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Leadership: The Sheep, The Parasites and the Wolves
Executive level management training programmes often look at examples of leadership styles to identify the elements that contribute to organisational and team success. If you look at companies who have experienced high levels of success in recent years you will find that they have as their basis a determination, communicated by the leaders in that organisation, to be different from the rest. With this in mind, if you are an aspiring leader you should regularly ask your self a question regarding your and your team’s attitude to creating value for the organisation. This is "Are we acting like sheep, parasites or wolves?"
Lets start with the Sheep. They have three core characteristics. Firstly, they are only happy when they are part of a flock. Secondly, sheep are short-sighted and can only see the green grass which is directly under their noses (thus they do not like to think for themselves and are the ones that want to be shepherded by the tutor on management training courses!). And lastly, when they are disturbed, they start to bleat and run about in confusion.
In recent years, some organisations have behaved very much like sheep. They only feel happy when they are doing the same things as their competitors. Such as introducing similar looking products, running the same type of promotions, using the same advertising techniques, etc. They still think about the short-term, focusing on short-sighted factors such as, for example, the monthly market share data. They therefore end up allowing themselves to be disturbed regularly by the number one panic factor: Price politics. As soon as they become aware of a strategic price change introduced by a competitor, they panic. They forget about all other marketing tools and simply resort to price politics. This, not only is a sign of blind panic, but is also worse as it shows a lack of imagination! They lack ideas for their longer term success. When they talk about their competitors, they speak almost exclusively about the tough price situation. In short, I don't have much respect for sheep. Nor do I want to live like these conformists, beacause I do not want to end up in the frying pan some day.
Now lets consider the parasites. You may be wondering what good parasites do. The answer is not a lot. Parasites also have three characteristics. Firstly they need someone to live on, they cannot survive life alone. Secondly, they often transmit nasty diseases. Finally, and this is their one half positive characteristic, they tend to kill off the weak. Because of this lifestyle parasites never develop new products, methods or technologies. Parasites never take responsibility for their companies: social engagement is foreign to them. All they can do is feed off their competitors’ ideas and product developments.The disease most frequently transmitted by parasites is action-itis: they tell their clients that they could make more money by buying their product and solemnly declare that their copy of a product is more profitable than the named brand. These activities always have the same result of ruining price and profit levels in the entire business sector.
So what about the one half-positive characteristic of parasites? Are they really able to kill off the weaker competitors they live on? Well, it is possible, but only if:
- a) The company they are attacking stops investing in their brand and their product quality and
- b) The attacked company plays the price game with the parasite.
If the company concerned does allow parasites to force them into a price war, it has lost to the parasite.
Now lastly let us look at the wolves. Wolves are the most misunderstood life form on this planet. What do you really know about them? Wolves are very independent, in fact they are loners, and are not found together in large packs for long. Wolves are also nomadic, but they do have a base. They will stay in suitable base for a number of seasons and will defend this territory for as long as it is worthwhile. Most important is that wolves like to eat sheep.
To be successful in today’s uncertain climate, the wolf has a lot of admirable characteristics! Just as the three most important things in the property market are “location, location, location”, for successful organisations it is “be different, be different, be different again!” OK, this approach is not a guarantee of success, but business leaders on management training courses usually conclude that this attitude is certainly an important requirement for the leadership of a company to have and communicate to the team.
