. In addition, serotonin and oxytocin affect our social lives by helping us form relationships with other people.

17 May, 2020 09:33 Share

In addition to helping us survive, hormone-driven behavior is also responsible for creating the basic template for social hierarchy. In hunter-gatherer societies, for example, a rush of endorphins allowed hunters to push for miles and miles in order to secure meat for the community, which in turn earned them the privileges of higher status. Weaker individuals, who for one reason or another couldn’t participate in the hunt, had to accept less prestigious roles, such as gathering fruits. This distinction between the "strong" and the "weak" was the first step on the path towards social hierarchy. Yet, while certainly being responsible for these class distinctions, hormones also add cohesion to these hierarchical structures by giving the weaker individuals a serotonin- or oxytocin-based warm feeling towards one another as well as the leader, rather than destructive stings of jealousy.

17 May, 2020 09:34 Share

A feeling of safety is our main engine of progress and must be ensured by the group and its leader.

When it comes to survival, living in a group offers many perks, the most important of which being that we don’t have to face threats alone.

18 May, 2020 05:20 Share

Living in a group, however, allows us to divvy up the tasks necessary for self-preservation, thus enabling us to concentrate on other specific projects, such as fashioning better tools. These, in turn, help us progress as societies. As such, our brains have evolved to prioritize feeling safe, which is why we now do strange things like stay in jobs we hate simply because they make us feel secure.

18 May, 2020 05:21 Share

Working in a safe and trusting environment created a bond between the company’s employees, who even began helping each other even in times of personal crisis. Some even transferred their own paid vacation days to those in need.

18 May, 2020 05:21 Share

Today, the leader decides a company’s culture and values, and thus their employees’ mentality.

We can learn a bit about how this works by looking at the history of Goldman Sachs: between 1970 and 1990, the company operated under the motto "long-term greedy," showing a willingness to stand by clients even if that meant short-term financial losses. Since the 1990s, however, CEO Lloyd C. Blankfein and company president Gary D. Cohn shifted the company’s focus to short-term profits, even when they come at the client’s expense. Company culture doesn’t just affect leadership – it stretches all the way down the hierarchy by setting the standards that employees have to meet in order to get hired and ultimately stay with the company.

18 May, 2020 05:22 Share

Our responsibility comes from our proximity to and empathy for others, without which we can cause great harm.

Being in a leadership role doesn’t necessarily mean you’re a force of good. When the bond between the leaders and the team is somehow severed, the consequences can be horrific. In essence, this is because responsibility is actually about caring for other people; when we’re removed from the people for whom we are responsible, we’re less cautious about the damage we cause. Our feeling of responsibility comes from our empathy, the ability to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes. Without empathy, we risk becoming emotionally removed from decisions that affect others. And if we add physical distance to the mix, it leads to abstraction, where the consequences of our actions seem less real than they otherwise would.

18 May, 2020 05:23 Share

While many participants expressed great discomfort at inflicting apparent harm onto the Learners, Milgram found that the less proximity a Teacher had to a Learner, the more likely they were to continue the experiment. In fact, more than half the participants of one particular group, who could neither see nor hear the writhing and screams of agony from the Learners, eventually administered what would have been deadly voltage! When abstraction occurs, we begin to prioritize our interests over other people’s, which can lead us to actively make decisions at others’ expense.

18 May, 2020 05:24 Share

Bad leadership has contributed to modern-day selfishness and the dehumanization of others.

As we’ve already seen, being part of a group offers us a feeling of safety and opportunity for progress. Conversely, feeling alone and threatened makes us selfish and causes us to dehumanize others.

18 May, 2020 05:26 Share

And once we prioritize the pursuit of profits over all else, it can lead to the dehumanization of others.

18 May, 2020 05:26 Share

We’re therefore more likely to dehumanize others, i.e., to see them as tools that fulfill a specific purpose, than we are to treat them as living, breathing people with their own wants and needs.

