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7 LEADERSHIP
LESSONS
FROM ORCAS
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WHAT CAN WE LEARN FROM ORCAS?
Orcas – powerful, dominant and admired creatures.
Who of the leaders wouldn’t want to be like them?
Orcas – killer whales, magnificent animals that dominate the
seas. We know them for their power, intelligence and we
admire their elegancy. But is that all what these animals can
share with us?
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1. Evolution and
innovation
Evolution has brought us where we are
today. We consider ourselves to be at
the top of the world. In spite of all
achievements we still can learn from
other species.
Orcas live in pods, led by mothers or
even grandmothers. They depend upon
vast experience and knowledge of their
senior members. By combination of
extraordinary hunting skills, creativity,
intelligence, power and agility they are
nightmare for their prey. Orcas really
dominate their habitats. WHY?
Orcas learned how to adapt to different
environments and conditions. They are
the most dominant predator in the sea.
They are considered to be one of the
most dangerous and even smartest
predator species.
Are we able to adapt to new
conditions and
requirements of modern
business in 21st century?
Once we stop growing and
learning it will be beginning
of our end…
2. Communication can
save our lives... Orcas developed specialized hunting
strategies based on their intelligence.
They are able to hunt puppy seals on the
shore. Puppy seals are not safe even on
solid ground. Orcas have unique
strategy that allows them to create a
special wave that helps them to wash
and suck puppy seals from shore back to
the sea.
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2. Communication can
save our lives...
Special movement of their body creates
waves. This maneuver is very risky and
can cost an orca a life. During hunt orcas
can get trapped in shallow water on the
shore. They can’t breathe in shallow
water neither they can effectively move.
They can die from lack of oxygen and
their body is not capable to withstand the
pressure of bodyweight and gravity
outside of deep waters. Once they get
trapped in the sand it’s a matter of
minutes to save their lives.
Young – inexperienced orca gets
trapped in shallow water. It can’t even
move and has only couple of minutes to
save her life. Her mother hears her call
for help, but mother cannot physically
drag her back to deep water.
Mother can only show her
how to move. Young orca is
able to mimic these
movements and get away
from a shore. This time and
many to come
communication saved her
life. YOUNG REPEATS THE
SKILLS OF EXPERIENCED
ADULT.
3. What do our leaders
teach us?
What do we teach our children? Which
behavioral patterns do our children
create while watching our behavior?
What brain maps do we encourage in
our children? What managerial patterns
do our leaders and managers teach us
by their behavior? Accordingly to new
neuroscience discoveries – either we like
it or not – subordinates or team
members adopt their brain structures to
the behavior we experience in our
workplace.
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4. Creativity and problem solving
Orcas are great in problem solving and
they are even able to understand cause
and effect relationship. Orcas are able to
create a concept of a hunt.
In other environments orcas hunt for lion
seals. Lion seals can hold breath and
stay under the water up to 30 minutes.
Orcas are able to locate seals in range
of 1 km and swim up to 55 km per hour.
They need to be very observant.
Lion seals have biomechanical alarm
system that can easily detect any
communication between orcas. So they
can detect hunt before it actually
happens. This time orcas do not
communicate at all. They are completely
silent until they reach their prey.
In spite of all effort young orca makes
some sounds. Lion seal immediately
dives to deep waters. Hunt is almost
lost.
During steep dive orcas can
physiologically change their bodies so
they can dive fast and deep enough to
catch their prey. In this particular case
lion seal was able to dive in deeper and
for a longer time so orcas need to get
back to surface to breathe.
A mistake of a young can cost the whole
group a meal. Over a million calories in
form of lion sea are now lost.
Orcas are forgiving – they are
ready to forgive mistakes
juniors do while learning and
hunting. They do not punish
such mistakes for example by
excluding juniors from their
clans. Orcas depend on power
of their teams. And still orcas
are lead by strong and intelligent
leaders.
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5. Forgiving and
tolerant
Are we as human also forgiving and
tolerant to mistakes and learning
styles of our junior team members?
Or do we rather require perfect result
immediately? Strong and intelligent
leaders realize that their future depends
on strong and intelligent followers. We
won’t be able to cope with our future
challenges if do not patiently develop our
junior leaders – who will become our
hope in the future.
6. Strategy and
cooperation
Orcas have also echolocation that
enables them to locate seals in range of
1 km. In frozen sea they hunt for seals
resting on ice floes. Though orcas can’t
reach on the ice floe they got strategy
how to get seal away from its safe
“ground”. Orcas are able to understand
that they need to destroy ice floe to get
seal to the water. In this specialized
hunting strategy orcas swim in
synchronized way up to 30 kilometers
per hour. They create special wave and
water vortex that breaks the ice floe into
pieces. The wave splash washes the
seal into the water.
In this situation orcas even understand
that small pieces of ice floating around
can help the seal to hide and escape so
they even clear the surrounding space
from broken ice. They do all of this in
synchronized and team way.
7. Teamwork
and respect
Orcas demonstrate creativity and pure
teamwork. They rely on perfect
communication skills and mutual
synchronization.
Their teamwork is so efficient that they
are able to hunt for whale calves. It’s
extremely dangerous situation while and
adult whale can kill an orca just by
waving the tail.
They respect knowledge
and experience of older
animals – of their seniors.
They also cooperate with
vitality and agility of
younger members of the
clans – of their juniors.
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1. Evolution and innovation
2. Communication can save our
lives...
3. What do our leaders teach us?
4. Creativity and problem solving
5. Forgiving and tolerant
6. Strategy and cooperation
7. Teamwork and respect
7. LEADERSHIP LESSONS FROM ORCAS
WE ARE EVOLVING – OUR WORLD
IS EVOLVING – MANAGAMENT HAS
TO EVOLVE AND OUR LEADERS
NEED TO EVOLVE... • do we really want to develop younger
people?
• are we tolerant to mistakes of others?
• do we apraise achievements of others?
• do we really innovate?
• do we really want to change?
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