"Tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that here obedient to their laws we lie..."

Today we celebrate our military veterans, both past and present.  Veterans Day is celebrated every year on November 11th, and it's a day in which we honor all military veterans for their service and patriotism.  Importantly, Veterans Day honors all those who have served in our nation's armed forces, both living and deceased and during peacetime or wartime.  Memorial Day, celebrated on the last Monday in May every year, specifically honors those men and women who have died while serving their country.

Abraham Lincoln once said, "Any nation that does not honor its heroes will not long endure."  We should honor our veterans every day, but today most of all.  It is with profound respect, admiration, and gratitude that I honor our veterans, most of all those who "gave the last full measure of devotion" so that we may have a life of freedom.

The title of today's post comes from one of the greatest books that I have ever read, Gates of Fire by Steven Pressfield.  Pressfield opens his historical novel of the ancient Battle of Thermopylae with this ancient Greek epitaph carved into a stone placed on top of the burial mound of the 300 Spartans that heroically died at Thermopylae (see the ending scene of the 2006 film 300 which was based on the Battle of Thermopylae) .  The words were likely first written around 480 BC, shortly after the battle itself, by the poet Simonides of Ceos.

The Battle of Thermopylae was fought in 480 BC between the invading Persian army under Xerxes I and an allied force of Greek city-states led by Leonidas I of Sparta.  The Greeks were vastly outnumbered - classic sources (principally the Greek historian Herodotus) estimate that the Persian army numbered in the millions, while the Greeks consisted of about 7,000 men, including 300 Spartan hoplite soldiers.  Modern historians reject these numbers, suggesting that the Persian army numbered between 40,000 to 300,000 soldiers.  Modern estimates of the size of the Greek army are much closer to the estimates of ancient sources.  Regardless of the exact numbers, what is not disputed is the fact that the Persian army greatly outnumbered the Greeks.

While the geography has changed significantly over the centuries, Thermopylae (from the Greek, "Hot Gates," so named from the local hot sulfur springs in the area which were once believed to be an entrance to Hades, the Greek Underworld) used to be a narrow pass between the mountains on one side and the ocean on the other.  Leonidas I chose to place his army at the narrowest point, which was approximately 20 meters wide.  At the same time, allied Greek naval forces blocked the sea route at the Straits of Artemisium, where a naval battle with the Persian navy occurred simultaneously to the land battle at Thermopylae.  The Greeks held off the Persians for a time, before Leonidas withdrew all but his 300 Spartan hoplites and 700 Thespians, as well as 900 Helots and 400 Thebans, though this is disputed.  This remaining rear guard, with the exception of the Thebans, who reportedly surrendered en masse, fought to their death in a heroic "last stand" that lasted for another three days.  Leonidas, too, died with his men.

The Gates of Fire tells the story of the Battle of Thermopylae from the perspective of Xeones, a Greek perioikos (a free person, though not a citizen, of Sparta) who was captured by the Persians near the end of the battle and asked to dictate his story to Xerxes through his court historian, Gobartes.  Xerxes is amazed on how well the Spartans, in particular fought.  He asks Xeones directly why the Spartans fought so hard for Leonidas.  Xeones tells Xerxes:

I will tell His Majesty what a king is.  A king does not abide within his tent while his men bleed and die upon the field.  A king does not dine while his men go hungry, nor sleep when they stand at watch upon the wall.  A king does not command his men's loyalty through fear nor purchase it with gold; he earns their love by the sweat of his own back and the pains he endures for their sake.  That which comprises the harshest burden, a king lifts first and sets down last.  A king does not require service of those he leads but provides it to them.  He serves them, not they him.

Admiral William McRaven, of whom I have posted about numerous times in the past (see "A shepherd should smell like his sheep" for one most relevant to the subject of today's post), recites this exact passage during a lecture on leadership delivered at the National Football Foundation's William V. Campbell Trophy Summit (I believe in August, 2023).  Admiral McRaven says, "If you’re a leader, everyday you have to bring it. The only thing you’re entitled to as a leader is more hard work...Men and women will follow you as a leader if you are the first to lift the heaviest burden and the last to put it down."

There is a reason that Gates of Fire has appeared on the professional reading list for several branches of the United States military.  Its major themes stress core leadership concepts such as duty, honor, commitment, self-sacrifice, and esprit de corps.  While it is historical fiction, the story and the lessons that can be learned from it are timeless.  Let us honor all veterans today by living by the leadership philosophy and example of King Leonidas I.  Thank you to all of our veterans!

