Leaders Eat Last

After ditching a career in law and ‘spending some time’ soul searching for why some people enjoy their jobs and others don’t, Simon Sinek seems to have made it his one man mission to change the world and inspire people to change the course of the often toxic business practises that effect not only the ultimate success of the businesses themselves but also the achievement of the people that work within them.

It turns out that, you, we, us haven’t changed biologically for about 50,000 years, we are the same today as we were ‘back then’. Our bodies and minds it seems have evolved to work efficiently in small groups of up to 150 people in harsh, sometimes scarce environments using a collection of rewarding chemicals as incentives. These four major chemicals as, Sinek explains can be divided into ‘Selfish Chemicals’ and ‘Selfless Chemicals’ all of which are designed to motivate us ‘to keep tracking the deer, even in mid-winter’ or to ‘build trusting and supportive relationships to protect the group’. According to Sinek, the problem is that these days businesses, being the equivalent of our modern day tribes, are set up to reward people with only the easiest and quickest feel good chemical response - Dopamine - being a ‘Selfish Chemical’ which is released when we hit a target or get a pay rise or get praised for an idea by our boss. It makes us feel great - temporarily - but isn’t designed to build trusting relationships between our colleagues. This ‘Dopamine addiction’, creates a stressful, ‘me first’ environment where “...a vicious cycle is set in motion. The less our colleagues and leaders look out for us, the less we look out for them. The less we look out for them, the more selfish they become and, as a result, the more selfish we become. And when that happens, everyone loses.” The ultimate result is that when we aren’t getting our Dopamine high we have the stress hormone, Cortisol, flowing through our veins, most of the time, a state that we weren’t designed to operate in - which Sinek neatly points out is not only bad for business but also bad for your health.

“What too many leaders of organisations fail to appreciate is it’s not the people that are the problem, the people are fine. Rather it’s the environment in which the people operate that is the problem. Get that right and things just go.”

The solution according to Sinek is to re-address the balance and to encourage and to incentivise the release of the major ‘Selfless chemical’ - Oxytocin - that encourages people to look out for one another, share ideas and work efficiently as a team. The problem is that this takes time to build and the effects aren’t felt immediately and is perhaps the reason why businesses don’t encourage it. Cultivating this environment creates ‘a Circle of Safety’ where people feel that as others are looking out for them they will look out for others and encourages selfless co-operation, efficiency and ultimately a much more successful business.

Backed up by a staggering amount of case studies and examples of businesses from Goldman Sachs to organisations such as the US Marine Corps, Sinek makes a compelling argument that is difficult to ignore and serves as an inspiration to all of those in positions of leadership. Highly recommended.