Why the shift from trusty gray suits to charisma? In his book Looking for a business rescuerKhurana pointed out the issue of ownership. From the 1970s onwards, institutional investors such as investment funds and insurance companies started to buy up large parts of companies. At the same time, stock trading became the new American pastime. These two changes caused outsiders to take an interest in who ran companies—and who wanted to flash outsiders.
“CEOs could afford to be dull and drab if they were less visible in society,” wrote Khurana† But with the public owning their companies and watching their leaders, passing out was less of an option.
Charismatic achievements have only become more important in technology. “As a CEO, your job is to sell to all kinds of different people,” said a founder CEO in Boston. “First of all, you have to convince people to join the company and join the mission. You also have to sell to customers.”
Especially important are investors. Many tech companies have been living off investment capital for years, making investor perception crucial. “To do the role well, you have to build a bit of a persona,” said a founder CEO in San Francisco. “Investors are often drawn to founders who have some sort of unique charisma or personality –specialI think is the word they would use.”
While neither of them are on restrictive diets, these founders understand the social pressures that force such achievements.
The need to be special is reinforced by the uncertainty and sheer magnitude of potential rewards. Founders need to convince investors that with time and dollars, their companies will turn into fat, pearly unicorns. But they have little that sets them apart, especially in the beginning. “There is no income. There are no profits. There’s an idea I don’t want to ignore,” Khurana said. “But that leaves you very little to evaluate, other than what school the person went to, who they know, where they worked.” Like shamans, founders rely on personal qualities to convince investors that they can do something almost miraculous.
While CEO of Twitter, Jack Dorsey talked about intermittent fasting On podcastsin Twitter messagesand during a online Q&A hosted by WIRED. “Non-intuitive,” he says tweeted“but I notice that I have a lot more energy and focus, feel healthier and happier and I sleep much deeper.”
Perhaps. But if the scientific literature is any indication, his self-denial isn’t just laser focus and cozy nights. Intermittent fasting seems promising for people with obesity or diabetes, but studies examining the short-term effects of fasting on sleep and cognitive function usually show no change or deficits.
So CEO shamans put on a show? People everywhere feel that self-denial and other shamanic practices cultivate power. As humans, tech executives presumably draw the same conclusions. In any case, part of their decision to engage in shamanic practices may come from a genuine desire to be special.
But people are also skilled artists. We pay close attention to which identities are valued and then prepare to conform. We are guided by automatic, often selfish psychological processes and then delude ourselves with noble justifications. “The whole world is, of course, not a stage,” wrote sociologist Erving Goffman, “but the crucial ways in which it is not are not easy to specify.” If CEOs are anything like the rest of us, their personas (including the shamanic elements) are modified for acclaim and then rationalized.
Whatever the motivation, the result is the same. Look past buzzwords like bio hack and transhumanism and many technical managers are much like the trance dancers and medicine men of earlier societies. As long as people search for miracles, others will compete to look like miracle workers, forever reviving old and tried-and-true techniques. Shamanism is not lost wisdom or superstition. Rather, it is a reflection of human nature, a fascinating tradition that develops everywhere as people turn to one another to produce the extraordinary.