18 May, 2020 05:26 Share

Modern society has become addicted to better and faster performance.

What do you think of when you hear the word "addiction"? Probably things like alcohol or drugs. It may surprise you, but you can also be addicted to performance. This addiction is intimately tied to our biology. Whereas the release of dopamine was once linked directly to our survival, nowadays it’s tied to our job performance, rewarding us when we achieve better and faster performance. Many companies looking to increase their production welcome this, all too easily forgetting the stability provided by long-term goals.

18 May, 2020 05:27 Share

When we "like" some human rights campaign – or anything, really – on Facebook, it triggers a dopamine response that gives us a rush of happiness for having completed a task. In order to prevent ourselves from becoming addicted to these little bursts of dopamine, we need to balance them out with a serotonin- and oxytocin-driven sacrifice, i.e., actually going somewhere to volunteer or building relationships with real people.

18 May, 2020 05:29 Share

The problem is that technology makes it easier and easier to just click "like," and actual volunteer work stays just as hard as it always was. As a result, we become addicted to the "quick fix."

18 May, 2020 05:29 Share

Integrity and the ability to bond with others are essential for leadership.

We need to be able to trust our leaders, which means they must have integrity. We all know that leaders are only human, and we therefore don’t expect them to be perfect. What we do expect, however, is that they’re honest and forthcoming about their mistakes and take responsibility for them.

18 May, 2020 05:29 Share

For example, in 2009, the Ralph Lauren Corporation learned that its Argentine branch had been involved in bribery. Rather than staging an elaborate cover-up, the leaders of the company instead informed the American authorities and even offered to aid them in the investigation. Although this course of action meant that the company had to pay over a million dollars in penalties, it was able to keep its integrity, and thus the trust of their customers and employees.

18 May, 2020 05:30 Share

Furthermore, once leaders have earned the trust of their group, they must keep that trust by bonding with others. Whether with their employees, customers, colleagues or rivals, it’s important for a leader to maintain real connections in order to stay honest and focus on the needs of others. We can see how a lack of bonding can affect leadership by looking at the US Congress. Until the 1990s, most congressmen and -women lived in Washington and thus communicated daily, which resulted in laws built upon close cooperation. Today, however, most members of Congress live elsewhere, and fly to Washington for a few days a week. The result? Some of the lowest approval ratings in congressional history!

18 May, 2020 05:30 Share

Being a leader means putting others ahead of yourself in order to fulfill a vision.

Essentially, a leader forges a vision for the future that the entire group feels inspired to fulfill. Although every group member has individual goals, the group as a whole needs purpose in order to remain cohesive, and that purpose comes from the leader’s vision.

18 May, 2020 05:31 Share

Think of Bill Gates, for example. His goal wasn’t to earn billions of dollars, or even to build a great company. His dream was to put a computer on every desk. It is precisely this vision that ensures that Microsoft doesn’t lose itself in the abundance of profits and possibilities, and instead remains a major force on the market.

18 May, 2020 05:31 Share

Counterintuitively, by providing a vision for the future, leaders actually serve the led, and not the other way around. Indeed, true leaders understand that their duty is to serve the people that follow them. Although leaders do enjoy certain privileges, these come at the cost of an enormous responsibility to the people they lead. In times of crisis, a true leader will use all his personal resources for the good of the community.

18 May, 2020 05:32 Share

And on that path, the leaders need to follow last in line to ensure that every member of the group makes it to the end

18 May, 2020 05:32 Share

Final summary

True leaders prioritize the needs of the group over their own, and thus ensure that the group as a whole progresses. Because a leader’s vision is a cause for action, it’s important to ensure that these leaders are a force for good. Remember: Your employees are your family. When you turn to your employees, view them as family members instead of subordinates. Set a vision. If you wonder how to manage your company, try to set a vision for the future, instead of concentrating on short-term goals.

18 May, 2020 05:33 Share