Tribal Leadership summary

Have you noticed that some people are more hardworking than others? The same is true of tribes: some are more productive and function better.

Each tribe has it’s own tribal culture, characterized by the members’ relationships and attitudes toward each other. The tribal culture results from the interactions between members, but it also influences the members in turn.

Why are tribal cultures so important? Because they affect the entire tribe, and which stage the tribe reaches. There are five stages, and the lowest stages are the least productive.

A tribe in stage one has a hostile environment. People with a stage one mind-set feel that life is cruel and unjust. They often believe they must be violent or hateful to survive. Only two percent of Americans have a stage one mind-set at their workplace, but many more do in society at large.

In the middle of the five stages of tribal cultures, we find stage three. Stage three is the most common mind-set, affecting 48 percent of American employees. Unfortunately, it is still negative and unhealthy.

Stage three is characterized by selfishness and arrogance toward others. People with a stage three mind-set only care about their own interests. They’ll form two-sided bonds with other stage three people, but only if both sides directly benefit.

Stage four is the stage you’ll ultimately want to aim for.

In stage four, tribe members are united around common values and a noble cause they truly believe in. Members are more devoted to the tribe’s cause than to their own success.

Though stage four is optimal for businesses, stage five is where the magic truly happens.

Stage five is rare – only two percent of American workplaces have a stage five tribal culture. In stage five, the central cause of the tribe is the only thing that matters to the members. They don’t work toward the company’s goals for personal gain. Instead, they feel an almost religious sense of wonder about their cause, or the possibilities it offers.

All tribes, including workplace tribes, need a tribal leader. In a business tribe, the leader doesn’t necessarily have to be the manager or CEO. However, tribal leaders do eventually have high positions in their companies, as their performance typically results in them getting promotions.

The role of the tribal leader is to guide the tribe forward when they’re stuck in one of the stages. This can be challenging, as the members can make it difficult to move forward. We saw how individual employees adopt the nature of the tribe’s culture, meaning that if the tribe is in a lower stage, the members might prevent each other from moving forward. A strong tribal leader, however, can pull the whole group higher.

A leader must move their tribe to each higher stage, but it’s important not to rush it. Before moving on to the next stage, the leader must become a master of the previous stage.

Although the stages are quite different, it’s important to progress through all of them. If a leader tries to move the tribe from stage two straight to stage four, for instance, the tribe won’t be stable. If the tribe encounters a serious challenge, members will be tempted to back away and think only of themselves, because they didn’t mature out of that by passing stage three.