WHAT MAKES A LEADER WORTH FOLLOWING

Unprecedented times call for unprecedented measures and these times also call for leaders to step up to make a positive difference. This is done by first understanding why our society is set up the way it is today. A society where some people seem to have lots of power to do what they want, and others seem to have no self-determination at all? Where, exactly, do these hierarchies come from?

These questions are answered 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? 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 have 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. And then there are endorphins, which disguise exhaustion and pain as physical pleasure. Endorphins are the reason why we leave the gym aglow after a hard day of training and just cannot wait to go back for more. Ten thousand years ago, endorphins would have helped a village’s hunters continue the hunt and bring back meat to their hungry families despite their physical exhaustion. Today, they inspire professional athletes to achieve their peak performance.

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 to secure meat for the community, which in turn earned them the privileges of higher status. Weaker individuals, who for one reason or another could not 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.

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 do not have to face threats alone. This provides us with a feeling of safety that allows us to concentrate on making progress rather than avoiding threats. In prehistoric times, we found danger around every corner: we had to protect ourselves from predators, other people, and diseases, while simultaneously trying to secure food and shelter.

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. But safety does not just come out of nowhere: it is a group’s leaders who draw a circle of safety around their community members. This circle of safety describes a group of people who share common values and beliefs and strive to protect one another from threats. Within this circle, members can trust each other and thus pool their resources to progress. But it is the leader who determines just how far the circle extends.

Given that living in a group makes us feel safe today just as it did when we lived in caves, we also need a leader who can help us pool our resources and achieve progress. Today, the leader decides a company’s culture and values, and thus their employees’ mentality. When we imagine a CEO, we often picture someone who seals the deals and sends profits through the roof. However, successfully running a company has as much to do with creating the culture as it does with managing finances. This is because a company is more than merely the sum of its buildings, investors, and workforce. It also embodies a culture that dictates how employees’ approach various problems, treat customers, and prioritize values. And because leaders, such as CEOs, determine how the company is run, they also craft its culture.

Company culture does not just affect leadership either as it stretches all the way down the hierarchy by setting the standards that employees must meet to get hired and ultimately stay with the company. Let us deal with the drastic effects of bad leadership as that responsibility comes from our proximity to and empathy for others, without which we can cause great harm. Being in a leadership role does not necessarily mean you are 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. When abstraction occurs, we begin to prioritize our interests over other people’s, which can lead us to actively make decisions at others’ expense. Bad leadership has contributed to modern-day selfishness and the dehumanization of others.

As we have 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. And once we prioritize the pursuit of profits over all else, it can lead to the dehumanization of others. This is due, in part, to the technology that makes global business possible. Because businesses operate on such an enormous scale, it is easier to think of people as abstractions, such as consumers, shareholders, or expenses.

We are 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. And what we are seeing is that 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 is 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.

In addition, the fact that we are surrounded by all this amazing technology has shifted our attention from long-lasting value to getting a quick “buzz.” 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.”

So now we know what defines bad leadership, let us discuss what it takes to be a leader and be one worth following. Integrity and the ability to bond with others are essential for leadership. What do you think of when you imagine a good leader? You probably think about their specific skills and expertise that help them excel at what they do. It all comes down to integrity and that ability to relate and connect with others.

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 do not expect them to be perfect. What we do expect, however, is that they are honest and forthcoming about their mistakes and take responsibility for them. The feeling of safety that is so vital to the group is built slowly over time upon a foundation of honesty and trust. A leader thus has an opportunity to set an example to others with their integrity.

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 is important for a leader to maintain real connections to stay honest and focus on the needs of others. Being a leader means putting others ahead of yourself 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 needs purpose to remain cohesive, and that purpose comes from the leader’s vision.

Counterintuitively, by providing a vision for the future, leaders 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. The true meaning of the term “leader” can be found within the word itself: you must lead people in a certain direction, showing them the path and giving them a purpose to walk on it. 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.

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Until next time…ENGAGE, INSPIRE, & EMPOWER.