Rethinking Herd Mentality

Great teams thrive on two seemingly conflicting traits: unity and diversity. They rally around a shared mission and vision while embracing individual differences essential for creativity and problem-solving. A herd of horses is the perfect blend of these two attributes.

Our herd running across the field may look homogenous to the casual observer, but we’ve learned they have distinct personalities. Some are comfortable out front, some prefer bringing up the rear, others excel at water crossing, and others are hypervigilant of any dangers. We have created short bios describing each horse’s strengths and quirks, which we send to clients before they arrive at our ranch.

Our neighbor runs a large sheep operation, and I have been noting key differences in how sheep and horses behave in a herd. Horses follow a clear leader, the “lead mare,” who sets the tone and direction for the group. Sheep are conformists who simply follow the sheep next to them. Horses maintain enough space between each other to stay individually alert and keep their heads up. Sheep cluster tightly with their heads down, relying on the group for safety.

A few weeks ago, I filmed this video of our horses running on our ranch. I’ve posted dozens of videos on my YouTube channel. I try to keep them short, given our ever-shrinking attention spans. This is my longest video at five minutes, but surprisingly, it has by far the most views. I rarely rewatch the content I create, but I’ve watched this dozens of times. I hope you will be as captivated by these majestic animals as I am, instinctively moving as one, while individually contributing -- an elegant example of unified diversity.