A starfish and spider appear similar at first glance, but when you start exploring you learn the starfish has no head -- if you cut it in half, it can replicate itself -- it can grow a new arm. One part doesn't totally rely on another, i.e., it's decentralized. A spider has a head that runs its eight-legged body, and it needs all the parts. Cut in half, it dies -- thus, it's centralized.

    The Starfish and the Spider offers fascinating insight into how groups like Wikipedia, Napster, Craigslist, and Alcoholics Anonymous successfully function as leaderless organizations, and how this system creates the common thread that bonds folks together who are part of these groups.

    The authors also talk about hybrid organizations: part spider, part starfish. A perfect example is eBay, which relies on a decentralized user feedback system to build trust among users, yet its infrastructure is all spider -- "a centralized company that decentralizes the customer experience."

    The best a-ha from this reading is a trip back in history to 1943, when General Motors refused to accept Peter Drucker's philosophy of incorporating customer opinion into the corporate strategy. GM had excelled at operating with "bottom-up" input from the front line, so they felt they did not need to hear input from customers. The Japanese auto industry, however, listened to Drucker's concepts. "I taught them that communication is to be upward if it is to work at all… that top management is a function and a responsibility rather than a rank and a privilege," Drucker says. He taught the Japanese to embrace the hybrid organization, with Toyota's successful team approach hitting what the authors call "the sweet spot … enough decentralization for creativity, but sufficient structure and controls to ensure consistency."

    Leaders can learn a lot by asking themselves: What drives the leadership and forward motion of my organization? Who influences its direction, where does the voice come from, who monitors the progress and who controls it? Is this organization a starfish or a spider?