Issue 216, June 12, 2025
We’ve all been taught Charles Darwin’s theory of the survival of the fittest. The theory has ruled in the animal kingdom as well as the boardroom. The strong, the bullies, and the ruthless were always perceived to be the survivalists. We admired the fittest and sought to emulate them. This interpretation of success was mirrored by the top-down, paternalistic management strategy that became the command-and-control Industrial Age school of leadership of the past decades. This management style seems unshakable, despite the changes in our cultural environment, types of work, and evolved workplace models.
Our exploration today is whether the survival of the fittest has stood the test of time in the business world, and more specifically, how the wild card we have been dealt, AI, plays into a leadership and organizational survivalist strategy.
Darwin Decoded: What Survival Really Means for Leaders
But first to provide context, a brief review of the survival of the fittes…
