The Law of the Jungle
As you know, this is a blog about medical leadership, so today I want to say a few things about … baboons. Stick with me. Hopefully, it’ll make more sense by the end.
The neuroendocrinologist and writer Robert Sapolsky is well known for his research on stress. Much of his early work focused on baboon troops in the Serengeti, because it turns out baboons live stressful lives.
Typical baboon culture is very hierarchical, and frequently aggressive. This is especially true of the males, who jockey for dominance almost every minute of every day. Usually, young adolescent males leave the troop they were born into, and end up joining another troop. There, they have to battle their way up the chain of command, suffering humiliation and aggression at the hands of the older males, and then returning the favor to the newbies below them as they gain status.
One year, the baboon troop Sapolsky studied was turned upside-down when most of the dominant males contracted tuberculosis by eating tainted meat. Soon after, something surprising happened. In the absence of the alpha males, the rest of the troop adopted a kinder, gentler culture. The females took more dominant roles, and the adolescent males that arrived from other troops were treated much less aggressively. The time needed to integrate new males into the group decreased from months to days. Fighting went from a daily event to a rare occurrence, and male-to-male grooming became common where it had once been unheard of. Almost overnight, the culture of the group transformed from aggressive, competitive and hierarchical to kinder and more cooperative. And that effect wasn’t transient--it remained stable for many years, despite the constant influx of males from other troops.
So, what does this have to do with your healthcare organization? Maybe more than you’d think. For example:
Even for baboons, whose behavior is presumably at least as hardwired as our own, DNA isn’t destiny. In social animals, culture can be more potent than biology.
Once established, a culture can be stable and self-sustaining in the face of turnover and an influx of new members.
Although we have an inherent capacity for competition and aggression, we also have a predilection for cooperation and kindness. Both are probably hardwired.
Leaders matter. They set the culture, and they sustain it. A change in culture requires change from the top--at least in approach, and possibly in personnel.
We need more women leaders.
Leadership and culture are closely intertwined. That’s true whether you’re a CEO or a baboon. Or both.