"Leave it better than you found it!"

As I've mentioned before (see for example my post, "Leadership Aphorisms I", "Stick to the Code", and "Fatherly Leadership"), I was a Boy Scout throughout my childhood and adolescence.  One of the lasting lessons that has stayed with me today is a concept that was first articulated by Robert Baden-Powell, a British army officer, writer, and original founder of the Boy Scouts.  Baden-Powell said, "Try and leave this world a little better than you found it, and when your turn comes to die, you can die happy in feeling that at any rate, you have not wasted your time but have done your best."  I've even incorporated this concept into my personal mission, vision, and values.

We were always taught as Boy Scouts to "leave it better than you found it" when it came to the outdoors, which has has evolved over time into the "Leave No Trace" conservation movement.  Whenever we went camping, we always made certain that we cleaned up the campsite to the point where the area was even better than when we had arrived.  But consider Baden-Powell's quote - he wasn't just speaking about the environmental movement or conservation.  He was speaking more generally about life itself.  We should be making an impact so that we leave the world a better place for future generations.

I've been thinking a lot about Baden-Powell's quote lately in the context of change in organizations.  As a matter of record, change is quite difficult.  And leading the kind of change required for an organizational transformation is exceedingly so.  Perhaps the best that any leader can hope for when it comes to organizational transformation is to "leave it better than you found it."  

Oday Kamal wrote an article about leading organizational transformation for the World Economic Forum (see "Organizational change is tough. Here are three rules to help get it right").  Kamal referenced the 19th century French chemist Henry Louis Le Chatelier who described a fundamental principle about systems in general that can be applied to organizations.  Kamal explained this principle as follows:

Every stable system will respond to change by trying to restore its original condition. Put another way, he deduced that any system will favor the least disruptive path.  This fundamental principle changed the course of chemistry in the 19th century. But it is not limited to the laws of thermodynamics. It describes how systems, organizations, and teams can learn to change.

In my own experience, I have found that organizations respond to change by trying to restore back to their original default mode.  The consulting firm, McKinsey, once cited a statistic that over 70% of all organizational transformation efforts fail.  While that is probably true, I've found that most consulting firms have failed to improve upon this statistic.  Change is hard.  Transformation takes time.  And many leaders don't have enough time to see the transformation to the end.  So I am left with the following conclusion - we can (and should) aim high as leaders, but perhaps the best that we can ever achieve is to "leave the organization better than we found it."

What's in a promise?

Most of the public believes that before they graduate from medical school, new physicians have to raise their right hand and recite the Hippocratic Oath.  And if asked what is in the Hippocratic Oath, most people would say "First, do no harm" (perhaps a few would even recite the Latin version from the original Greek translation, "Primum non nocere").  Just to correct a common misconception, "First, do no harm" is often attributed to the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates, but it actually doesn't appear in his famous Oath.    

To correct another common misconception, most graduating physicians don't actually recite the Hippocratic Oath.  Many medical schools use more contemporary versions, and at least according to the Association of American Colleges, over half of medical schools in the United States use their own customized version, often written in collaboration with their medical students in order to emphasize more modern ethical principles such as health equity and patient advocacy.  Many medical schools use a version during the "White Coat Ceremony" (which often takes place when medical students start their clinical years of training) as opposed to graduation.

I recently came across the Oath of Maimonides, named after the 12th century rabbi, philosopher, and physician, Maimonides.  While some physicians recite the Oath of Maimonides at graduation from medical school, the Oath is more often used in other professions, including pharmacists.  Here it is:

The eternal providence has appointed me to watch over the life and health of Thy creatures. May the love for my art actuate me at all times; may neither avarice nor miserliness, nor thirst for glory or for a great reputation engage my mind; for the enemies of truth and philanthropy could easily deceive me and make me forgetful of my lofty aim of doing good to Thy children.

May I never see in the patient anything but a fellow creature in pain.

Grant me the strength, time and opportunity always to correct what I have acquired, always to extend its domain; for knowledge is immense and the spirit of man can extend indefinitely to enrich itself daily with new requirements. Today he can discover his errors of yesterday and tomorrow he can obtain a new light on what he thinks himself sure of today.

Oh, God, Thou has appointed me to watch over the life and death of Thy creatures; here am I ready for my vocation and now I turn unto my calling.

