Frog recently had the enormous pleasure of interviewing the world renowned primatologist and U.N. messenger of peace, Dr. Jane Goodall. Frog’s own Jane Kennelly, accompanied by a top AUT student and journalist, Nicole Pryor, questioned Dr. Jane around some key findings on leadership, following her extensive field studies of chimpanzees.

Having conducted the longest standing study of chimpanzees in history, 45 years of research has led Dr. Jane to be recognized as the world’s foremost expert in chimpanzees. Dr. Jane has a PhD from Cambridge University, several honorary PhD’s, as well as a member of the Order of the British Empire. Her key breakthrough in the scientific community came when she recognized that chimpanzees used tools, at the time something that was uniquely attributed to humans.

In the interview, Dr. Jane revealed different strategies chimpanzees take to become leader in the community, and the differences between the role of leader and that of the alpha male. Generally, the gentler chimps that rallied support from their cohorts lasted longer in positions than those that took it by force. Some chimps would also form very strong bonds between siblings, as well as child and parent, and then act together to secure positions in the community.

The parallels between the ways in which chimpanzees interact with each other and leadership in humans was quite apparent by the end of the evening. In fact, a book by Andrew O’Keeffe, as recommended by Dr. Jane, titled Hardwired Humans explores this link further by connecting primal instincts to leadership behaviour and noting why they are important. There are definite outtakes managers at organizations can use to understand their own behaviour, but also the behaviour of their own managers.

In the upcoming weeks, Frog looks forward to bringing you video footage of the interview, and hope that you will enjoy it as much as we did!

The Jane Goodall Institute: http://www.janegoodall.org/
Andrew O’Keeffe’s Hardwired Humans: http://hardwiredhumans.com/