TRIBES

5.0 out of 5 stars Tribes: Is the world of leadership changing?, May 14, 2011
By Robert Ewoldt - See all my reviews
This review is from: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Hardcover)
The Internet has made the world smaller. Instead of writing letters and waiting weeks for them to arrive at their destination, we now write emails, and they arrive instantly. Instead of watching the nightly newscast or reading the morning newspaper, we can find the news at our fingertips at any second of the day. Instead of joining the local club, we can now join any club in the world, with people that have the exact same tastes as we do.

In Tribes, Seth Godin writes that "before the Internet, coordinating and leading a tribe was difficult. It was difficult to get the word out, difficult to coordinate action, difficult to grow quickly." The Internet has made it easy for people to communicate with each other, but there are tribes that are just waiting for leadership.

Old rules are out the window
Instead of the old rules of the world that stated that everyone must report to a manager, and that manager to a vice president, and the vice president to a CEO, there are new rules in a new world. One no longer has to be a manager to lead a tribe. "There is a tribe of fellow employees or customers or investors or believers or hobbyists or readers just waiting for you to connect them to one another and lead them where they want to go."

What's needed?
What are the components of a successful tribe? It takes two things to turn a group of people into a tribe:

1.a shared interest and
2.a way to communicate.

Tribes was not written in the way that I usually think. It requires more interpretation than most authors require of their readers. Most people like to read a book that confirms their ideas. If you're one of these people, then don't read this book. If you are willing to have some of your ideas questioned, and open to a new way of thinking regarding leadership, then go out and get this book!
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4.0 out of 5 stars Short and Sweet for a Reason, April 9, 2011
By RG (Seattle) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Hardcover)
The negative review given by one contributor indicates that the person must not be a creative leader given his comments on the frustrating lack of clearer examples to validate Godin's confident reasoning. I don't think that is necessary for the audience Godin is speaking to. If they take him up on it, they will figure it out. If you are looking for scholarly validation of Godin's reasoning, Read Group Creativity by Paulus & Bernard (eds). I've read many books and articles on leadership creativity for the purpose of disrupting the status quo and for group-oriented innovation. What I like about Godin's book is that I can give a copy to everyone on my organization's leadership team, and indeed to all of our staff because it's not academically dense. Instead it's fast moving and inspiring. In addition, much of what he says in very casual, cheer-leading, non-academic language confirms much of the same learning coming out of more recent scholarly research. I've just ordered 17 copies Of Godin's book for our next Leadership Team meeting! Will see what happens...
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4.0 out of 5 stars Want to change the world? Read this book!, April 6, 2011
By Danielle Raine "Author of Housework Blues - A... (North Yorkshire, UK) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Hardcover)
Phew! I'm exhausted after reading this. It is absolutely crammed with ideas about business, altruism and leadership. Even though it's quite a short book, it took me so long to finish it as I found I could only digest a few pages at a time. There's something thought-provoking or eye-opening on virtually every page.
Really interesting stuff. If you've ever thought you might want to change the world -read this book!
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5.0 out of 5 stars Def get it, March 31, 2011
By Kyle Newell (Central, New Jersey) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Hardcover)
This book was great for anyone that is an entrepreneur or leader. You must create a tribe and a culture within that tribe to really grow what you are doing. Tribes follow their leaders and spread the word. Godin shows you how in this book. Very impressed with the content.
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4.0 out of 5 stars Coffeechug Book Review - [...], February 25, 2011
By A. Maurer "Coffeechug" (Iowa) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Hardcover)
This is a book about what it takes to be leader for your tribe. It is a different take on becoming a leader. This is not some action plan type book where you must follow this step, then this step, etc.

This is book bounces around from thought to thought. I loved it. It provides some great ideas, thoughts, and suggestions on what it takes to be a leader. It is general so it applies to whoever you are and whoever you plan on leading.

I am a big fan of Seth Godin.I started reading his blog and tweets a few months back and just love his insights and thoughts. I finally decided to read one his books. This was the one that I decided to go with. Yes, I will be reading his others. I have them all on hold as we speak. I took many notes.

My favorite little story in the book is the balloon factory and the unicorn. I laughed and then thought, "Wow, that is a perfect story to share with my team."