There's something to be said about making a promise, following a covenant, or reciting an oath (see my post, "Stick to the code").  I think it just means more than simple words on a piece of paper.  And studies suggest that they matter - for example, people who take an oath to act honestly actually do act honestly (compared to those who don't take an oath to act honestly).  Reciting an oath or promise represents a true commitment to a specific purpose.  The physical act of reciting an oath, as opposed to even signing one, just means more.

I do not remember reciting the Hippocratic Oath at my own graduation (and we didn't have anything like the "White Coat Ceremony" back then), but I remember taking my Oath of Office on the day that I accepted my U.S. Navy commission like it was yesterday.  It was a big day for me for sure.  As I reflect more on what my Oath of Office meant to me personally, I can't help but wonder whether our world would be a lot more trusting (and trustworthy) if we used oaths, covenants, and promises more frequently?

Let's draw straws!

Today is Election Day in the United States of America.  It's an important day, when we all exercise our responsibility of citizens to vote on our choice for government leaders, at the local, state, and federal level.  While conducting some research for today's post, I went down a surprisingly deep rabbit hole when I looked up whether we had a legal right to vote or a duty to vote.  Whether we choose to vote or not is not the subject of today's post.  I will also refrain from entering the debate on whether states should allow early voting, mail-in ballot voting, or require a photo identification in order to vote.  

Today, I wanted to write about a concept known as sortition.  Sortition has roots in ancient Greece and refers to the selection of government officials or jurors at random, in order to obtain a truly representative sample of all stakeholders.  Apparently, ancient Athens in particular used sortition, believing it to be even more democratic than selecting leaders by popular vote.  Sortition is basically similar to the selection method of drawing straws (whoever draws the shortest straw is the leader).  As I look at the current dysfunction in government, I can't help but wonder whether we would be better off choosing our government leaders by sortition.  As it turns out, I am not alone in asking this question (see the article appearing a few years ago on Vox.com, "Can randomly selected citizens govern better than elected officials?").  Similarly, the author and organizational psychologist Adam Grant advocated for sortition in an article that he wrote in The New York Times in 2023 (see "The Worst People Run for Office.  It's Time for a Better Way").  

But I'm not going to write about that in today's post either!  Instead, I wanted to talk about whether we should be using sortition, or something similar, to identify all leaders, not just those in government.  In his NYT article, Adam Grant referred to an older series of experiments published by Alexander Haslam in the journal Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice (see "Inspecting the Emperor's Clothes: Evidence That Random Selection of Leaders Can Enhance Group Performance").  Haslam and his colleagues found that groups made better decisions when the leaders were chosen at random than when they were elected by the group or based on their skills!

In the first experiment, groups had to imagine that they were stranded on a remote island and were asked to rank in order the items that they would want in order to survive.  Groups chose their leaders via one of three methods - random selection (i.e. sortition), election, or based on reported leadership skill.  The equipment and supplies that each group selected was compared against the gold standard - a list chosen by survival experts.  Groups with a randomly selected leader did much better (i.e. their list of equipment and supplies looked more similar to that of the survival experts) compared to groups in which leaders were elected or selected based upon their leadership expertise.

The second experiment was very similar.  Groups were tasked with coming up with a list of equipment and supplies necessary to survive a nuclear apocalypse.  Again, groups whose leaders were selected randomly did much better at the task compared to those groups in which leaders were elected or selected based upon their leadership expertise.

If these results seem counterintuitive, it's because they are (which Haslam and colleagues showed in their third experiment).  In a small group scenario, we generally believe that groups will perform better when the leaders are selected by vote (probably the most common scenario) or based upon their expertise, knowledge, and skills.  The results of these experiments suggest otherwise!

I should also mention a study published by a group of investigators working with the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) (see "How do you find a good manager?").  These investigators found that individuals who aggressively campaign for a group leadership position perform worse than group leaders selected at random.  Self-nominated leaders, at least in this study, tended to be overconfident, particularly in regards to their leadership and social skills.  

So, what should we conclude from these studies?  Is Adam Grant on to something here?  Should we be selecting our leaders at random?  I think it's difficult to extrapolate small group performance to a more macro level, like the organization.  I don't think we will be randomly selecting corporate CEO's anytime soon, and that's probably a good thing.  However, when it comes to smaller teams, perhaps we should be selecting our group leaders by random, say by drawing straws!  We at least should beware of individuals who campaign for the group leader position.

I will conclude today's post with a simple request.  Please go out and vote today.  It's an important responsibility for all of us, and every vote counts.

