10 Leadership Lessons from an African Safari
A few days ago, my wife (Rose) and I just returned home from a trip of a lifetime. We spent 5 nights in two different camps – first along the Linyanti Delta in Botswana, and then moving to a lodge on the upper Zambezi River in Zambia. The Linyanti Bush Camp is as remote and wild as you can get – only accessible by flying in and out via helicopter, and with no villages in this area for hundreds of miles around. At our second stop, Thorn Tree Lodge, the location was more civilized. But we again viewed another amazing variety of wildlife as we undertook “rhino walks” and game drives in its adjacent national park. In the mornings we were awakened by the raucous antics of a large troop of local monkeys who frolicked between our room and the river shoreline, just a few meters from our door. At night we undertook an enchanting sunset cruise on one of the most pristine rivers still left in the world, with our Guide making sure we were far enough away from the grouchy, territorial hippos and always with a sharp eye for any unexpected crocodile encounters.
As an old biologist, for me this trip was a sacred pilgrimage. It was at the top of my lifetime “bucket list”. It was exhilarating to be so immersed within our natural world - as human, mammal, predator, and prey. At Linyanti, we were privileged visitors to the most concentrated populations of wild elephants on the planet. Every sunrise and nighty game drive became its own thrilling “adventure movie” – from the unexpected siting of a rare pack of African painted dogs late one morning, to a night time encounter with a magnificent lioness drinking from the swamp, following her gorging of a fresh kill, all less than 20 feet from our range truck!
As a Leadership Coach and Trainer, I felt reinforced by several key learnings:
The symbiosis of life is incredible - with everything connected to everything else. The impalas need to be next to the baboons in order to hear their sentinel warnings, and the baboons are comforted by the impala herd as a diversion during any future lion or hyena attack. Every tree in the bush generates its own mini ecosystem that fosters diversity among plants, fungi, insects, reptiles, and so many different birds. Yet the trees need the whole forest, and every inland watering hole provides a rich source of nutrients and minerals that constitutes its own oasis of life. Every organizational leader and employee are each connected in the same way, and the man-made supply chains among our human enterprises are really no different than the essential interconnections of impalas, termite mounds, and baboons.
The leadership communication within an elephant matriarch’s herd is something to behold. If only we human leaders could be as sensitive and responsive to an infinite array of both audible and inaudible gestures and sounds. If only we could be as attentive!
In nature we saw mentoring everywhere. Female elephants mentored each other through constant touching, nudging, and murmuration inaudible to our human ears. Each herd is in preparation of its next matriarch. We watched young male kudos and impalas play fighting and observed many role modeling behaviours intended to guide these young bucks into antelope “male hood”. And a pack of baboons demonstrated more continuous grooming, teaching, and cross-generational inter-actions than a university campus. Each baboon colony is called a parliament. Too bad our own House of Commons does not seem to emulate their same “learning culture”.
There was a rhythm and harmony in the remote African bush that was truly liberating. May I suggest that the best digital detox is five days on safari. All that matters is the glorious rising of the sun, accompanied by a cacophony of celebrating bird life. This was followed by the warm and quiet siestas of both man and animal in midafternoon, only to be followed by nights that again become fiercely alive, especially for the big cats and hungry hippos moving to graze inland. No need for artificial clocks or digital media. Everything you only need to know is being communicated by the cicadas and the chirping frogs, or the warning calls of starlings and baboons.
Nature is both savage and beautiful all at the same time. It defies anthropomorphic descriptions and false judgements. It just is what it is. On safari you get to escape from the constant and artificial barrage of our entertainment society, whether it be Disney, Netflix, or CNN. It is exhilarating to return to a primeval reality that transcends all the distorted constructs of our disconnected metaverse. All that matters is birth, love, nurturing, and death.
Human kindness and service was comforting and universal. The great care and tremendous hospitality offered by all the friendly staff who protected us in this wilderness – we were repeatedly told - was merely a reflection of the quality and attention to employee engagement that was at the heart of the founder of this tourism enterprise. Beks Ndlovu was the man who founded these African Bush Camps. Everyone on staff spoke so admiringly of their boss, as a humble and true Servant Leader who was a native of Zimbabwe and once a Bush Guide himself. Beks vowed to one day operate his own nature-inspired business that gave back to all the local villages in each area, and which insisted upon applying the most progressive training, mental health care, and other supports that go well beyond the colonial-dominated histories of other businesses in Africa.
When you are together as a community of weak homo sapiens - surrounded by such power and majesty as the African wilderness - there are no black people, or brown people, or white people. We are all simply one group – just people – enjoying our humanity as a collective. And over dinners and breakfasts we shared the same things – stories about our mutual love of family, pride of elders, and the paradoxical and fascinating chemistry between husbands and wives, all over the world. This is the reason why South Africa now calls itself “the Rainbow Nation”. Nature does not care what color we are, what wealth and status we have individually accumulated, or any other variations within our species. This is no different than how each Wild African Dog is painted in a slightly different pattern. To a lioness we all just look like lunch! The political factions and racism of mankind is petty, stupid, and insignificant when viewed through this bigger lens of cosmic consciousness, global humanity, and the bigger Web of Life.
None of this trip would be even a fraction as impactful, or likely even possible, without the companionship of my wife. Perhaps my biggest insight from this whole trip was how impossible and superficial it would have been to conduct this pilgrimage without Rose. Growing old together as a couple is another of nature’s wonderful gifts. The most real and valuable reasons for living are to thrive inside the food chain, and to experience companionate love. Making memories together are even better than the physical experiences themselves.
To even think of such artificial measures as GDP, ROI, or Asset Valuations seems blasphemous compared to what we just saw, smelled, felt, and heard. We must find a way to reconcile industrialized humanity with nature. It must not be an either/or trade-off. The old rules of the global game of economic development have got to be changed. Every day I kept thinking, “My grandchildren also deserve to see this place”. Even more so, I was also thinking how the poachers, the corrupt political systems, the cartels, and the climate crisis are what are truly “uncivilized” – and we humans are an ever-encroaching stain on the true dignity of wilderness itself.
The wilderness may not see or care about the petty differences among mankind, but we need to care about the integral diversity of Nature. We are part of, and not separate from life. The fact that we saw the last of only 10 white rhinos left in all of Zambia, protected on a 24/7 basis by armed guards, is a warning call for us all. There is no “Planet B”, or alternative Linyanti Delta. No TV documentary or zoo visit could ever be a substitute to the panoramic symphony of interconnectedness that I just experienced in the African bush. As young Greta Thunburg said, “How dare we!”
I know that I am just one puny, insignificant, and nearly 70-year-old man. But I emerged from this experience in constant rumination about how there must be more that I can do – and each of us in turn. After this trip, I would never want to ever see a dead African elephant, let alone attempt to eat one. Yet I was told by the local villager that they still do on occasion, especially at ceremonial feasts. I am going to chew on these thoughts of accelerated conservation, rewilding, and carbon reduction – even if its only one small bite at a time.