It is a book that is a quick read, but I spent many pages re-reading and then writing down my thoughts and reflections. Yes, like the other books I have been reading(Find Your Zone) I will be making future posts about how I am applying the ideas I have recorded in my notebook.

The key to remember is that anyone is capable of being a great leader in this day and age. We all have access to all the tools needed to organize and construct our tribes. Just remember that you have to have a tribe to be a leader and vice versa.

I have already thought about implementing his ideas in this book into my coaching youth basketball and in my job as a middle school teacher.

I would love to connect with others who have read this book about what they took away from the book.

This is one that will probably be purchased so I have it to reference to when needed.
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3.0 out of 5 stars "Tribes" One-Dimensional, February 20, 2011
By M. Edwards (Taichung, Taiwan) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Hardcover)
In "Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us", Seth Godin inspires by telling stories such as Nathan Winograd's, who followed the steps written about in "Tribes" and did not compromise. He was clear and vivid in communicating his vision and within months, half who didn't want to join the tribe, had left. Yet in the end he succeeded (p. 144).

Godin reminds us that one of the most powerful of our survival mechanisms is the desire to be part of a tribe, to contribute to (and take from) a group of like-minded individuals (p. 3) An important part of leadership is the ability to stick with the dream in leading the tribe for a very long time (p. 132) Resistance is to be expected: without people pushing against your quest to do something worth talking about, it's unlikely to be worth the journey (p. 129). And of course these and many other aspects of leading tribes are heightened and transformed in light of modern information technology and the internet.

However, the little which Godin says so often comes across sounding like a broken record to me. The status quo is bad.... Innovation is good... Effective leaders are "heretics" who change the status quo and innovate.... In repeating this Big Idea over and over and again and again, Godin does not seem to develop or support it beyond the shallow and superficial. For example, effective leaders also know when to preserve tradition, and how to maintain balance and stability when and where appropriate. In the final analysis I found this book to be a slight disappointment which did not measure up to all the hype.

SKIP THE NEXT TWO PARAGRAPHS IF YOU ARE NOT INTERESTED IN HOW "TRIBES" RELATES TO MY PARTICULAR FIELD'

On a personal note, I'm reminded of what the late Paul Hiebert has to say about so called "social clubs" and voluntary organizations in his book "Transforming Worldviews: An Anthropological Understanding of How People Change." Tribes, according to Hiebert, are normally single-purpose gatherings in that people gather in one club or tribe to meet a specific need and turn to other clubs to meet other needs. Attempts to make a club a strong group, such as a family, a clan, or a tribe, inevitably fail because the club, by its very purpose and nature, differs from strong groups... The social glue holding clubs together is weak because loyalties are based on personal interests... Idiosyncrasies and differences are not as well tolerated as they are in strong group societies. ... Members join because of that they hope to get, and they expect to receive essentially as much as they give... Clubs work well in modern societies because these societies view the autonomous individual as the highest value. The price of this freedom and autonomy, however, is a lack of permanent human relations and security. In the end, the autonomous person is a person alone, never in community, because he or she is not willing to sacrifice his or her interests for the interests of the group. The autonomous person is also a self-centered person who measures all things in terms of their benefits and costs to him or her (Hiebert, p 173).

According to Hiebert, modern Christians unfortunately often tend to organize their churches the same way they organize other areas of their lives. Hence, many churches are reduced to one-dimensional religious clubs. Few members are willing to pay the price of real community. One result is that such churches increasingly tend to opt for professional and paid leadership, whereas the laity become consumers who come to church for the services it offers to them.

In conclusion, I think it is important to remember that what Godin says about so-called "tribes" may not always apply to all groups across the board. Some of our modern ideas about tribes may in fact impede us from moving beyond the autonomy of the individual and over into authentic community.
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5.0 out of 5 stars A Must Read, February 15, 2011
By Jennifer Reynolds "Jennifer" (Georgia, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Hardcover)
If this book doesn't change your life nothing will. A fantastic look at leadership, how it's done and how it's not done. I read the book frantically because with every page it inspired new ideas. If you want to stay exactly the same and never do anything exciting in your career, do not read this book. If, however, you want to take a risk and discover that work can be so much more than a daily grind, this is the book for you.
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3.0 out of 5 stars We need Tribes. We need World Changers., February 9, 2011
By Michael A. Robson "21tiger - Books Biz Asia" (Shanghai, China) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Hardcover)
A heretic, as defined by Merriam Webster's dictionary is: "a dissenter from established religious dogma; especially, a baptized member of the Church who disavows a revealed truth; one who dissents from an accepted belief or doctrine; a nonconformist"

If you understand why this actually a very good thing, and not a very bad one, you'll understand where tribes come from. In a way, it's Heretical to start a new religion. But that's what great leaders do. Let me explain.

