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[Nile TV] Leadership & Social Dynamics
In this insightful interview on Nile TV, Mr. Abdo Magdy, an executive coach, joins the host to discuss the critical role of leadership and social dynamics in creating a healthy, fruitful, and productive work environment. The conversation explores how understanding personality patterns, fostering group cohesion, and maintaining a code of conduct can help organizations achieve their objectives. Watch the full interview on YouTube for more details!
How can we identify different personality patterns and approach them effectively in a work environment?
Yes, definitely. I think the objective of every organization and every team and every project is to make the best utilization of everyone into achieving a specific objective. And I think one of the difficult challenges there is understanding what people actually want out of the experience, their preferences in terms of communication, and also how to kind of get them to work together to achieve that objective. So this is usually a kind of a big challenge and sometimes unfortunately it’s an unspoken challenge for organizations and how to get this social dynamics components going. So and definitely there is some times in which that a lot of work environment actually research shows that there is huge percentage in which that employees are very much unsatisfied, they are losing energy, they are not excited to go to work, and that sometimes is a challenge of not properly understanding and addressing different personality types and not understanding social dynamics at the level of complexity requires to get things going.
How do different personality types interact, and how should they interact to achieve the required objective?
That’s a very good question. I think that’s actually the core of understanding and working with social dynamics. I think we have different personality archetypes that actually built around everyone’s approach in life and almost philosophy. So as we understand if we imagine any project or organization as a bus, which is one of the famous ways and easiest ways to comprehend that, we’re going to be seeing the ones who are in the leadership—they are the ones who are leading the bus. They have the map, they have the understanding, they understand the objectives, they have the strong character in kind of leading that force, and these are the alphas. So the alphas are like the abilities and decision-making, they voice their opinions, and basically they are strong leaders who push things farther. Afterwards, we’re going to find betas who are not necessarily as dominant in terms of their behavior and their psychology, but rather they are fine following the leader, and for them it becomes more about a social experience other than about the objective itself. And we have other roles, but I think the last role that we look at are the sigmas, which basically they are more like the alphas but they are introverted. So other than being in the front of the bus, they choose to be at the back of the bus and be focused on observing what’s going on, and they prefer to only interfere once they can actually bring something positive to the table. So understanding these different personality types—in the middle we can see people who are quite separated or isolated, they do not have interest in doing any influence, but rather they are happy to be provided with what they need to survive and continue being part of the group. So we would actually find from that, when it comes to a matter of leadership and moving things forward, we have the alphas at the front and we have the sigmas at the back of the bus, where basically the alphas, if things are going very well, then the alphas would actually be doing 100% of the work, but by then, if things are not really going appropriately, by then the sigmas might actually feel obligated to interfere with the group dynamics.
How can we create cohesion within the group to create this group dynamics that you were talking about?
Yes, I think human society agreed on having a code of conduct when it comes to interactions like this. So there is no other solution other than for people to talk together and to specify what are the principles upon which we want to move forward. And that has to be an open sharing process in which everybody really opens up and writes down what they really care for. And the challenge with that is not that this exercise does not take place, because usually it takes place in all organizations and projects, but by then it becomes a responsibility of the entity that’s actually controlling this setup to maintain no breaking of these rules from anybody. So an organization that’s managing this environment should be very decisive and sharp in terms of tracking these principles and to treat everyone equally in terms of violating or probably needing to be coached on how to adhere to that. So in an environment, for example, we say that our principle is trust, it’s not possible to be broken inside the circle and then this is not being addressed. So if we say that this is about trust, then if trust is broken, we need to say that trust was broken, and we’re sorry, and then we’re not going to do this again, and we move forward. But in case trust is broken and you do not go there and say that trust is not broken, this is not addressed properly and directly in the same way it was made, that actually creates a lot of tension, and that creates possibly a lot of depression and a lot of unexpressed feelings, and by then people do not have the energy or the motives to contribute equally to the group.
What would be the negative scenarios that could occur if we cannot maintain cohesion inside the group?