The Producer's Button

You probably know of Leland Sklar, even if his name doesn't ring a bell.  Well, you probably know of him if you are around my age or listen to classic rock music.  Leland Sklar is a famous bass player who is perhaps most famous for playing in James Taylor's band, but he has also toured or recorded in the studio with artists such as Linda Ronstadt, Phil Collins, Jackson Browne, Toto, The Doors, and Carole King.  Oh, and he even played bass on a number of television song tracks from the 1970's and 1980's, including The Rockford Files, Magnum, P.I., Hill Street Blues, The A-Team, to name a few.  He is a musical legend!

I mention Sklar, as there is a post that is making it's way around the Internet, in which he claims to have used what he calls the "Producer's Switch" on his bass guitar.  I am always skeptical of what I read on social media, but the story turns out to be true (I fact-checked with a number of sources, including "Guitar World" magazine and a website called "Ultimate Guitar" - there's even a live interview on YouTube in which Sklar tells the story).  Basically, the "Producer's Switch" is a dummy toggle switch on his bass guitar that does absolutely nothing!  Sklar says, "If I’m on a session and the producer asks me to get a different sound, I make sure he sees me flip this switch and then I just change my hand position a bit. There are no wires of anything that go to this switch. It's a placebo, but it’s saved me a lot of grief in the studio."  The producer invariably believes that the switch changed the sound to his or her liking and almost always approves.  Sklar has used the "Producer's Switch" for over a decade, and it has become a famous signature feature on his custom German-made Warwick Star Bass.

It's actually a funny story.  But as I thought about it more, I had to ask myself how many times leaders inadvertently created something similar to the "Producer's Switch" in their organizations.  In other words, as leaders, we should be asking ourselves, "How many times have our teams developed something to basically give us the information that they think we want to hear or see?"  Or worse, how many times have our teams created the metaphorical "Producer's Switch" in an attempt to make us feel like we were in control of the situation?

There's no question that teams develop workarounds, shortcuts, or sometimes, even a "Producer's Switch".  All of these indicate the presence of friction in the workplace, whether due to an inefficient process, bureaucratic hassle, or even micromanagement by the leader.  While these quick fix interventions may at least resolve the initial problem at hand, in the end they actually harm the organization.  As John Burns writes in his blog post (see "When Workarounds Become Workflow: How Small Exceptions Become Systemic Failures"), "Over time, these workarounds start to shape workflows, and before you know it, the entire system is running on exceptions, not standards."  This is not how High Reliability Organizations are supposed to work!

One of the biggest drawbacks to workarounds (and shortcuts) is that the root problem is not addressed.  The workaround effectively sacrifices long-term efficiency for the immediate term - it's a temporary fix to a much bigger problem.  Just as important, the workaround is rarely documented or codified in a standard operating procedure (SOP) or policy.  When team members leave, a new team member is trained on the "official" SOP but not the "unofficial" workaround.  Problems then ensue.  Notably, this particular issue played a major role in the famous "Friendly Fire" accident during Operation Provide Comfort in 1994, discussed at length in Scott Snook's book of the same name.  

In a similar way, the "Producer's Switch" doesn't change the leader's behavior.  It's another example of a short-term "fix" substituting for a longer term issue or problem.  Rather than addressing the issue, the team has effectively created a workaround.  

Workarounds, shortcuts, and the "Producer's Switch" collectively create hidden risk, wasted resources, and erosion of trust.  Leaders should find out how the work is really done, not how it is set forth in SOPs and organizational policies.  They should seek feedback from their teams on how things are really operating, and set clear expectations that if a process is not working effectively, it should be changed.  Finally, leaders need to create environments of psychological safety, where team members can raise their concerns, provide feedback, and at times even openly disagree with the leader.

The last thing I will say about Sklar's "Producer's Switch" is that the both Sklar and the producers in question are neglecting the HRO principle of "Deference to Expertise".  The producers in question fail to acknowledge that Sklar is a professional with expertise in his craft.  On the flip side, Sklar is failing to acknowledge that the producer is also a professional with expertise in his or her craft.  One would hope that in a psychologically safe environment, both the producer and the musician could have had a productive conversation about their shared goals, as well as their individual ones.  It's a funny story nevertheless, but one with a great lesson for all of us in leadership.

Island at the Edge of the World

As I mentioned in a recent post ("Are tropical birds returning back to Guam?"), I occasionally return to the subject of an older post so that I can provide an update to the information I previously shared.  Today, I would like to update not one, but two older posts on Easter Island (see "Butterfly Wings and Stone Heads" and "Robin Hood and the State of Texas"), based upon information that I recently read in a book by the British archeologist and journalist Mike Pitts called Island at the Edge of the World: The Forgotten History of Easter Island – A Provocative Archaeological Study of Colonial Legacy, Indigenous Reclamation, and the Collapse Myth (see also Margaret Talbot's review of the book in The New Yorker magazine).