We've seen a lot of marketing trends in the past 10-20 years. The question is obvious: how do you get people excited about buying stuff? Well as it turns out, people aren't really exciting about stuff, they're excited about human achievement, like breaking rules, changing the world, it turns out people don't care about buying stuff, what they really want is to be inspired.

And what's inspirational about doing the laundry with Brand X over Brand Z. Not much. It's not exactly William Wallace taking on the English.

So ask yourself this question: What evil empire are you trying to overthrow? If you don't know, or can't answer that, you just answered why your job/company is so dull, and why it's so hard to get your customers amped. We have to have big huge massive hulking challenges here: Think Death Star huge. Think Microsoft huge. Think Egypt huge.

This book is not about getting `tribes' of people (eg. lunatic customers) talking about the TVs your company makes. Forget it. It doesn't make sense, and wouldn't work. What you want them to do is carve the company logo in the back of their heads, because being a customer means being part of a group of cool, smart, confident, independent people. Or maybe it means something completely different.

We are hard-wired to belong to a group. Think of a fraternity. It's exclusive, it's important, and you have to go through an embarrassing/painful test to get in. It actually means something to be on the inside, and it means something to be on the outside. It means something qualitatively whether you're in or out. And we wanna be in. Why? Because there's something exciting going on. THere's a group of people that are fired up. They're going somewhere exciting and groundbreaking. That's why you want to join the journey.

So who gets these crazies together? Godin discusses huge difference between Leaders and Managers. I could have sworn Manager was a cool job title. Turns out, according to Seth, it's totally lame. Organizing things so that nothing gets out of control. Keeping people in check, making sure they're doing the same thing (essentially) they did last month. Mediocrity.

Instead, as a leader, your responsibility as the leader is to:

a) transform a shared interest into a super passionate goal. Specific. Not just wild arbitrary angst.
b) Give people the tools to do this, and tighten communications. Yes you can sell them the tools, if you must, but remember, any barrier to entry is gonna keep the tribe small.
c) Help the tribe grow.

As a leader you don't just tick these 3 boxes, done, done, got it. Nope. You keep pushing your tribe to do something bigger, and better. You exist not to keep the tribe `managed' or `status quo' but to keep the passion alive, so the tribe can grow.

As I said, it's a Heretocracy out there. We need nutjobs like Arnold Schwarzzenegar, Steve Jobs and Albert Einstein. People with principles are considered crazy, because humans are expected to break, to trip, to have weaknesses. Great leaders may have weaknesses, they may be unattractive, they may be ditzy, but they do not break when it comes to character. Their tribe aspires to have that resilience, and thus keep coming back for more.

Heretics don't ask for permission, as for forgiveness. They are needed not just for their electricity and their energy. They are needed because they are solutions to a problem that the status quo can't solve!

They don't ask for money (unless they're selling books, making movies, touring around the country giving speeches). Heretics don't even ask for credit (even though much is given). Credit isn't the point, Change is. As long as the Heretic is trying to change the world, the crowd of supporters, the fans, the tribe will follow. Not because they have to, but because they have faith.

In sum, to get your team inspired, take a look at your target. Are you just another laundry detergent? Or are you changing the world, one customer at a time? Your tribe will fight for you, given just the right enemy.


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5.0 out of 5 stars Tribes..., January 29, 2011
By Trevor J. Flannigan "www.theguidetogetrich.com" - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Hardcover)
The book of the week was Tribes by Seth Godin. There are quite a few little tidbits that give me that "Oh yeah! That's true!" kind of thought process. Right toward the end of the book Godin writes this: "Leaders have nothing in common. They don't share a gender or income level or geography. There's no gene, no schooling, no parentage, no profession. In other words, leaders aren't born. I'm sure of it." It's very smart... obvious, yet thought provoking. To be a leader is to make a choice. Sure, it may be easier for some to make that choice, but anyone can make it.