Yeah, I think the first thing that gets lost is the objective, which is basically why are we here. Because if we look at a group that’s working together, they have a specific objective, and probably everyone would have a different objective from their perspective, but by then there has to be a properly defined objective for the whole group, and basically what should be done is that everyone is contributing in a way for this final objective to be reached. So getting back to your question, when it comes to what needs to be done to maintain looking towards the objective, I think that getting back to what was written in terms of the code of conduct and interference from this organization is vital. Because if we don’t do this, we’re going to have lots of energy, we’re going to have people who are possibly depressed, we’re going to have some abuse and harassment at the workplace, and we possibly are going to get into—because also understanding that the power dynamic within the group is there are actually some very powerful people who are not bringing their power to the group, and sometimes if these people really understand that things are not going well, they’re going to bring that in a way that’s not going to be convenient to everybody. So sometimes we have a lone wolf scenario in which the whole group is being punished because we’re not adhering to that. I think we have a lot of creative examples, like in the movies, there is a movie called ‘Law Abiding Citizen,’ the movie called ‘The Rock,’ even like ‘Scent of a Woman’—these are all movies that discuss that people with a sigma personality type are put in an environment where the law is being broken, and this is not being addressed, and then the situation goes totally dramatic. So understanding that this would be the fault of the authority or the organization that they are not addressing things explicitly. Because if they address things explicitly, they say that this is a code of conduct, we’re going to have to follow it equally, by then there will be no friction. People are going to be happy, energetic, and moving forward. And usually problems happen when the organization or the leader are not identifying that and expressing it openly.
How can we bring the best out of everybody so that everyone is effective and energetic, even if not everyone wants to be an alpha?
Exactly, I think part of the question is that not everyone wants to be alpha, because there is, for example, a social cost to being an alpha in terms of maintaining lots of social connections and social relationships, and not everyone is willing to make such an investment. But I think it comes back to the responsibility of who is holding the floor—the organization or the leadership that’s holding the floor. They should be actually introducing lots of exercises and games that allow people to identify the different personality types and also understanding that as a group works together, this happens naturally. So if the organization in which this exercise is taking place is not intelligent enough and aware enough and doing enough work in identifying how we can get people to openly share about their preferences, their personality types, what they want out of the experience—there are many exercises in which this could be done, and it becomes necessary for these exercises to take place.
To what extent can individuals influence their roles and change their status within the group?
Yeah, okay, I think that’s more of a leadership question because, as we said, alpha seems to be the most desired status, and accordingly there would seem to be a lot of competition around who’s going to get into the leadership, which actually happens across all organizations. So in all existing organizations, there is usually different political struggles that go around who actually influences the outcomes. And I think one of the necessary ingredients for individuals to also understand is that they have to accept the rules, they have to accept that this is how things are, and this is the way that I would like things to be done, and they would actually communicate this to others. So, for example, if I see myself as an expert who does not want to lead, I would actually go to the group telling that, guys, I have technical expertise, I have no interest in leading that, but rather I would like to contribute my expertise in a way that’s most convenient to others. So being open and expressing the way things work for you would possibly be one of the best ways for this to go on. Also understanding that there is a cycle because people go through different experiences, and with these experiences, some people could change their perception. So some current sigmas could, for example, if we see someone who’s 55, 60 years old who is an advisory board member of an organization, so as an advisory board member, he provides expertise to the leadership, but he’s not actually in the leadership. So there are different changes that happen with age, with experience, and I think it’s important to identify and understand how we can move on and move forward while getting all these issues addressed and avoiding negative scenarios that might evolve from lack of understanding and not addressing things properly.
How can we detect whether we’re on the right track in terms of group dynamics and cohesion?
Yeah, I think there are analytical ways to do that in terms of surveys and things like that, but the best way is that for the people in the leadership to actually walk in between the teams. Because if they show up and say that how was your weekend, were you enjoying your time, do you feel energized—if we see that the energy in the room is low, that means there is something wrong going on. So direct personal interaction becomes very necessary to understand and identify that there is something that might be going wrong, and by then they would introduce the necessary actions to fix that.
How can we develop the awareness of leadership to recognize and address negative energy in the group?
Yeah, I think that’s a very, very big problem because also we have different types of institutions and organizations, and the leaders have different educational backgrounds, so not all of them understand what’s going on. They have a problem, they do not understand what’s going on or how to fix it. So it becomes necessary for them to do the actual efforts to seek consultants, to actually be proactive and provide them with the actual insights into what’s going on, how to fix it, and they have to also be flexible in taking this feedback. Because sometimes it’s very difficult for people in leadership to say that we do not know. So they have to reach that there is a problem here, and we do not know, and we need help in fixing that. So for them to confess to that and address it, that becomes necessary for the objective and the group to move forward.
Also published on Medium.
