Munafo Core Values: MCV05 — Promote Each Level

Promote Each Level

formerly "Contribute to and Enfranchise" Each Level

This core value has three aspects: Promotion, Contributtion, and Enfranchisement.

Promotion

In this aspect, the core value invokes the concepts of Promotion, which has its own extensive article. In particular, the use of the word Promotion emphasises the other two aspects of the Core Value as being related to dimensions of Promotion:

When we contribute to someone or a group, we raise them up to a higher level, as in one of the definitions of "promotion", specifically by helping then either directly or indirectly to be better versions of themselves. This requires using the platinum rule to find out what they want or how they may wish to be helped, and thus promotes affinity. The act of converting what is heard (through listening) to an idea for how to help is itself referral, and the help itself is likely to be direct endorsement.

When we enfranchise someone or a group, we empower them by promoting their role in a process of consesus-building. This also requires the platinum rule and builds affinity.

Contribution

In this aspect, this Core Value guides your choices in deciding how much time, effort, focus of attention, and other resources to give to different activities in your life.

There is an implicit understanding that the various activities one can choose from are broadly categorised by what "level" they pertain to (keeping in mind that many activities benefit more than one level). These levels are distinguished by how many people are involved or affected by the activity in question.

The core value is present when there is a balance in the amount being given to each different level. For the first few levels — individual, relationship and team — there is a basic subsistence minimum. Each individual must choose how much to give to each level — notwithstanding the need for the basic minimums just mentioned.

Human beings have individual ability (of varying types and degrees, e.g. intellectual independence or complete physical self-sufficiency) but tend to benefit from working together with others. Depending on the activity and the purpose, the number of people who can be involved varies. This results from some (at the lower levels) basic limits in the ability of the mind to communicate and represent knowledge about the outside world and (at the higher levels) the complexity of organising large numbers of people. Because of these limits, the type, nature and style of interaction changes depending on how many others are involved, and this gives each level a different sort of flavour.

The levels are:

Individual — anything and everything you do by and for yourself; anything that does not involve or affect someone else.

Relationship — things concerning only one other person.

Team (or nuclear family) — a group of people numbering from 3 up to the subitising¹ level. For humans (and for all other animals tested) the limit on subitising, and thus on the size of a team, is about 1 (yourself) plus 7 others, for a total of about 8. This limit applies to such things as a human sports team or a hunting pack of wolves. Larger "teams" of animals such as a school of fish are more like a community.

Note that in sports such as football and football employing 11 active players per side, almost all players can limit their attention to a fraction of that total. The cutoff at about 8 is particularly important to people because of the importance of modeling in teamwork. Beyond the subitising limit, one loses the ability to keep track of who knows what and this greatly diminishes the efficiency of the rapid, nonverbalised communication upon which teamwork is built.

Organisation (or extended family) — a larger group of people, too large to be a team but still small enough to retain almost complete knowledge of all people involved. The term small organisation might be more appropriate — this is an organisation in the classic sense, a group small enough to retain a family-style intimacy. There is a limit to how large a group can be to retain character-identification² — about 30 or 40 people.

This is the oldest size limit for human society groups, and is the limit for the size of band societies in anthropology. A band society is held together by kinship bonds and forms decisions by consensus: there are no firm authority roles or definitive leaders. The group size is evident in the living-groups of the most ancient surviving cultures — such as the Mbuti and indigenous Australians[6]. Dunbar refers to these groups as an "overnight camp" [5], and gives an average of 38, with a variance of 42%, based on data from 8 indiginous cultures. (This is to be contrasted with a "village", which is larger.)

These group size numbers have also been found in Western societies [9]. Modern-day groups that experience the same limit are a primary school classroom, or a sports club (including everyone on the field plus those on the bench and the coaches, but perhaps excluding certain specialised players, such as pinch hitters and short relief pitchers). 30 or 40 is the maximum size a company can attain before it must employ hierarchical organisation, middle-management, and other more modern social structures.

Community — This is an even larger group of people, limited by the ability to retain a moderate level of familiarity and trust. This is Dunbar's "village" size, which he gives as 148 with a variance of 29% averaged over 9 cultures[5]. This group-size is also evident in Western society[9]; see also Gladwell[7]. It is probably no coincidence that this is also the minimum population for long term genetic viability (see also [8]).

Community size is a personal experience, and varies by person — some can keep more connections active. The size of your community depends on your own ability to remember people and to maintain the relationships. If you encounter someone you used to know, and have to re-familiarize yourself with them before being able to do something that involves personal risk and a moderate level of trust in them, then they were not part of your "community". Most people experience this limit at somewhere from 100 to 250. The term "community" is also used to express larger groups, such as "the Italian-American community", but this is actually closer to the next level up, "society".

