Evolution and HR: men (and organizations) don’t really need nipples

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The nature of evolution

It’s amazing how much useful interesting information can be found on the Internets.  For example, today I learned that the human body has more than 20 pieces and parts that are either not very useful, or are completely useless. Check out this excerpt from a piece reviewing the research of Charles Darwin:

Some are vanishing leftovers from our prehominid ancestors, such as muscles useful for walking on all fours or hanging from trees that appear in various atrophied forms. Others are by-products of a natural redundancy inherent in human sexual development, including nipples on men and the tiny vestigial sperm ducts lurking behind the ovaries of women. Then there are curiosities that, having outlived their apparent usefulness, linger simply because there’s no real reason to leave: What good or bad is hair on the little toe—or even the little toe itself?

These parts are still hanging around because nature takes a long time to affect change.  This means that humans and other animals get to have these extraneous organs hang around for many generations before they are finally gone.

One could say the same thing about many organizations.

Survival of the fittest

Just as in nature, as organizations mature and evolve, some of the functions and even some of the people become unnecessary and irrelevant, but get to hang around for too long not contributing much.  Darwin  is given credit for coining the term “survival of the fittest”, a concept that is applicable in mature and management.

The recent bankruptcy of Kodak is a good example of a company not being one of the fittest. Kodak was once a company that lead in innovation and research, but fell to the wayside in recent years after failing to advance their own digital technology, first developed decades before it became a part of the smartphones we depend on.

Are you doing what you can to make sure that your company is staying fit and surviving?

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Tagged as: Charles Darwin, Darwin, evolution, Kodak, nipples, survival