The book is about leadership. The idea is that a tribe is a strong organization with a strong fan base of members and strong leadership. I like the idea of a tribe. An organization that is so strong that it's members will fight for it's survival and put every ounce of effort in to maintaining continual success. Tribes don't grow on trees. They are developed by strong leaders. The leader doesn't need to have authority in the organization it is trying to transform into a tribe. A leader just needs raw passion and hunger for their desired outcome- The Tribe.

Two things I want to talk about from this book... Fear and Entertainment. Interesting couple of words. But they both deal with leadership as Godin writes about in this book.

Fear is a huge deterrent for individuals to step into leadership roles. That is the choice I was talking about earlier. It really comes down to choosing to step away from the status quo and into something new and better. It's easy to stick to the status quo, but the status quo is boring and not effective. People fear criticism more that anything else when stepping into a leadership role. "What will people say?" "What if people don't like my decisions?" "Will people follow me?".... The answer to all of the above- "It doesn't matter." These questions should not be a determining factor is stepping over the fear-line. This is easily the most difficult part of being a leader, but it should never deter you from continuing your path to make a better organization. The bigger and better changes you make, the more people will judge and criticize your actions. But no one has ever achieved greatness in the area of leadership by sticking to the status quo.

The next concept I want to talk about is Entertainment. This is an idea that is missed by a lot of leaders. They don't have the attention of their audience. If you can't make people interested in listening, then you have the cards stacked against you. The best way to illustrate this is with a teacher in a lecture hall. A teacher has a great venue for leadership. A lot of teachers are arguably some of the best leaders in the world. However, when you have a teacher in front of a bunch of students and the students are bored out of their minds, they aren't retaining the information and thus, they are not being led effectively. The same idea applies to organizations, if you are trying to lead the people of your organization to be more successful, but you can't capture the troops attention. You are fighting a losing battle. You have to bring charisma to the table. Get excited, fake it if you aren't. It's not easy to always be energetic, but it's the best way to get people's attention. So do whatever you have to do to make sure you aren't being boring.... coffee, tea, red bull... Whatever it takes! Once you have their attention, you just need to stick to your plan and choose everyday to continue to be a leader.

I think this was a fun little book. And it's been a few weeks since I had read a leadership book. And this one was really good to get me thinking about my own leadership techniques. As always, if you have any questions on the book don't hesitate to ask. I would be more than happy to help anyone that wants it.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars fun, brief and breezy capitalist devotional, January 24, 2011
By Rob Fitzgibbon (MA, USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (Hardcover)
Seth Goodin is the Professor Harold Hill of our era, a maestro of marketing, Trophonius of Twitter, apostle of aphorisms and all-around hyper-successful change-agent chieftain. Goodin's built a widely successful career banging out slim, didactic volumes on how to thrive in the new, new economy. "Tribes" is his volume devoted to groups of connected people, covering everything from corporations to swarm intelligence to Facebook groups.

What's good about "Tribes?" It's a fun, brief and breezy capitalist devotional - the kind of light, inspirational reading you might find in the bathrooms at the Stanford GSB. Goodin's seductive prose can effortlessly transport you into Walter Mittyesque fantasies, in which you imagine yourself dashing from the IPO meetings on Sand Hill Road to the TED Conference in Oxford - with a copy of Goodwin's wisdom purchased at the airport kiosk snugly nestled in the side pocket of your Hickey Freeman suit. We're all leaders, Goodwin seductively promises; we all have the capacity to be successful, adored and change the world through our passion.

What's the downside of "Tribes?" Goodwin's insight's come in Starbuck's VIA-sized doses, and there is nothing in his prose and vocabulary that requires any intellectual heavy-lifting. They are the tweet-equivalent of affirmations disguised as business cases, minus the data or empirical proofs, - ADD anecdotes for the MBA set. He's an incessant name-dropper and has a subtle conservative slant (if we're talking about self-organizing internet groups, why is the NRA mentioned but MoveOn omitted?) His metaphors often do not stand up to scrutiny - contrary to Goodin, heretics are NOT happier than everyone else - just ask Giordano Bruno or Tom Paine.

Overall, a good read but nothing extraordinary - perhaps "Tribe"s success is an example of what Charles Mackay documented in his Extraordinary Popular Delusions and The Madness of Crowds
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