Society — This is a group of people larger than a community but which share enough in common to communicate and/or interact effectively. Notice that "enough in common" does not usually require language (see MCV12), thus people who speak different languages can be part of the same society. A culture is a similar concept. Note that societies can include multiple cultures, and a culture can include multiple societies. Society includes anything from a network of communities (Anthropologists use the word "tribe") to cultures with millions of members or more.

Mankind — All human beings.

Here I would like to acknowledge that many people recognize higher levels. A few examples are: all living things; the entire physical universe; a larger world including spiritual or non-physical things.

Enfranchisment

In this aspect, the Core Value is a broad generalization that includes within it several principles of government that apply to multi-level egalitarian organizations. The "levels" are the same ones referred to in MCV05.

In extreme cases, such as when modifying the constitution or by-laws for a system of government, Enfranchise Each Level entails manifesting a system of checks and balances that guarantee division of power between each level.

A Two-Level Example

To illustrate the concept consider a small group of people in a meeting. In this example, there are two levels, Individual and Team. To be compliant with MCV05, two things must be present:

The group respects the wishes of the individual

The individual respects the wishes of the group

For example, if someone uses time in the meeting: the group respects them by giving the type of support they request (for example "just listening", or "asking questions is okay but no advice") — and the individual supports the group by staying within the topics and/or other guidelines previously agreed to by the group. By respecting each other, the two levels share control over what happens — both are enfranchised.

If the individual and the group both have a stake in the outcome of some activity or project, the core value Enfranchise Each Level is present when there is proper balance between responsibility and ownership.

Enfranchisement in Management

Another "two-level" example occurs in everyday manager-worker relationships. Enfranchisement is a balance between manager and worker, with more weight given to one side or the other depending on the style (micro- or hands-off) of management being employed. There is more on this is in my management entry.

A Three-Level Example

In a more elaborate situation, imagine several sports teams organized into a division. The levels are Individual, Team and Organization. There are many examples of situations in which the needs of the individual, the needs of the team, and the needs of the organization pull in different directions, leading to conflict. Here is the essence of MCV05:

The individual, the team, and the organization all depend on each others' success. Therefore, each must have some governmental power over the other two.

Let's take an example from professional sports. from time to time, individual players move from one team to another. There are many ways in which moves can be negotiated and decided — and most of them do not satisfy MCV05. For example:

If the player moves on their own initiative, and the teams and division as a whole have no say in the matter, then only the Individual is enfranchised — MCV05 is not present.

If the team managers and division president (for example) make the decisions with no input from the players, the Individual is disenfranchised — again MCV05 is not present.

If the decisions on moves are made only by team managers with no participation from division-level leaders and the players have no choice, then only the Team is enfranchised and MCV05 is not present.

If the players and division leaders initiate the moves without consulting or getting approval from the team (or at least a fair sampling of the team's members), the Team is disenfranchised and MCV05 is not present.

An Idea Petitioning the World

Imagine that you are in a complex social structure, such as a volunteer organization with multi-level hierarchical leadership structure — and you have a question, a problem, or a dispute with the way things are being done.

In traditional top-down control structures one would "follow the chain of command" — take it to the person "above" you, such as your manager, then if not resolved, appeal it to the next level up, and so on. This model is used in the legal (court) system, and it is one way in which we enfranchise each level.

In organizations without explicit managers or top-down control, the process translates into something like the following: First, discuss with individual people one-on-one. Give them time to consider it and give their reactions or feedback. If that doesn't resolve the issue, bring it up at a small group meeting. If still unresolved, start talking with people outside your small group, or get it on the agenda of a larger group meeting. Continue to expand your work to broader circles of people (higher "levels") until the issue is resolved. Taking time at each step constitutes enfranchising each level. Skipping levels, such as by going to the small group meeting right away before discussing it with anyone, would violate the core value.

In an earlier form, this "enfranchisement" aspect was a separate core value, Up One Level, Until Resolved or Applied. In general, it encourages new ideas, initiatives, investigations, etc. to work their way into gradually widening circles within an organization. An idea could start with an individual, a pair, a team, or some other group of people. It then expands in increments to ever-larger groups of people, pausing each time to give the new larger group time to evaluate and/or assimilate the new idea.

It is as if an idea has to earn status gradually, as if the idea itself were its own person, following the Code of Honor principle Earn and Honor Rank. For an illustration of Up One Level, Until Resolved or Applied, see the page on accountability.

The same principle applies to strict top-down organizations, such as companies, where ideas and policies flow strictly from "leaders". Although they are "in charge" the leaders still need to try out and refine their ideas. Try out the idea with a few trusted individuals, and refine based on the results. Then expand to a group, then a larger group and so on. Stop expanding when you've gotten up to the level at which the policy is to be applied. Such a process does not admit doubt on the leader's part, but represents a dedication to commitment before ego.

