Leaders Eat Last: Why Some Teams Pull Together and Others Don't

“Giving,” it seems, has become another area in which Millennials try to multitask. Bouncing from one cause to another, giving a little here and a little there, they feel like they can make a difference in lots of places . . . sometimes all at once. Just as the Internet, social media and their cell phones help them multitask in their social and acad

Research shows that more extrinsic rewards do not add up to greater inner drive. In fact, they have the opposite effect—a decline in intrinsic motivation. Nor do extrinsic rewards motivate children, or any of us, in the long term. The most they provide is a short-term lift.

To really inspire us, we need a challenge that outsizes the resources available. We need a vision of the world that does not yet exist. A reason to come to work. Not just a big goal to achieve.

Those are the experiences we remember as some of our best days at work. It was not because of the hardship, per se, but because the hardship was shared. It is not the work we remember with fondness, but the camaraderie, how the group came together to get things done.

The evidence is indisputable. Despite what they or anyone else believes, with rare exceptions, those who think they are more productive because they are better at multitasking are just wrong. What they are better at is being distracted.

In times when resources are scarce and danger is looming, we naturally come together.

Feeling a shared common burden is one of the things that brings us together. Less hardship means less of a need to cooperate, which means less oxytocin. Few of us volunteer to help people in need before the natural disaster—only after it.

When a company declares that its cause is to become a global leader or to become a household name or to make the best products, those are selfish desires with no intended value to anyone beyond the company itself (and often not even everyone in the company). Those causes can’t inspire

Everything about being a leader is like being a parent. It is about committing to the well-being of those in our care and having a willingness to make sacrifices to see their interests advanced so that they may carry our banner long after we are gone.