Why Pulling Beats Pushing in the Modern Workplace: Benjamin Granger

Leadership is often the deciding factor in whether organizations thrive or falter, but the way we lead matters even more. In the latest episode of Workplace Stories, Dr. Benjamin Granger, Chief Workplace Psychologist at Qualtrics and author of A Leader Worth Following, explores why so many organizations still default to dominance-based leadership, and what it means to build cultures that reward prestige-based approaches instead. Blending insights from evolutionary psychology, neuroscience, and years of workplace research, Ben shares his thoughts on how leadership styles shape employee experience and business success.

You will want to hear this episode if you are interested in...

00:00 Discussing Leadership Challenges and Trust06:21 Understanding organizational psychology07:30 Balancing theory and practical application14:50 Playing the power politics game20:00 Discussing organizational power shifts22:36 Operating under dominant leaders35:12 Handling Uncertainty as a Leader37:46 Influence of environment on behavior40:58 The impact of physical environment50:44 Focusing on honest feedback

The Evolutionary Roots of Leadership

Most social animals, including humans, establish hierarchies where certain individuals rise to the top. In non-human species, this rise is usually based on dominance: the biggest, strongest, or most aggressive become the alphas by imposing their will on others. Humans, however, have developed an alternative: prestige. Prestige-based leaders earn followership by demonstrating genuine competence and contributing to the group's well-being, prompting others to follow willingly rather than out of fear or obligation.

Prestige is one of the things that makes us the most evolutionarily distinct. But despite its clear advantages, modern organizations too often favor dominance. Dominance works in the short term, it gets quick results, especially in high-pressure situations, but, like alphas in the animal kingdom, it’s always temporary and can be overturned by newer, stronger rivals.

Why Organizations Default to Dominance

Despite prestige-based leadership delivering better outcomes, structural pressures and cultural inertia mean that organizations still often rely on dominance. Environments that obsess over immediate results—hitting quarterly numbers, quick responses to crises—inevitably reward those who can “get it done now,” even if it means sidelining empathy, trust-building, or transparency.

Organizations often pay lip service to soft skills, layering emotional intelligence and empathy expectations over systems fundamentally designed for command-and-control. This is backward, though, every organization exists to meet the needs of other people, and if it doesn't do that, it doesn't exist.

Building Prestige-Based Cultures

Changing leadership norms starts with both organizational systems and individual behaviors.

Audit Your Core Values: Are they truly reflected in observable behaviors and environmental cues—from glass doors symbolizing transparency to real open Q&As in all-hands meetings? Measure What Matters: Don’t just reward outcomes; examine how results were achieved, looking for consistency with your stated values.Foster High-Fidelity Communication: In an age of automation and AI, preserve spaces for genuine human dialogue to counteract the erosion of trust and connection.Invest in Leadership Skills: Require training in rhetoric, body language, and executive presence for all leaders—not to polish surface impressions, but to deepen real influence and trust.