Organizing Learning, Skill Development, Personal Growth, etc.

Enfranchise Each Level applies to the process of improvement through learning. It is usually implemented in the syllabus (progression of activities, or lesson order) of personal development courses.

Again, see the levels as defined in MCV05 and consider the following ideas:

The strength of the relationship depends on the maturity (and other positive qualities) of the individuals.

The effectiveness of the team depends on the strengths of the relationships between its members, and on their individual strengths.

The success of the organiztion depends on the effectiveness of its various teams.

and so on.

Because of this, when pursuing a program of education that covers different levels (individual strengths, relationship strategy, teamwork, etc.) it is important to cover the lowest level (individual) first, and move up. Such an ordering might start with awareness, then listening and communication skills, then teamwork and so on.

If you work on relationship strategy before establishing the necessary individual qualities and skills, then you have "disenfranchised" the Individual level.

MCV05 for Teams

For teams, we may again consider Contribution and Enfranchisement as different dimensions.

For Contribution, the team itself is the "individual", other teams and other larger groups represent the higher levels. For example we could refer to a "division" (e.g. the American League East) as a "team of teams", and a "league" as the next higher level, an "organisation of teams". I am putting "division" and "league" in quotes to signify that these words have specific meanings in certain sports which help illustrate the point, but to remind the reader that I intend this to be applied to all organisations of teams, not just sport organisations.

When this core value is present:

Contribution

The team works and plays with other teams. (+mcv5a)

The team works for the success of the other teams in its "division" and "league" (+mcv5b), and supports the larger organisation it is a part of. (+mcv5c)

The team benefits society and Mankind. (+mcv5d)

The team respects the leadership of the larger organization. (+mcv95e)

Enfranchisement

The team provides a member with support and/or interception before that member brings an issue to the division, league or higher level. (+mcv05f)

The team enables the individual to interact with and recieve support of the higher levels, regardless of any conflict of interest with the team or its individual members. (+mcv05g)

The team incorporates the opinions of all members and actively solicits opinions when needed. (+mcv05h)

When this core value is lacking:

Contribution

The team is isolated from other teams. (-mcv5a)

The team neglects the success of its "division" or "league" (-mcv5b), or does not support the larger organisation it is a part of. (-mcv5c)

The team has no interest in community service or other higher causes. (-mcv5d)

Enfranchisement

The team is ignoring, or bypassing, the leadership of the larger organization. (-mcv05e)

A member has an issue and brings it to the higher levels of the organization, because the team is/was not of any assistance. (-mcv05f)

The team actively interferes with an individual's involvement with the larger organization. (-mcv05g)

The team suppresses individual opinions, or exhibits significant bias favouring some members' opinions over others', or interferes in a dishonorable way with relationships between two team members. (-mcv05h)

Footnotes

1 : Subitising is a psychological phenomenon in which individuals can quickly identify and track a limited number of things (such as the position of players during a sports game). See [3] in bibliography.

2 : "character-identification" (in the context of this discussion) means being able to keep track of the opinions and moods of a person. If you are active within a group of people the size of an anthropolical band society then you can probably keep track of who's getting along with who, and who isn't, from one day to the next. Larger than a band, and the group becomes too large for you to track all the daily relationship changes.

Bibliography

[3] George Miller, The magical number seven plus or minus two: some limits on our capacity for processing information. The Psychological Review 63 (1956), pp. 81-97 In a variety of psychological experiments (of the basic kind that measure nothing more complicated than the ability to accurately distinguish different magnitudes of physical sensory inputs) they show that humans can typically distinguish at most n different levels of any particular magnitude, with n varying by the type of sensation and with n values clustered around 7.

[4] R. I. M. Dunbar, "Neocortex size as a constraint on group size in primates, " Journal of Human Evolution (1992), vol. 20, pp. 469-493.

[5] R. I. M. Dunbar, Coevolution of neocortical size, group size and language in humans. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 16 (4): 681-735 (1993).

[6] Cavalli-Sforza, The Great Human Disaporas (translated from the original Italian by Sarah Thorne), Basic Books (1995) ISBN 0-201-44231-0, p. 5 (Pygmies) and p. 19 (Aboriginies)

[7] Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference, Little-Brown (2000), ISBN 0316316962.

[8] John Moore, Evaluating Five Models of Human Colonisation, American Anthropologist 103 (2) pp. 395-408 (2001).

[9] R. A. Hill and R.I.M. Dunbar, Social network size in humans, Human Nature 14 (1) pp. 53-72 (2003).

[10] Susan Weinschenk (website "What Makes Them Click"), Our "strong tie" group size is 150 people, blog article (2010).

prev: MCV04 — Core Values — next: MCV06

This page was written in the "embarrassingly readable" markup language RHTF, and was last updated on 2025 Jul 17.

s.27