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Leadership: it’s a “no-brainer”

Written by: Douglas Long

Article Overview: "Red Zone" orientation fails today's leadership test. Today’s younger people no longer fit the “obey or conform” mould. We see this in the general response to authority whether it is in school, work, or society at large. “Gen Y” are not interested in “toeing the line” and they are prepared to openly rebel when this is demanded of them. While it is true that young people have always included a rebellious element that offended their elders and the powers that be, today the phenomenon is more widespread than ever before. Young people today demand to be engaged in what they are doing and with the people with whom they are doing it. The answer is true leadership.

Leadership: it’s a “no-brainer”

Just over 30 years ago a paper of mine entitled "Personnel Management in the Post Capitalistic Age" was published. In this I argued that the old days of "command and control" - telling others what to do and demanding either obedience or conformance - were dead. Well, they may be dead - the problem is that they won't lie down!

Back in 1819 when the Prussians introduced modern schooling, the bulk of the population (94% were destined for the "volkschulen") and the emphasis was on obedience - if you don't do as you are told you will be punished. This was enforced by harsh discipline and rote learning. For the next 5 ½ % (the "realschulen" ) conformance was the main organising principle and this produced the professionals who supported the state (the other ½ percent went to "academie" which were organised around engagement to allow that elite group to fully develop).

This, of course, had an on-flow into all areas of society including the workplace. Where obedience is based on "if you don't do as you are told you will be punished", conformance is based on "if you do as you are told you will be supported". If you read the management literature through most of the last century, this is the implicit (if not explicit) underpinning of how organisations should be run. In terms of the neuroleadership model Andrew Mowat, John Corrigan and I set out in "The Success Zone" (2009, Global Publishing, Melbourne) this is "red zone" behaviour.

When my paper was published in 1979, the buzz word was "teams". In practice this meant that, for most organisations, things remained exactly as they always had but a different terminology was used. The metaphor of shifting deckchairs on the Titanic comes to mind. I argued that "teams" would only ever be a fad unless there were significant structural changes. Status as evidenced by money and power were sought by all those "with ambition".

Zip forward to 2008 and 2009 and we see that, in fact, nothing much was different from 1979. Our society was still one in which many people strived for status based on money which would bring power. Many financial institutions had become bodies which did little or nothing to create real wealth and instead were largely places that inflated values of stocks by round robins of trades - many of which were secured by very doubtful real assets. People who questioned such approaches experienced tremendous pressure to conform with the consequences of failing to conform being job loss or ridicule or the like.

The problem is that today's younger people no longer fit the "obey or conform" mould. We see this in the general response to authority whether it is in school, work, or society at large. "Gen Y" are not interested in "toeing the line" and they are prepared to openly rebel when this is demanded of them. While it is true that young people have always included a rebellious element that offended their elders and the powers that be, today the phenomenon is more widespread than ever before. Young people today demand to be engaged in what they are doing and with the people with whom they are doing it.

And herein lays the issue.

Managers, societal leaders, and other authority figures tend to be in their 30's and above. For these people a "conformance" approach is the norm. Consequently we have significant increases in disenfranchised people who reject the status quo - and we don't know how to cope. Our "red zone" orientation prevents adaptation in order to provide an environment in which "engagement" is the norm. We have failed the leadership test.

What is needed today is a quantum shift - a shift away from compliance or conformance to one of engagement - to leadership.

!t's a "no brainer".

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Article Tags: limbic brain, nobrainer, red zone neuroleadership, true leadership



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