This continues our look at the book, The Starfish and the Spider.

The third of the five legs that decentralized systems stand on is ideology.

What makes members join a circle? Why do people spend time and effor to particiapte in a particular circle, especially since there really isn’t muchmoney to be made in a decentralized system?

One might say that open systems offer a sense of community; however, other organizations do that as well. It certainly isn’t about power because in an open system every one is eqaul within the circles.

The glue that holds decentralized systems together is ideology. The Apaches of the West held a common belief that they belonged to the land and deserved to be self-governing. Anyone who interfered with that ideology- whether it was a Spaniard, a Mexican, or an American - became the enemy. They held to their ideology so strongly that they were willing to fight to the death for their cause.

Ideology is what is spawning the adoption of open-source software. Ideology is behind the development of open-source software. Most open-source software programmers are not paid for the software they release to the public; it is a belief that software should not cost an arm, a leg, and a right eye to purchase and that it should work. That drives those programmers to no only write the code, but offer support as well as spend their own money in hosting a site where that software can be downloaded.

As you consider de-centralization within your organization, leadership must constant be expressing ideology. It becomes one of the most important practices a leader can engage in.