Leaders eat last when there isn’t abundance
There’s a story circulating from Simon Sinek circulating of why leaders eat last. It’s a story about leadership and community building, trying to pinpoint why we follow some leaders and not others.
He tells the story of how he interviews an officer from the US marines, asking about the leadership of the officers. The officer replies with what then became the title:
“Officers eat last.”
It’s a great punchline, and as the story is told in a very nice fashion, it’s a compelling thought. Until you think it all the way through.
There are a couple of things that I want to have said here, before you read on.
- I’m a 23 year old freelancer from Sweden. I’m sure that Sinek and the US Marines have insights that I haven’t had yet.
- I haven’t read the book by Sinek. This is based off my perception of him as a speaker as well as from some of his other books.
- I’m sure I’m wrong, but want to spark a thought and start a conversation.
With that said:
The tradition of officers eating last comes from a perspective of lack, which I imagine being really important to have as a soldier. The point of it is that the leader takes such good care of the other members of the group that they’re ready to give up their opportunity to eat in order for the rest of the group to fuel up.
That’s noble, I really do admire the point. I’d be happy to give up my food in order for my friends to be able to eat in a situation where there’s limited supplies of food. If someone else did it for me, I’d admire them.
Taking a wider perspective, it’s a great place to come from, to set the needs of others before your own. I truly think that it’s an important trait to have as a leader.
And at the same time, I want to nuance the picture of that kind of leader.
Grumpy leaders aren’t great leaders
If there’s anything to learn from advertising, which there rarely is, it’s this: You’re not you when you’re hungry.
I’d be a lot happier following someone that I know have the resources to make the best decision possible. In this case, it’s quite obvious as the example that Sinek brings up is about food.
But it goes for other resources as well. If leaders would read something important last, I’d be weary that they didn’t have the information they’d need. If leaders would exercise last, I’d be worried they might not have had the time to cleanse their head. And so on.
There’s a paradox here, as the leader is the one making the decision, they might need the resource the most. Then again, the ones following them might need the resource in order to be “good followers”.
Sacrifice
What’s really obvious to me in this story is the glorification of sacrifice that’s coming through. The perspective of the leader being tough and strong because of the sacrifice that they’re making.
There are all kinds of problems with that. It’s an extremely masculine ideal, it’s not always the right thing to do, it puts the leader in the shoes of a victim to name a few.
What bugs me the most with sacrifice being glorified is that it’s an ideal from a very long time ago where threats to us were completely different. It’s a really nice thing to think that Jesus sacrificed himself for all mankind, or that Achilles sacrificed himself for eternal glory and unifying people.
That’s not the result of most sacrifices tho. And it sure isn’t the intent with most sacrifices.
Being an optimist, I’d like to think that most sacrifices are done with good intent, but thinking slowly about this, I don’t know if that’s the case.
Management of lack
This is really the kicker for me. Something a friend of mine has pointed out numerous times the last year is that society to a large extent operates from a perspective of lack. The quote that I keep coming back to is this:
“We’re busy with the management of lack rather than the distribution of abundance.”
— Dominic Bosman Venter
As I stated previously, I imagine the management of lack being a really important part of being a soldier. There isn’t abundance in the situations they’re put in.
But for regular people, there’s usually more abundance than I think we’re giving ourselves credit for. The examples of leaders reading or exercising last proves that point quite clearly, as it’s absurd to think that the two of us couldn’t read something at the same time.
Most resources that we use in every day life today, especially as leaders, aren’t really in a position of lack. Therefore, we don’t need to manage them as they’re running out, but start being smart about how we distribute them in the best possible way.
Rather than managing lack, I think leaders need to come from a perspective of abundance. It’ll be a much more fun and interesting environment to operate in.
I really don’t know about this, and I want to be clear on that. After writing all of this, I think that the management of lack perspective that I see in big parts of society is less and less constructive.
As leaders, I think we all would like to distribute abundance instead, and that starts by realising that there is abundance where you are.
