all indian tribes rely on 'shamans' to travel to the spirit world and receive guidance from very old and very wise spirit beings. the navajo tribe has what is basically a parable that serves as a foundational instructional tool for upcoming chiefs-in-training; this parable was relayed to a shaman from a spirit guide a long time ago and has been adapted to modern-day for ease of understanding. this story-based teaching instrument is presented as follows:
the shaman sits down with the prospective chief-in-training candidate and says:
"as you grow up amongst your peers you find that as time goes by competitiveness becomes more of a part of every interaction and the importance of being victorious in all things seems to rise to the top of how you consider your every move. you lose a lot of what you thought were friends along the way to scheming, angling, ugliness, bitterness, jealousy, defensiveness, etc. surrounding this; both on your part and theirs. this is painful and takes its toll. everyone likes to be liked and to feel included and when one, such as yourself, is blessed with advanced abilities this can create a lot of murkiness in the water.
strong personalities are part of the larger plan, in the grand order of things, and are necessary in those who are suitable as managers of complex systems involving people. pretty much everyone with such a demeanor needs to have their rough edges ground down with some good old fashioned karmic reprisals; the important thing to consider is not what kind of mistakes one has made but rather if they eventually start to truly learn from them and move forward with their newly acquired knowledge contributing pragmatically to a reliable and functional 'principles compass'.
(and then the shaman delivers the parable)
let's say that you live on a planet very much like earth except for one big difference: the people live for hundreds of years. because of this there is a much higher acuity in everyone about their overall situation and especially regarding the quality of those in their social network. time draws trouble out of the smallest origins and a little thing can snowball into a genuinely terrifying problem if given a long enough duration to fester.
on this planet you're the owner of a large conglomerate and you have been for a long long time and so you've always got your eye out for someone that can take on more of the responsibilities of running it so that you can spend your time doing other stuff that you'd prefer at this point. there's a lot of hierarchy to the management structure and your philosophy behind hirings and promotions is solely based on competence. you worked really hard to build your company from scratch, it's a part of you, and after many trials and tribulations you've come to value the proper functionality of systems above all else. it's become crystal clear to you over the years that there are very tight tolerances that must be maintained in order to keep things as a whole from going off the rails.
you watch all of the management team members with interest and have a fair, balanced, and transparent performance review system in place so that they all clearly know what is expected. you've been at this a long time and you can spot suck-uppery, dishonesty, power-players, and scheming quickly and the performance review system deals with that kind of stuff nicely and removes it with proficiency.
as time goes by one of your management team members, who also happens to be your nephew, starts to rise through the ranks and to everyone's eyes looks like a natural fit as someone who's capable of taking over the majority of the day-to-day operations. he's respected and well-liked and most of all he seems competent. as he moves up the ladder you start to put him through some tests. he doesn't know that they're tests, which is important to the whole process, because when someone knows they are being watched they usually do everything right. when they don't know that they are being watched they do whatever it is that they do naturally. as one such test you give your nephew full authority on all personnel decisions within his division. after a while you notice that he starts to hire and promote underlings that are less competent than other candidates but rather 'kiss-up' and point some form of adulation his direction. and the most senior of his advisors seem to provide consultation based on 'outsmarting' and 'always having to win'; using absurd iterations of logic and reason in order to always appear to 'be right' in every interaction instead of keeping a focus on the correct functionality of systems and looking at things in a sterile manner with an eye for equitable order."
the shaman reminds the candidate that this parable is being used as a 'thought experiment' in which scenarios and their potential outcomes are mulled over; not as a riddle that needs to be solved, but more as an exercise in the seeking of clarity of perspective. because when one is the captain of a large ship they shouldn't be trying to 'win' at navigating it along the route that gets all of the passengers to their destination safely, because that's a concept that isn't even applicable, but instead one actually needs to have a mindset that's devoid of competitiveness.
the shaman then asks the the candidate to take some time and think about the parable and at their next meeting they'll revisit it and talk about potential 'routes' to clarity.
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at the next meeting the candidate offers their solution to the issue described in the parable, which basically comes down to firing and replacing the kiss-up subordinates and the know-it-all advisors lost down rabbit holes of chicanery and believing self-fictionalized versions of reality.
the shaman reminds the candidate of the fact that everyone chases the feelings that they prefer the most and uses whatever methods necessary to spur those feelings within; and to include this in their consideration of the parable.
that perhaps the problem is not really in the janky subordinates but rather more in the current core operating perspective of the nephew. and that the founder of any successful company has a responsibility to themselves to groom potential successors. which in this case includes diligently considering what kind of learning experience(s) might draw the nephew's latent consciousness errors up into the light of his attention enough for him to see them as detrimental and therefore produce an 'a-ha' realization about their incorrectness which would make them more easy to shed via the sheer understanding of their practical inferiority. this way the nephew doesn't feel 'judged' or compelled to be defensive, which is a major barrier to epiphanies that stick.
and to also keep in mind that the owner has no interest in being 'right' or 'winning' against his nephew, but that his interest is in finding competent managers that will keep the company from drifting off the path, which can easily happen over time when guided by those that don't have their attention on the horizon but rather get their 'feelings fix' from playing games.
It's hard to teach an old dog new tricks...Just ask 2 dogs 
