November 16, 2006

The mighty alpha male may muscle his way to the top, but once there he often casts a large shadow. And when these titans fall, their empires often collapse with them , writes Adil Ahmad

It’s the season for Bs. The BS factor in the current rhetoric appears centred around the word ‘ban’. Ban is in the air, from Ban Ki-moon to ban the bomb, to ban the veil, ban Buddo and Bundal, ban Inzy, and ban the Quickies.

First the Quickie was a chukker, and now he’s a dope. It’s a different kind of dope that’s been roped. The children are disgusted and they’re switching games. They’re trading in their cricket whites for soccer shorts and boots. Kim Jong-il has crashed the club, and Ban Ki-moon can’t ban Kim’s bomb. Iran is irate, to put it mildly, and the thorn in the Bush is more evident than the rose. The vaunted veil is under threat from a people who insist on a show of face. They’re saying it’s a hallmark of shame to hide the countenance. Why should the veiled countenance the greedy glares of testosterone-charged, hyper-achieving alpha males?

Dominic Rushe of The Sunday Times recently reviewed a book by Kate Ludeman and Eddie Erlandson called the ‘Alpha Male Syndrome’, due to be published by the Harvard Business School Press. According to it, alpha males can make and break a business, or a society. They are the masters of the business universe and the kings of the corporate jungle, and they make up 75 per cent of the world’s top executives. “Human history is the story of alphas, those indispensable powerhouses who take charge, conquer new worlds, and move heaven and earth to make things happen,” write the book’s authors.

The mighty alpha male may muscle his way to the top, but once there he often casts a large shadow. And when these titans fall, their empires often collapse with them. Many of the problems with rogue alpha males stem directly from their most positive attributes. Persistent people become stubborn. Brilliant analysts think themselves into a corner, and the unflaggingly self-confident lose the ability to listen.

Many alpha males, cocooned by their own self-regard, fail to see their problems until it is too late. The strengths that propelled them to the top are often closely allied to the flaws that bring them down. Rogue alpha males feel that they have to make their mark in the office no matter what the cost. And if it’s not about money, it’s about sex. “We have observed that many leaders who fit the dysfunctional alpha-male typology fall prey to sexual predation, becoming womanisers who use conquests and control to assert their dominance,” the authors write, the Monica Lewinsky case being a prime example.

The worst sort of alpha male believes the laws of the jungle should be applied to the workplace, according to the authors. But it turns out that ‘the chest-thumping leadership style not only doesn’t cut it in today’s office, it also doesn’t work that well in the jungle’. Research into baboons by Stanford University primatologist Robert Sapolsky found that the most brutish ones suffered the most stress and were not good at keeping the status they fought so fiercely to obtain. The baboons that got to the top and stayed there were the clever and collaborative ones who survived by forming coalitions.

“Everybody needs some alpha traits to be successful — the drive for results, the ability to inspire people to do more than they thought possible,” said Ludeman. While lesser mortals can cultivate those aspects, the pure alpha male is born with an abundance of those characteristics. The most successful will adapt to their environment and grow in their position. The problem alphas find is that “what gets you there, does not keep you there”, said Ludeman.

And what of the alpha woman? Is there such an animal? According to Ludeman and Erlandson, she does exist but in far fewer numbers. The boardroom, they say, is one arena where the female is less deadly than the male. Women at the top tend to be less belligerent than their XY-chromosomed counterparts. “Alpha women want to lead, but they don’t necessarily need to rule,” the authors write.

In an interview, Ludeman said that alpha women were ‘less angry and less impatient’ than men. As a result, Ludeman, who has worked with multinational companies, said most of her problem clients had been men. In the book she jokes that part of her job is ‘transforming jerks into nice guys’.

The authors identify four main types of alpha leaders, all with good and bad points. Commanders are intense and magnetic. They push people hard to reach their goals, but can end up bulldozing people, are free and loose with the rules, and create an atmosphere of fear. The present incumbents in the war on terror definitely fit this bill. Visionaries are creative, curious, inspiring, and they can see the future.

Though one can’t really say about seeing the future. Strategists are quick, analytical and objective, and they find opportunities others miss. But they can also be smug, opinionated know-alls, lacking in team spirit and unable to admit mistakes. Minus the analysis and objectivity. Executors are tireless doers with an eye for detail, they are excellent problem-solvers who get the job done. But they can be unreasonable micromanagers who burn out employees and are overcritical.

Alpha males may end up playing several roles, and vary from ‘sweeties who everyone wants to work for to absolute bullies’, said Ludeman. But even at the nicer end of the scale, alpha males can hide deep-seated faults that are brought out by stress. Ironically, alpha males often seek out stressful situations or create them artificially in order to get their adrenaline going. Like staying in the line of fire. “Alpha males like stress because they like to win. But they don’t necessarily deal very well with it,” said Ludeman. When alphas are under stress their behaviour tends to be at its most problematic.

But there is a serious issue behind the authors’ analysis. Domains run by unhealthy alphas tend to develop real problems. Organisations dominated by dysfunctional alphas often have a higher incidence of illness, absenteeism, burnout, turnover and early retirement than businesses run by healthy alphas and non-alphas. Intervention is the answer, said Ludeman. For the good of the company, and for himself, the angry alpha needs to get help. But who is going to tell him?

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