MANAGE LIKE A MEDIEVAL

Enlightening Lessons from the Dark Ages

for the Modern Corporate Warrior

The medieval European world is a lot like the modern American corporation. Can you learn something about the Future of Work from revisiting the past?

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MEDIEVAL SOCIETY ROLES & MODERN CORPORATE EQUIVALENTS

Medieval Europe had a distinct social structure, the three estates or the three orders.

At the top of the hierarchy are the nobles: those who fight. Below them and sometimes intertwined you find the clergy: those who pray. At the bottom of the pecking order was the largest group, the peasants: those who work. Nobility, clergy, and peasantry, where everyone had their place by divine providence.

FAR FROM A LONG TIME AGO IN A LAND FAR AWAY…

…This maps neatly to corporate life today.

What was the nobility has evolved to be executives and management: those who boss. The largest group, the peasants, have moved up in the world to become employees: those who work. Some things never change.

Leave behind the plow and the loom; pick up ye olde laptop and printer. The church was a moderating force for more than a thousand years, smoothing the demands from the powerful on their subordinates, while still creating new demands, new tasks, new anxieties for the masses. This third group has become Human Resources: those who mean well.

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