Natural leadership, real Alpha Males, and the sources of toxic leadership. There is great misunderstanding in the tactical world about the concept of an Alpha Male, as it occurs in nature, and being a leader and the relationship between the two.
Start with this, Alpha Males are a feature of species like wolves, chimpanzees and hunter-gatherer humans that form coalitions in order to dominate resources. Imagine a valley or another piece of terrain that is rich in food sources. One wolf, chimpanzee, or man will not be able to hunt or gather on that terrain if several others band together and run them off or kill them. Coalitions form around Alphas/leaders because being in a coalition, following the leader, is good for both the leader and the followers.
They do not necessarily form around the biggest/baddest/toughest individual. They form around the best leader, who doesn’t have to be big/bad/tough at all. They have to be the one that others wish to follow because they are better off if they do. Being the best individual hunter/fighter isn’t what is important. This is especially true among humans. What is important is leading the best hunt and making sure that everyone involved feels like they are being led well and receiving more than they would if they were not part of this particular coalition.
Coalitions, after all, are voluntary. Members may leave when they want and/or form their own coalitions that would be in competition with the original one. They may also form an alliance and depose the poor leader. This means that an Alpha/leader must pay attention to the feelings/cares/concerns of those they wish to lead, or they will have no one to lead. In other words, the real Alpha/leader must be more of a politician than a bully.
Leadership within modern organizations such as militaries or law enforcement organizations, but also any large bureaucracy, is a completely different thing. Start with the fact that the leader does not have to form a coalition. It is formed for them. They are not chosen by those they wish to lead. Rather, both the leaders and the led are assigned to their positions by the bureaucracy. Most of what we call leadership training is about how to mimic what someone who forms a coalition might do while mainly being responsive to those who formed the coalition for the assigned leader, rather than for the members of the team.
Real leadership, as in the natural model of leadership, is a reciprocal relationship between leader and willing team member. This difference is what makes taxic leadership possible. In a bureaucracy, the members of a unit can’t leave. Their voices may not be heard. The bureaucracy itself has self-preservation as its primary goal. Bullies can function in positions of power because the entire weight of the organization can be behind them.
My friend good friend John, brought up how Michael Jordan used to pressure members of his team to be better, raising the level of play for the entire team. One important thing to consider was that his role in forming the team and holding it together. The team and league were formed long before he showed up, but he had to build a coalition and hold it together within that framework. Balance this with the feelings each member had about what he brought to them, including how they felt about what they go out of staying on the team with him, including any bullying he may have done and you can see the true balance of leadership.
Members may stay, even with a leader they don’t like, but they get to make their own judgments about whether staying helps them or not. Consider the definition of the word loyalty. In a hunter-gatherer band it is entirely reciprocal. A leader cannot demand loyalty, in fact a leader cannot demand anything, unless they bring enough value to the team members to make staying as a member of the team and following the leader the best option. They have to display the qualities they wish to see from their team members to their team members. If you are not loyal to me, you cannot expect me to be loyal to you. If you are not honest with me…. If you are not brave, hardworking, dedicated… leaders must lead by example because the alternatives are being deposed as leader or seeing the dissolution of the group.
Matt Larson runs Patreon Combatives, a personal self defense website: patreon.com/MlCombatives
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It is hard to set good examples unless you lead by example. There are a lot of traits in capitalism, also, like voluntary affiliation and participation.
But, of course, the alpha male is resented by the betas, and by the feminists who believe that they ought to lead everything, but somehow never can.
Of course, the feminists who resent the alpha males, and wind up marrying a beta male, still wind up cheating on their husbands with an alpha. 🙂
Excellent article sir. I’ve written on the subject of leadership, focusing on law enforcement, in the past. One of the points I’ve made is the military has leadership training from private to general. Law enforcement doesn’t have a fraction of that, and that is a problem. I’ve known more than a few sergeants, lieutenants, etc who are good bureaucrats, decent supervisors, but in no way are leaders. My old department used to promote based only on a written exam. At the top of the list, we would have guys who were technically very competent, they can score very well on an exam.But have not idea how to instill confidence in their officers, think through a problem, influence others to achieve a goal, etc. In other words, lead.
Generally people like that move into the upper bureaucracy as soon as they can. And the department also reorganized the promotion system, making the written 60% of final score, a assessment in front of others sergeants/lieutenants/captains 40%. And they have a sergeant prep course now, focusing on the technical requirements (How to document use of force, reports for injured officers, how to prepare correspondence). Speaking with a friend at the academy, they are working on putting some leadership training into the course. Not as good as Army PLDC, but a start.