Smart Tribes: How Teams Become Brilliant Together (2013)
Author: Christine Comaford
Reviewer: Bob Moore, CMC
New York Times bestselling author and applied neuroscience expert, Christine Comaford, knows what it takes to move people from the Critter State into the Smart State, where they have full access to their own creativity, innovation, higher consciousness, and emotional engagement. When an entire culture maintains that state, it becomes what she calls a Smart Tribe: Focused, Accountable, Collaborative.
In Smart Tribes, Comaford explains that the reason why companies are not performing at the level they want to is because people are spending too much time in their “critter state,” which is displayed in times of change, rapid growth and turnover. She says that Maslow had it right with his hierarchy of needs and when our most basic physiological needs are met, we crave safety, belonging and mattering.
Safety: If a person spreads fear, they crave safety.
Belonging: If a person takes belonging away with gossip, forming silos and separating people, they crave belonging.
Mattering: If a person makes others feel small, they crave mattering.
Comaford also illustrates how to influence anyone, anytime, anywhere with four subconscious secret codes called meta programs:
- Toward-Away: Toward people are motivated toward getting, attaining and achieving; Away people are focused on solving problems.
- Options-Procedures: Options people want lots of choice and like to create procedures for someone else to follow; Procedures people want a proven step-by-step process.
- General-Specific: General people start by looking at the 10,000 foot view then drill down; Specific people start from the bottom then bubble up.
- Active-Reflective: Active people embody Nike’s slogan “just do it” and act without caring if they make a mistake; Reflective people analyze, understand and consider before acting and may get stuck in “analysis paralysis”.
There is much more that every executive, team leader, sales and marketing professionals can apply immediately. One of the few books I have seen in a while that leadership teams need to have and should start a study group to be sure it is applied. I totally endorse this great work, which happens to be an Amazon “Best Books of the Year So Far”.