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I was lent a book recently, Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us by Seth Godin.

I quite like the read, it’s interesting enough, but I can’t help feeling it’s the same message over and over again, presented in blog style messages with every post revolving around the idea of the tribe with leaders and followers.  Godin’s message (my take, anyway) is that anything, wether that be a product, service, group or religion, can be successful with the right passion, leadership and loyal base.  No surprises there, but it’s more than that, as its a stab at how the old style corporate factories don’t necessarily generate the huge profits like they used to and its the daring guy with the good idea that will most often succeed.  This is backed up by success stories of your Apples and Teslas, Wikipedias and David Changs.

Tribes – Seth Godin

One thing I can’t understand at all is this section:

The Balloon Factory and the Unicorn

“I’m not sure you’ve ever visited a balloon factory.  Probably not.

The people who work in the balloon factory are timid.  Afraid, even.  They’re very concerned about pins, needles and porcupines.  They don’t like sudden changes in temperature.  Sharp objects are a problem as well.  The balloon factory isn’t really a bad place to work if you rationalize a bit.  It’s steady work, witha  bit of a rush around New Year’s.  The rest of the time it’s quiet and peaceful and not so scary.

Except when the unicorns show up.

At first, the balloon factory folks shush the unicorn and warn him away.  That often works.  But sometimes, the unicorn ignores them and wanders into the factory anyway.

That’s when everyone runs for cover.

It’s amazingly easy for a unicorn to completely disrupt a calloon facory.. That’s because the factory is organized around a single idea, the idea of soft, quiet stability.  The unicorn changes all that.  The balloon factory is all about the status quo.  And leaders change the status quo.”

What the? The rest of the book made relative sense, but this is something straight out of Fear and Loathing or Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.

Join the tribe, live the passion

A good book, none the less, definitely an insightful read.

Now to start Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting… Aye cannae tell ye hea much ea bin looking forward tae that!

Tags: reading

This entry was posted on Monday, March 1st, 2010 at 11:11 pm and is filed under reading. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.