Why Bad Bosses Will Soon Be Extinct
One day about 40,000 years ago a Neanderthal named Grog organized a successful hunting party then later sat around the campfire taking credit for Thor’s tiger kill to impress others because he organized the hunt — and we’ve been dealing with bad bosses ever since.
Good leadership is still the exception for our species. Over 77 % of organizations report that leadership within their organization is lacking.
But why? Why aren’t we experts in leading each other by now? It’s because historically humans simply haven’t prioritized leadership.
Until today, good leadership was helpful and sometimes critical in war or forging nations but it wasn’t our primary method for perpetuating our existence and getting what we wanted.
Violence was.
Leadership was just an effective tool to enhance our violence.
Today, it’s the tool to replace it.
That’s the revolution.
Poor leadership is a relic of our violent past.
Bad leadership is a lingering relic of our entire human story of power backed by violence.
Just as racism is a lingering relic of our biological aversion to difference, poor leadership is a relic of violent power as our primary means of influence.
Last century when slavery finally fell out of popular acceptance (it sadly took us humans this long), you could still be beaten for not working hard and corporal punishment of workers was legal.
In many ways today we are still enslaved — not with whips, but with fear, unaffordable necessities, and debt. Even today people fear their company and the power they have over their lives.
Workers, the people, were less than and still often are. You didn’t have to care about the worker to lead them — you could get quicker compliance with fear, punishment, and debt. You often still can.
But today, we are increasingly refusing to be treated only as cheap tools for building someone else’s profit, and increasingly choosing not to be enslaved by fear or debt…
