Leadership Lessons: a new insight from the “non-typical” bees

It's probably not the best-known fact, but a foraging bumble bee is only ever about 40 minutes from starvation .? Why, then, do some bees risk everything and not follow the dance to guarantee food and life?

A lesson highlighted in this article is that if everyone just follows the same path, it will lead to an inevitable decline as all the resources will be used up. Successful societies depend on a few who will risk everything for the collective to have a secure future by finding new resources. Therefore, how do you, as a leader, find, recruit, value, and reward those who risk everything in the long-term interest of the business?

A new study has revealed that within some beehives, there exists a small group of bees whose behaviour differs from the majority when it comes to reacting to the waggle dance - the visual social interaction for honeybees. The waggle dance, performed in a distinctive figure-of-eight pattern, is how bees communicate vital information to their colony mates about the location and distance of nectar and pollen sources, water sources, or potential new nesting sites. While most bees closely follow the directions conveyed by this dance, a minority cohort diverges, ignoring the pivotal form of communication within the hive.

In the honeybee world, conformity is not universally embraced.?

A startling one-fifth of bees boldly defy the waggle dance instructions, the very backbone of their society. While 80% diligently follow the endorsed objectives, dutifully pursuing the communicated flower patches, this rebellious 20% takes an entirely different path. They set out into the unknown, flying in seemingly random directions, turning a metaphorical blind eye to the social pressures demanding compliance.

This insurrection is born not of mere capriciousness, but of dire necessity. The 80% mainstream bees, for all their industrious stability, are trapped in a cycle of following instructions that may well lead to demised resources, ultimately draining the communal larders. The 20% outliers risk everything, dancing to the beat of their own drum in a desperate search for new pollen and nectar sources before starvation stakes its grim claim a mere 40 minutes later.

In this striking dichotomy, we find a potent reminder that bold non-conformity, however unsettling, plays a vital role in ensuring a group's survival and evolution. The minority uniquely shoulders the burden of exploring new frontiers, even when their very existence seems to undermine order itself. True resilience demands not just respect for this indispensable dance of deficit, but an empathic understanding that the entire colony depends upon these fearless few.

Bees provide a clear example of an important natural phenomenon. For a community to truly survive and thrive, there needs to be a balance between individual traits and community-level traits. Innovation and creativity often stem from individual bees exhibiting unique behaviours that diverge from the broader community norms.

Innovation and creativity often stem from individual bees exhibiting unique behaviours that diverge from the broader community norms.

In the case of the honeybee colony, the 20% of bees that ignore the waggle dance instructions and fly off in random directions represent this individualistic streak. While seemingly contradictory to the cooperative nature of the hive, this non-conformist minority actually plays a vital role. If all the bees simply followed the same instructions to the same food sources, the colony would eventually run out of resources.

By exploring new frontiers and seeking out unexplored food sources, even at personal risk, the 20% minority introduces new options and opportunities that the larger 80% conformist group depends upon for long-term survival. With this individualistic drive for novel solutions, the entire bee community could continue and thrive. The apparent tension between individualism and community is actually a symbiotic relationship critical for prosperity.

The apparent tension between individualism and community is actually a symbiotic relationship critical for prosperity.

This observation is not new

"The Fable of the Bees" by Bernard Mandeville (1714): This philosophical treatise uses bees as an allegory for human society. It explores the idea that individual vices (like self-interest) can lead to collective benefits (like a thriving economy). This concept could be applied to revolutions as well.? The pursuit of individual freedom or justice (seen as "vices" by the ruling class) can lead to a more just society (the collective benefit). Humans have observed, over a long period, that in nature you need diversity for societies to thrive. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fable_of_the_Bees ?

The 80% perspective

A non-conformist majority lens may suggest that some bees are deficient and highlight that the 20% divergent bees are failures because they won't or can't behave according to the standard expectations for proper bee behaviour.?

However, the 20% are a significant strategic asset for honeybee hives. The divergent cohort of the hive bucks the norms and charts a new course, widening the scope of the hive's territorial reconnaissance operations and its behavioural matrix. At the end of the day, this “divergent minority” appears to account for a disproportionate share of new pollen discoveries, helping the whole community thrive. This probably suggests that there is an “advantage” and that conformity may find some new resource on route, these are insufficient on their own.??

Nature suggests that 80% will follow the same pattern, making great strides in improving efficiency and effectiveness within the same paradigm. They will be creative and innovative within the boundaries and framing they have. Without the 80%, we have no normal, stable home or place to reproduce, and survival becomes impossible.?

Equally, 20% will not follow the rules, toe the line, or listen. They break the rules, find new boundaries, break the patterns, and are creative and innovative outside of the existing framing.

In business there are two ways to find new income/ deals/ products/ markets. Be one of the 80% doing the same and hoping you are not the last to the honeypot before it runs out. You will find new margins, new efficiencies, and new ways of doing the same things better - there is nothing wrong with these deals. Or be one of the 20% looking in new places, finding new innovation, discovering new creativity and distributing the old by finding the next sources of food.? The same equally applies to the deals themselves.? Only 20% of what we see will be in a category that are rule breakers.?

Let’s not confuse how the? 80:20 rule could be mis-applied

The Pareto principle states that for many outcomes, roughly 80% of consequences come from 20% of causes. In the case of bees, 80% of the community leads to the community being stable—if that is the outcome, then it is the majority who make it happen. However, for the community to survive and thrive, it needs the 20%, but the 20% only find but don’t deliver.??

If you are like me - one of the 20%, being crazy means others thrive because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.? “Here’s to the crazy ones”? Written by John Chapman (1774-1845); this poetic letter was used by Apple in that rather infamous 1997 marketing campaign.

Here’s to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes, the ones who see things differently — they’re not fond of rules

You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but the only thing you can’t do is ignore them because they change things, they push the human race forward, and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do.

Leadership Take Away

If you take any rules based approach (do these 5 things, 7 habits, this style) it might work for the 80% or the 20% but it will not work for both.? Rules, heuristics, rituals, processes, methods and management work - but differently for these two groups. The very same is true of culture - these two groups are different.? But you need them both.? Diversity matters for a reason.

Why does leadership remain an art, because in your situation you have to determine the balance needed to survive today and be ready to thrive tomorrow, with two different groups, one who cannot survive by doing the same thing and one who will risk everything.??

From two bees who are in the? 20% encouraging the next 20% ones to have agency and freedom to break the rules.