Easter Island (also known as Rapa Nui - I will use that name from now on, even though Rapa Nui is still not what the island's original inhabitants called their home) is so-named because the Dutch explorer, Jacob Roggeveen "discovered" the island on Easter Sunday in 1722.  The island is located in the Southeastern Pacific Ocean and was annexed by Chile in 1888.  It is technically part of the Polynesian islands, and it is truly an island at the edge of the world, as it is one of the world's remotest islands.  The closest inhabited island, Pitcairn Island, is over 1,200 miles away (Pitcairn Island is famous for being the island where nine of the mutineers from the famous "Mutiny on the Bounty" led by Fletcher Christian settled).

Rapa Nui is perhaps most famous for its nearly 1,000 monumental stone statues, called moai, which were created by the early Rapa Nui people.   The moai, monolithic human figurines carved out of volcanic rock more than 500 years ago, played a major role in the culture of the island during its early history. Oral tradition suggests that Rapa Nui was first settled by early Polynesian explorers from the Cook Islands, though the Norwegian scientist and explorer Thor Heyerdahl suggested in the late 1940's and early 1950's that Rapa Nui was also settled by people from parts of South America, most notably Peru.  Heyerdahl completed a voyage in 1947 from South America to the Polynesian Islands aboard a raft called the Kon-Tiki to at least prove that his hypothesis was plausible (the voyage was the subject of a book and a movie, which won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Film in 1950).  He further elaborated on this theory in his 1957 book, Aku-Aku (also an instrumental song on the studio album "Pieces of Eight" by the legendary rock-n-roll band from Chicago, Styx).  As Pitts discusses in his book, until recently Heyerdahl's theory had been largely discredited.  More recent studies suggest that there was at least some mixing of the two populations (Polynesians and South Americans), though not to the degree and manner originally suggested by Heyerdahl.  

The first European explorers noted the presence of the moai, and at this point in time, most of the moai were still standing.  However, by the time that the British explorer James Cook visited the island in 1774 (see the painting "A View of the Monuments of Easter Island, Rapa Nui" by William Hodges, who accompanied Cook on one of his voyages), most of the statues had toppled over.  Whether this was done intentionally and, if so, for what reason can only be speculated at this point.  Unfortunately, after first contact with European explorers, the population of Rapa Nui dramatically decreased, to the point where by the late 1800's, the population was just over one-hundred inhabitants. 

Explorers and scientists going back as far as James Cook have speculated that the Rapa Nui islanders caused their own destruction.  In her speech on Global Environment to the United Nations General Assembly on November 8, 1989, then British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher said, "We also have the example of the tragedy of Easter Island, where people arrived by boat to find a primeval forest.  In time the population increased to over 9,000 souls and the demand placed upon the environment resulted in its eventual destruction as people cut down the trees.  This in turn led to warfare over the scarce remaining resources and the population crashed to a few hundred people without even enough woods to make boats to escape."

The theory that the Rapa Nui islanders sowed the seeds of their own destruction (the "ecocide hypothesis") was greatly popularized by the American scientist and writer Jared Diamond in his book Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (see also his two publications in the journals Science and Nature).  Basically, they cut down the island's native palm trees in order to create the logs, ropes, and sleds used to move the moai from the quarries in the center of the island to their final positions at the island's periphery.  As the palm trees took up to 100 years to reach adult height, the trees were cut down faster than they could be replaced.  Without trees, the island's ecology (and Rapa Nui society) collapsed.  The loss of the trees led to the collapse of the bird population.  No trees meant less rain (apparently tree growth and rainfall are mutually interdependent) and more soil erosion and greater water runoff.  Crop yields tumbled.  Without trees, the Rapa Nui no longer had wood for their cooking fires, canoes, and shelters.  As food and water became more scarce, the different tribes of Rapa Nui started to fight.  Diamond claims they even resorted to cannibalism.  

