The superhero in most cases presents himself as a lone ranger. He has few friends, associates and colleagues if any. He neglects to develop alliances and networks. He sees life as one big solo flight in which nothing but his and only his welfare matters. He has a dim view of other people's views and opinions, and thinks much less about other people's welfare let alone the wider implications of his actions. He is self-indulgent and inward looking.  In the extreme cases he is a recluse.

However, the most important trait of the superhero mentality is that he is in the game for self-aggrandisement. Everything he does is so as to enhance his personal glory and maximise personal benefits. Consequently, he behaves like the biblical man who has no regard for God or man or the environment.

For a season superheroes make progress or appear to be making progress. However, ultimately they fail spectacularly for the simple reason that their life philosophy is gravely flawed. Self-aggrandisement sparks for a moment, but eventually loses its shine. Man was not designed to live, and let alone succeed as an island.

The antithesis of the super hero mindset is the locomotive mindset. A locomotive has a head which determines the direction and the speed of the train. It is also designed in such a way that it can connect to trucks, freight cars and cargo carriers. A locomotive rarely travels alone unless it is on a test drive. It always pulls and transports vast amounts of cargo. What can be learned from the locomotive mindset?

True success is not a solo flight.
The locomotive never arrives at its destination unaccompanied. It arrives with its cargo and its trucks. Likewise, the truly great never arrive at their moment of coronation alone.

On their way to the top they do not trample mercilessly upon the weak, but they pull up the weak with them. The leader who trail-blazes on his way will one day awaken to realise that he has no more following. The purpose of the locomotive is to pull the cargo.

Travelling without a cargo, the locomotive merely wastes fuel. The purpose of the strong in this life is to pull the weak.

Human beings and even nations can never fully maximise their potential by neglecting their associates and neighbours. We are so interconnected that one's success depends on the direct or indirect contribution of others.

True greatness is not measured by what one acquires in life but by how many great people one breeds successfully. Not how successful you are individually, but how many people you have made successful is the true metric of success. The great therefore, continuously ask themselves the question-how many lives am I positively impacting daily.

The strength of a chain lies in the weakest link.
The locomotive is directly linked to the truck just behind it. The trucks are in turn linked to one another. In essence they are all linked to one another. Often locomotives derail because of a fault line in the weakest link. What determines whether the locomotive will reach its destination successfully is not the strength of the strongest link because this does not cause derailment, but the weakness of the weakest link. The fate of the locomotive and that of the weakest truck are intertwined. This is true for locomotives and chains, and also for organisations and teams. We are all interconnected and our fates are intertwined like rings on a chain. Since we are all interconnected like a locomotive, the prudent do not neglect to strengthen their associates and colleagues.

The whole is a sum of its parts, and when one part is missing the whole is handicapped.

A handicap to one truck is therefore, a handicap to the whole locomotive.

The Butterfly Effect
Scientists have discovered that a butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon in South America can trigger a concatenation of events that causes a storm in Cape Town in South Africa. In simple terminology, little actions in one place can result in cataclysmic consequences in another place. Nowhere is this more vitally important than in the locomotive. Uneven movements in one truck can cause the driver to lose control of the whole locomotive thus wrecking the whole locomotive.

Most organisations fail because of the cumulative effects of little actions done or left undone in seemingly inconsequential places. Prudent leaders pay attention not only to the details of their lives, but also to the important details of those with whom their fates are linked be they partners, employees, subordinates, associates or colleagues.

The Synergy Effect
The locomotive head can not carry the cargo. That is the domain of the trucks. The individual trucks cannot generate forward momentum and determine the direction of the locomotive as a whole because these come from the head. The trucks cannot succeed without the locomotive head, and the head is irrelevant without the cargo in the trucks.

Success demands a synergistic contribution from all involved.

The locomotive head is different from the truck, but it is not better than the truck. The locomotive head and the trucks do not compete with one another but they cooperate with one another. Likewise people differ one from the other, but not one is better than the other. Women differ from men, while one man differs from the next man and one woman from the next. The locomotive succeeds because it acknowledges and celebrates differences, and allows each part to contribute without hindrances and prejudices.Competition is increasingly falling out of vogue and cooperation is becoming the in thing. Compete if you have to with your rivals, but always cooperate with your colleagues. There is no place for intra organisational and intra familial competition in the twenty 21st. The locomotive mindset is focused on doing it together.

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