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The second half of this year will be all about “Tribes”. Master marketing blogger Seth Godin has written yet another book: “Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us“. Although details are not known, “according to Godin, Tribes are groups of people aligned around an idea, connected to a leader and to each other. Tribes make our world work, and always have.”

Photography by The Dilli Lama.

Would this be a useful way of looking at projects?

I think so. It’s always nice to jump on a hype bandwagon once in a while. And it has such a nice ring: Project Tribes.

The central element of a tribe is the leader and the idea, the goal. You need a leader who can inspire, one that can present Big Audacious Goals that seem to rock the world. Your project needs Al Gore, your project needs goals like “Save The Planet”. That’s why people join the gang. That’s why people want to be part of it.

The goal and the leader.

The leader will set some rules of interaction. The leader will keep efforts aligned. Within this context the teams get self-organized and the Big Hairy Audacious Goal makes sure it’s all in the right direction.

So it’s not top down, and it’s not entirely bottom up.

It’s all about tribes.