To get an understanding of how you can be an effective leader you need to understand a little bit about how humans work. Nothing too scary but something to help create a model. The first thing to understand is the field of emotions and to explain that we need to understand a little bit about our (and other animals biology) through our nervous system.

Are you nervous? You should be

For leaders to be effective they need to have followers. For followers to follow they need to be able to detect their leader and the environment they are in. The subject of detection is the subject of the nerves. Without functioning nerves the world is far more difficult place to live as you can imagine. Nerves themselves are special cells that conduct an electrical signal from one end to another where the signal may be passed on to another nerve cell or to another cell to do something. As all the nerves are connected in some way we call the whole thing the nervous system which makes up one of the eight systems in a human: 1) digestive – breaking down foods into nutrients, 2) cirulatory – moves fluids, notably blood, around the body, 3) respiratory – taking in and out gases, 4) immune – fights infection , 5) reproductive – new humans, 6) musculloskeletal – movement, 7) Endocrine – controlling, 8) nervous – sending messages and thinking. I’ll come back to these systems to show how the nervous system affects the others after the body detects something (or thinks it detects something).

The nervous system itself is broken down into two sub-systems which are physically and functionaly different. The first is the touchy system called the peripheral (on the edge/outside) nervous system or PNS. It has two functions – 1) detect touch, heat, pain, external change and, 2) pass signals to organs such as the heart, muscles to do something e.g. contract muscle, excrete a hormone etc. Thing of the peripheral system as how we feel the world. To go one level deeper the PNS is divided further into the somatic and autonomic nervous systems. The somatic system is seen as voluntary (of the mind) as it controls movement on command – it’s the system you use to move. The autonomic system is the system that happens without any thinking – it’s automatic – it’s the system that takes care of you without you noticing. The reason that I’ve gone to this level is that a lot of what goes on in you you don’t detect for the majority of the time, other times you will feel different things that are not controlled by the brain which makes it really hard to work out why you feel such a way. Again I’ll circle back to how this comes together but for now just take away that there is one system that does things – moves you physically (you could even call this the physical nervous system but don’t go shouting this around as it’s not that simple).

The second part of the nervous system is the thinking system called the central (in the middle) nervous system or CNS. The CNS has two main parts 1) the brain and 2) the spinal cord. Together these two parts take in messages from the PNS, have a little think about them, and then send a message back if appropriate to do so. For example if you wanted to pick something up the CNS would send a message to the hand to pick up the object of choice. Simple.

There are a few bits of the CNS that are special and stick out – the eyes and ears (well, the ears don’t stick out but hopefully you can see my point). The ears are special nerves that detect light (you know this) and are wired into the brain via the optic nerve so are part of the CNS. The ears or more precisely the auditory system is more complex involving canals, drums, hairs and tiny bones. However at the end there is a signal that is passed to the auditory nerve and into the brain just like the eye.

To try and keep things simple we are interested in the detection of input (touch, sight, sound, taste, smell, and other senses), processing of input (CNS – Brain) and output (PNS – muscle contraction, change in systems).

A few examples will highlight how some of the two parts of the nervous system (PNS + CNS) work with the other systems. Example 1 – hunger. When you are hungry you’re stomach will be empty and not digesting food. The nerves of the stomach will signal it’s empty state sending messages through the peripheral nervous system to the spinal column and then up to the brain. The brain will register this message as hunger and will try and find food. Once the brain has located food it will send messages down the spinal cord to the section where the nerves that control the arms are. A signal will then move from the spinal cord to the somatic nerves of the peripheral nervous system that will control the contraction of muscles to place the food in the mouth. Once munched down the food will enter the stomach stretching the stomach signalling the stomach is full and no longer hungry.

In reality there is a load of other stuff going on but in general the systems work together to keep the whole body working. The body as a whole is an open system where things enter and leave, change over time.

This is great. Well, no. It’s boring. I’m here to learn how to be a leader not a biologist of brain surgeon. What has being hungry got to do with being a leader? An excellent question and the answer is – emotion.

I love you – I think

Now things start to get interesting. The nervous system I described is very mechanical: input, process, output. But we are not mechanical – we are emotional, soft, squidgy, irrational, shaved apes. These skills have evolved over millions of years that define what we are as humans – social; we like being with things normally other humans and if you want to be a social animal then you need emotions to help you survive and to pass on those pesky genes if you want to. The reason emotions are so important is that they protect you by enhancing the nervous system at the two levels that leadership is based on – personal satisfaction then group acceptance (that’s the next chapter).

So what are emotions? Well – it’s complicated but to keep things simple they are mental states that a person experiences when conscious that can be classifed as positive or negative to the state of that person. They are constructed in the brain in response to some form of stimulus which can be external (detected) like seeing a cake can create the emotion of hunger (or desire, or internal (created) like thinking what life will be like at the end of week.

As emotions are a mental state and are a manifestation of stimulus you can create emotions in other people. This emotion can make them think a certain way and then do certain things. When you can create an emotion to create a physical reaction that is called motivation. And, we finally got there, how followers are created – through an emotional connection to do something.

Before we head off to