anthill
January 2006 
What Makes Us So Tough?
Posted on Jan 21st, 2006
by 
Steve
Steve
Have you ever watched ants at work? - One of the things that comes to mind when you watch them is they seem to have a strong sense of purpose. They look like they know what they are doing. If something gets in their way they work around it for as long as it takes for them to get back on track. What is it that is motivating them?
Etymologists tell us that ants (and all other insects that live in colonies for that matter) appear to be hard-wired to serve the colony. By doing so they are enabling themselves to survive. They serve the colony - the colony serves them.
Jim Doheney was the CEO of Capital One, the credit card company. It was Jim who coined the phrase ‘You can't teach an anthill to fetch'. The story behind this remark is that although you can't teach an anthill to fetch - an anthill can feed itself and survive in very harsh environments. In other words the ant and the colony it belongs to is a good example of a resilient system. No single ant knows how it all works - nor does it need to for the thing to work - and the ant serves the anthill, which in turn serves the ant. Great system really. Not unlike how human colonies operate. Except we seem to have more trouble with the ‘serving the colony' thing, especially within organizations.
I would like to propose that you can teach an anthill to fetch. That on closer examination there seem to be very simple rules that guide the ant's behavior and because everyone follows them the whole thing works - most of the time. If we were to apply this concept to human systems, such as businesses the simple rules could be taught.
I would like to stretch the metaphor one last little bit and say that the rules are skills which every human being already has on-board. However one reason or another we don't express the skills as much as we can.
It is my contention that given the right opportunity people and teams will embrace these skills and as a result become more adaptable and resilient.
Ray Wurzeil, author of ‘The Age of Spiritual Machines' has calculated that the next 100 years will be accompanied by 20,000 years of technological progress compared to to-days rate of change. The acceleration is almost numbing.
It is becoming increasingly clear that if we are to accommodate to these rapid changes in society and business, we shall have to increase our ability to adapt and tap into our own deeper reserves of resilience.
This is why I say ‘you CAN teach and anthill to fetch.'
My blog is an exploration of ‘what makes us so tough?'
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