Optimal Leadership  by Wayne M. Angel, Ph.D.
The Causes of Organization Failure: The Alpha Passion
















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The Quest - A Preface

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Optimal Leadership
  The Optimal Organization
  Causes of Organization Failure
    Introduction
    Complexity
    Power Disparity & Wants Frustration
    Faulty Beliefs
    Playing the Odds
    The Malaise of Mediocrity
    The Alpha Passion
    Other Possibilities
  Creating the Optimal Organization
  The Optimal Change Agent


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In the last section I introduced the concept of the Alpha Type within the organization.  These are individuals who have an above average want-to-be-at-the-top-of-human-dominance-hierarchies.  These individuals can be a positive value by continuously driving the organization to improve it effectiveness in wants satisfaction.  However, there is a dangerous balance. 

It is our emotions, our passions that motivate us to action.  But if we let our passions rule our reason, such as Eric Hoffer describes in his books, "The Passionate State of Mind" and "The Mind of the True Believer," we tend to use any means to achieve what we want.  If the mechanism by which the Alpha Type is able to get into the Power Elite within an organization does not work against the passionate state of mind, then the Power Elites will move more and more toward a passionate state of mind.  They will work to remove access to their positions and they will use their power elite positions to feed their own want satisfactions with less and less regard for the want satisfaction of others.  This will eventually cause the wants frustration of other members to build to very high levels where it can trigger organizational collapse.  When the organization is in the political realm and involves the use of significant force or control over food and other life essential products, then, to borrow Joseph Tainter's phrase, a major portion of the population may die as a side effect of collapse.

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