Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us

by Seth Godin

So here we are. We live in a world where we have the leverage to make things happen, the desire to do work we believe in, and a marketplace that is begging us to be remarkable. And yet, in the middle of these changes, we still get stuck.

Fear of change is built into most organisms, because change is the first sign of risk.

The marketplace now rewards (and embraces) the heretics. It’s clearly more fun to make the rules than to follow them, and for the first time, it’s also profitable, powerful, and productive to do just that.

Management is about manipulating resources to get a known job done.

Leadership, on the other hand, is about creating change that you believe in.

Leaders have followers. Managers have employees.

Today, marketing is about engaging with the tribe and delivering products and services with stories that spread.

“Established 1906” used to be important. Now, apparently, it’s a liability. The rush from stability is a huge opportunity for you.

If you’re a middle-of-the-roader, you don’t bother joining a tribe. Partisans want to make a difference. Partisans want something to happen (and something else not to happen). Leaders lead when they take positions, when they connect with their tribes, and when they help the tribe connect to itself.

They use passion and ideas to lead people, as opposed to using threats and bureaucracy to manage them.

They establish the foundation for people to make connections, as opposed to commanding people to follow them.

three steps: motivate, connect, and leverage.

Smart organizations assemble the tribe. Crowds are interesting, and they can create all sorts of worthwhile artifacts and market effects. But tribes are longer lasting and more effective.

The end result of this is that many people (many really good people) spend all day trying to defend what they do, trying to sell what they’ve always sold, and trying to prevent their organizations from being devoured by the forces of the new. It must be wearing them out. Defending mediocrity is exhausting.

Instead of always being on the hunt for one more set of eyeballs, true leaders have figured out that the real win is in turning a casual fan into a true one.

Fans, true fans, are hard to find and precious. Just a few can change everything. What they demand, though, is generosity and bravery.

Laura couldn’t have done this with one speech or one blog post. But by consistently touching a tribe of people with generosity and insight, she’s earned the right to lead. Personally, I can’t imagine the technology mattering much. Blogs and Twitter and all manner of other tools will come and go, possibly by the time you read this. The tactics are irrelevant, and the technology will always be changing. The essential lesson is that every day it gets easier to tighten the relationship you have with the people who choose to follow you.

The levers just got longer (for everyone). The Web and word of mouth and viruses and outsourcing and the long tail and the other factors involved in social media mean that everyone (every person, all six billion of us) has far more power than ever before. The king and the status quo are in big trouble.

The party didn’t take four minutes to organize; it took four years.

On a recent trip I took to India, this mind-set was made crystal clear. Ask almost anyone there what the perfect job would be, and the answer is: working as a government bureaucrat. Not only do you have air-conditioning, but you aren’t even asked to take initiative. The job is steady, the pay is good, and there are no surprises. The factory is part of the fabric of our lives. It’s there because it pays, and it’s there because it’s steady, and it’s there because we want it. What you won’t find in a factory is a motivated tribe making a difference. And what you won’t find waiting outside the factory is a tribe of customers, excited about what’s to come.

In unstable times, growth comes from leaders who create change and engage their organizations, instead of from managers who push their employees to do more for less.

What’s interesting about the folks I meet who are engaged and are clearly heretics is that they’ve actively talked themselves out of the fear. I mean, the fear is still there, but it’s drowned out by a different story. It’s the story of success, of drive, of doing something that matters. It’s an intellectual story about what the world (or your industry or your project) needs and how your insight can help make a difference.

The essence of leadership is being aware of your fear (and seeing it in the people you wish to lead). No, it won’t go away, but awareness is the key to making progress.

When you are leading a tribe, a tribe that you belong to, the benefits increase, the work gets easier, and the results are more obvious. That’s the best reason to overcome the fear.

Working in an environment that’s static is no fun. Even worse, working for an organization that is busy fighting off change is horrible. So why

What people are afraid of isn’t failure. It’s blame. Criticism.

Constructive criticism, of course, is a terrific tool. If a critic tells you, “I don’t like it” or “This is disappointing,” he’s done no good at all. In fact, quite the opposite is true. He’s used his power to injure without giving you any information to help you do better next time. Worse, he hasn’t given those listening any data with which to make a thoughtful decision on their own. Not only that, but by refusing to reveal the basis for his criticism, he’s being a coward, because there’s no way to challenge his opinion.

It’s easy to hesitate when confronted with the feeling that maybe you’re getting too much attention. Great leaders are able to reflect the light onto their teams, their tribes. Great leaders don’t want the attention, but they use it. They use it to unite the tribe and to reinforce its sense of purpose.

Leadership is scarce because few people are willing to go through the discomfort required to lead.

When you identify the discomfort, you’ve found the place where a leader is needed.

If you’re not uncomfortable in your work as a leader, it’s almost certain you’re not reaching your potential as a leader.

The difference between backing off and doing nothing may appear subtle, but it’s not. A leader who backs off is making a commitment to the power of the tribe, and is alert to the right moment to step back in. Someone who is doing nothing is merely hiding. Leadership is a choice. It’s the choice to not do nothing.

It’s more about a five- or ten- or fifteen-year process where you start finding your voice, and finally you begin to realize that the safest thing you can do feels risky and the riskiest thing you can do is play it safe.