> first thing that comes to mind is lions and gorillas
Better ones are chickens and horses. (Females, I believe, in both cases.)
Gorillas have a variety of social structures, only one which involves the Silverback fighting for dominance [1]. With lions, meanwhile, the females eat first [2].
> are they not alphas? Don't we structure our teams according to leaders?
Leaders, yes. Hotheads, no. The “alpha” hypothesis states that the most aggressive rises to the top.
Of course. Nobody argued aggression isn’t effective. The argument is it isn’t the effective strategy, just one among many.
> See here on what an alpha is
You’re taking a definition that arose from animal observations and then filtered through anthropological and management academia. Colloquial, academic and industry definitions have diverged on this term; it’s probably being redefined in American English right now.
> Also for chickens, I've raised chickens
Chickens are the correct analogy. If you’re leading a team of people who remind you of chickens, leading with aggression works. (Not exaggerating. Some situations respond well to e.g. raising one’s voice or acting out frustration.)
As your sources show, that isn’t necessary for leadership.
>You’re taking a definition that arose from animal observations and then filtered through anthropological and management academia. Colloquial, academic and industry definitions have diverged on this term; it’s probably being redefined in American English right now.
I cited two dictionaries as well.
>Chickens are the correct analogy. If you’re leading a team of people who remind you of chickens, leading with aggression works. (Not exaggerating. Some situations respond well to e.g. raising one’s voice or acting out frustration.)
Analogies were never part of the equation. You know they weren't. You were talking about animals explicitly not animals as an analogy. I feel you're trolling.
Those are point-in-time snapshots. The Wikipedia article expands on the term's etymology [1].
(If you can provide links to those definitions I'll help look up when they were adopted. I couldn't find the definition you quoted on Webster's website [2], for example.)
> Analogies were never part of the equation
The term is an analogy. That's the point. There was a term in animal ethology that was popularised to the point it entered mainstream use. Synonymising alpha to leadership, moreover, is even more recent and mostly occuring in American English (and now, with partisan flair).
Better ones are chickens and horses. (Females, I believe, in both cases.)
Gorillas have a variety of social structures, only one which involves the Silverback fighting for dominance [1]. With lions, meanwhile, the females eat first [2].
> are they not alphas? Don't we structure our teams according to leaders?
Leaders, yes. Hotheads, no. The “alpha” hypothesis states that the most aggressive rises to the top.
[1] https://gorillas-world.com/gorilla-social-structure/
[2] https://www.felineworlds.com/lion-social-structure/