Marc Gerstein and Michael Ellsberg write about Diamond's ecocide theory in their book, Flirting with Disaster: Why Accidents are Rarely Accidental, "It would have been impossible to conceive that one day an islander would cut down the very last tree and, with that act, one thousand years of civilization would collapse soon thereafter."  The economist Joseph Stiglitz referred to Diamond's theory in an article for The Guardian in which he warns of the global threats of rising inequality, the undermining of democracy, and climate change, “It reminds one of Jared Diamond’s story of collapse on Easter Island where they cut down the last tree and there they were, unable to paddle to any other island and they’d destroyed their future...We're doing the same."

It's a popular theory, and scientists (and at least a few politicians, such as the late Margaret Thatcher in her speech from 1989 mentioned above) like to use the story as metaphor for what's happening on planet Earth today.  For example, Diamond said in a speech at Stanford University in 2000, "The fate of Easter Island society seizes hold of our imagination, because the parallel between Easter Island isolated in the Pacific Ocean and Planet Earth isolated in our own galaxy is so obvious."  John Flenley and Paul Bahn also compared the fate of Easter Island to Earth in their book, Easter Island, Earth Island, "Humankind's covetousness is boundless.  Its selfishness appears to be genetically inborn...But in a limited ecosystem, selfishness leads to increasing population imbalance, population crash, and ultimately extinction."  

Unfortunately, the environmental metaphor here is probably not accurate (see "What really happened on Easter Island?" published earlier this year in Scientific American).  In fact, the population on Rapa Nui more than likely decreased slowly over many years (see Terry Hunt's article, "Rethinking the Fall of Easter Island" that appeared in the journal American Scientist), and the decline was not because the Rapa Nui people cut down all of their trees.  The most plausible reason for the decline is far more disturbing.  Recent evidence, as discussed by Pitts in his book, suggests that Rapa Nui's population decline was largely external in origin (rather than internal, as proposed by the "ecocide hypothesis").  As Hunt writes, "Newly introduced diseases, conflict with European invaders, and enslavement...were the chief causes of the collapse."  In other words, Rapa Nui's story is similar to what the earliest Indigenous Peoples of North America experienced shortly after the arrival of Europeans.  The Europeans arrived, bringing with them diseases that the native Rapa Nui islanders had never been exposed to, such as smallpox, tuberculosis, and others.  The population was further decimated when islanders were forcibly removed from the island by South American slave traders.  History, as they say, does tend to repeat itself.

The final point that Pitts makes in his book (Island at the Edge of the World) is also an important one.  The anthropologist Katherine Routledge traveled to Rapa Nui in 1914-1915 with her husband, William Scoresby Routledge.  During her extensive time on the island (they spent a longer time on the island than originally planned due to the outbreak of World War I), she conducted archaeological investigations and interviewed islanders about their traditions and history. Her work preserved invaluable evidence about Rapa Nui culture and the memories of its people.  Unfortunately, her work was largely discredited, overlooked, and forgotten because she was a woman.  In the end, rather than a case study of ecocide, Rapa Nui is an apt metaphor for the social injustices of gender bias, racial prejudice (even if implicit), and colonialism.

Leading Student

I recently finished Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community by the American political scientist Robert D. Putnam.  The book has been on my list for a very, very long time.  I am really glad that I finally picked it up to read (and finish - it's packed with over 400 pages of data), because I think Putnam provides one of the most important commentaries on what is happening in American society today.  He argues that civic engagement, social connectedness, and social capital have significantly declined in America since the mid-20th century, mostly due to the impact of generational changes (replacing a generation that was very active in the community with one that is not), television and modern media (notably the book was written before social media and the Internet), suburban sprawl, and pressures of work and time.  Putnam goes on to argue (convincingly in my opinion) that this is a bad thing for America, as the loss of social capital weakens democracy, increases loneliness, lowers public trust, and degrades community health, safety, and governance.

I'm still processing most of what I've read in Putnam's book, and I suspect I will return to the subject in future posts.  However, today I want to focus on just one very subtle point that Putnam made with me, either intentionally or unintentionally.  I came across several instances in the book where he was describing the research of some leading authority in a specific discipline.  Rather than stating that the individual was the leading authority or the leading expert, Putnam wrote that the individual was the leading student.  I love that!  He's basically stating what the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates once said about wisdom, "The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing" (please see my recent post, "He who knows most knows best how little he knows").

I came across the following graphic on the Internet that I think summarizes Putnam's (and Socrates') point perfectly:

As we begin to learn more in a specific field of inquiry, we start to become more confident about our knowledge in the field.  As we develop more knowledge, however, we soon discover that there is a lot more that we need to know.  We are never experts, but rather, we are always students of our craft or in our field.  Rather than striving to become a leading expert, focus on being a leading student in your field!