Herman - The Viking Heart

Partially motivated by a search to discover his own roots, Arthur Herman painstakingly documents the Viking Age to provide a more complete picture of who the Vikings were in The Viking Heart: How Scandinavians Conquered the World (2021). By going back as well as recounting the more contemporary impact of Scandinavian immigrants in America, Herman provides a much more complete characterization of a people and period of time that is often portrayed only for its brutality.

The Vikings, originally knows as Norsemen, were a people with a particular "frame of mind, a way of life, a way of doing things and making things, including making things happen in the face of the worst adversity" (Preface). Herman asserts in the book title as well as text that this particular way of being was distinctive and survives to this day, evident in a much larger portion of our collective genetic mix and human history than most people realize.

The Vikings, originally meaning "people of the Vik" or sea voyagers, traveled widely throughout Europe and into the Mediterranean, spreading ideas about astronomy, medicine, mathematics, physics, and instruments wherever they went. Coming from the current lands of Norway, Denmark, and Sweden, Vikings first sailed to England in the year 793 when they began their summer raids. Large Norse expeditions began staying over the winter in Ireland by the 840s and York became the capital of the Viking kingdom by 876. By 878 over half of England was under Viking domination, with the Orkney and Shetland Islands, Scotland and Ireland essentially being Norwegian colonies. During the period 780 to 950 Vikings from Norway and Denmark penetrated all of Europe and those from Sweden pushed as fas as the Mediterranean and the Black Sea.

The seafaring exploits of the Vikings revolutionized ship design and navigational capability, allowing them to travel faster and farther than any other sailors of the day. Mobility and pursuit of resources quickly turned from piracy and raiding to trade and settlement, resulting in Vikings establishing villages, turning to agriculture and fishing, and intermingling with Saxon tribal groups throughout England. As the number of villages increased, Vikings established "The Thing" as a political institution for landowners to address concerns that affected the entire community and elect their kings. The Althing of Iceland is derived from this self-governing entity and constitutes the oldest continuous democracy in the world.

The Vikings embraced many cultures and languages but men were privileged in all. While women were recognized as playing an important part in Viking villages, they were certainly not recognized as equals. Viking ships also supplied slaves to central Europe who were captured from Slavic tribes widely dispersed from Kiev in Ukraine to Prague in Bohemia. "The wealth and prosperity of the golden age of Islam were made possible in large part by the human labor supplied by Viking slave traders" (p. 49). The trade resulted in Vikings amassing hoards of silver, including eighty-four thousand silver coins eventually discovered in Sweden.

The concept of leadership in Viking days included the leader being one with his subordinates and loyalty terminating only at the point of death. There were no limits to the loyalty expected and given to the most revered among them. The brutality and sacrifice of the early Viking "berserkers" (from which we adopted "going berserk") would eventually merge with the spread of Christianity and by 1000 CE Vikings moved to a spiritual journey rather than a physical one. The myth of seeking a placed in Valhalla, a place where the bravest warriors go when they are killed in battle, was replaced by a Norse-informed religion that viewed the relationship between humans and gods as reciprocal. In this transactional view, "what seems to be decline and destruction is ultimately a source of renewal" (p. 112), a view adopted in Nietzsche's "myth of the eternal return." The progression of Christianity was slow and included the incorporation of previous images and borrowed traditions of paganism. Eventually, Christianity embraced compassion and moral obligation and the "Viking ideal of loyalty and service to community took on a new dimension: one of service to Christ and others as a Christian duty" (p. 122).

The Viking Heart traces the evolution of Viking character from 793 until the days of William the Conqueror (born 1027 or 1028 to September 9, 1087) when Norman's transformed the Viking "aristocracy of the brave" into the "dynastic rulers and cultural transmitters" who "laid the foundations for the unity of the medieval West" (p. 161). These foundations served the descendants of the Vikings well for almost another 1000 years.

Viking myth permeates many of today's most popular books and films - J.R.R Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, George Lucas' Star Wars, and J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter all celebrate the superheroes and fantasies of these ancient stories. The "...dazzling qualities of the Viking Heart - indomitable courage, fierce loyalty, national pride and power, plus a religious zeal and a charismatic ambition" (p. 216) are qualities that inspire many among us. The unfortunate part is that not all recognize the accompanying depth of commitment to community, equity, and helping one's neighbor that a Viking heart would embrace. Bravery, fierceness, and dominance divorced from the commitment to common welfare have inspired some of the hate and aggression that is seen among white supremacy groups today.

The Viking Heart is a long but interesting read. I have only summarized the early history portion of the book and for those who want more on how the Viking heart impacted more contemporary times, the rest of the book will be of great interest. Related to leadership, it was clear that much of the philosophy and many of the images of Vikings are celebrated in the heroic versions of leadership that popular media often portray.

Popelka - Experience, Inc.

Jill Popelka, former SAP executive and advocate for improving the experience of work, offers compelling evidence that organizations of all sorts need to change. The specific change is that they should prioritize employee experience in order to foster motivation, commitment, and innovation and all of these contribute to the bottom lines of productivity, profitability, and sustainability.

Experience, Inc. (Popelka, 2022) is relevant to all types of organizations, although the author is coming from over 25 years as a technology executive. Think schools, not-for-profits, community, churches, and for-profit businesses. None can escape the reality of 2022, a time when post-pandemic recovery is underway but with the new twist of employees being empowered to demand better compensation and working conditions. Even organizations that rely on volunteers would do well to heed Popelka’s advice; perhaps these settings require even greater focus on experience – the experience of being involved, contributing, and spending time in ways that bring meaning to one’s life.

 What do employees (e.g., workers, volunteers, contributors) want?

·      Purpose: to find meaning in their work

·      Agency: to have some say over how, when, and where they work

·      Belonging: to feel part of a community, even if they are remote, freelance, or part-time; to be part of a diverse community.

·      Recognition: to be acknowledged for their contributions, in multiple forms, on a regular basis (p. 12).

It's not about simply going through the motions of employee responsiveness. These conditions must be based on a sincere belief in people and in their desire to both advance themselves and contribute to something greater than themselves.

Agency and autonomy are core to ongoing growth and innovation and, therefore, deserve special attention. Popelka references Dr. Autumn Krauss to explain the primary challenge – “Marketing has got it all segmented down to a sample size of one… we shouldn’t be surprised that employees come to work wanting an individualized experience, specifically catered to them” (p. 54). Agency allows workers to figure out what is important to them and propose ways to achieve what they most want. Agency and autonomy require cultivation, especially among new members of any community. When you’re new, the inclination is to go along with what you believe is expected which tends to disempower. Helping newcomers identify their vision for themselves and how they will contribute may involve ambiguity that is initially challenging but it ultimately contributes to much greater involvement and satisfaction.

Leadership is obviously very important when attempting to create better workplaces or more engaging communities. And the most important responsibilities of contemporary leadership are:

·       Driving clarity of purpose

·       Creating connection

·       Requiring transparency and building trust

It’s not about charisma or power – it’s about the people and leading in ways that engage them.

Popelka’s book is easy to read, provides numerous examples, and offers “Take this with you” boxes at the end of each chapter to remind the reader of key points. Near the end of Experience, Inc. she offers the bold statement “Perhaps my single greatest motivation for writing this book is to argue that what is good for the company can never again be separated from what is good for its workers” (p. 196). Rephrase this for any organization – what is good for the collective can never again be separated from what is good for those who contribute to it. Purpose, a sense of belonging, and recognition of value naturally foster greater productivity.