What businesses can learn from studying gangs


A culture and leadership keynote from Kevin Chesters on why your best people stay, and how to build teams people fight to join and refuse to leave.

Kevin Chesters speaking with a business team
Enduring gangs: Mongol horsemen in a Persian miniature, Swifties at a pop concert, the Women’s Institute Calendar Girls and Hells Angels riders
Inside

What all businesses, brands and leaders can learn from studying gangs


Your best people aren’t kept by salaries or perks. They stay where they feel wanted, where they belong. With people they share more than a carpet with.

They stay with their ‘gang’: a word that doesn’t mean what people think it does.

In What Businesses Can Learn From Studying Gangs, I reveal the ten identical traits shared by every enduring gang, from Hells Angels to the Women’s Institute, the US Army to the Salvation Army, the Mongols to the Swifties, and show leaders how to use them to build teams people fight to join and refuse to leave. Expect pride, purpose and undeniable momentum.

Give your audience the secret to attracting and keeping top talent.

Book a conversation with me today.

Inside the talk

Ten traits every enduring gang shares


Code, aim, loyalty, pride, enemy, iconography, place, fear, damage and swagger. The talk takes leaders through all ten. Here are three of them.

Code

A core belief system that defines what makes the group unique, like the US Marines’ “Semper Fi” or the police’s “Protect and Serve”. A values list any competitor could sign is not a code.

Aim

“Humans need a purpose. We’re happier and live longer when we understand our collective aim.” Think of the BBC’s founding mission to inform, educate and entertain.

Loyalty

Earned, never demanded from the top. Loyalty comes from the people beside you, not the logo above the door. As Kevin puts it, “You don’t fight for the name, you fight for each other.”

Planning your event

Who it’s for and how it runs


The talk is built for leadership teams, HR and people leaders, and any organisation that wants to attract and keep its best people. It turns culture from a values poster into something people can feel, belong to and act on.

Like all of Kevin’s talks, it can run as a keynote, a masterclass or a workshop. The thinking also sits behind Kevin’s strategy work, which aims to make businesses undeniable inside and out.

Book a conversation with me today.

CLIENT FEEDBACK


“If you want to be inspired, provoked and entertained, you want Kevin Chesters at your next event.”
SIMON LENDRUM
CEO, AXIS SPEAKS, NEW ZEALAND
“Kevin is a truly magnetic speaker who brings transformative insights to the stage.”
PELIN OZKAN
FOUNDER OF BRANDWEEK ISTANBUL
“Kevin is a brilliant speaker. Reads the room, wonderful storyteller and engaging.”
ELIZABETH ANYAEGBUNA
CHAIR, BLOOMFEST UK
“Kev is the perfect combination of entertainment and insight. He is always a real highlight.”
HELEN BROCKLEBANK
CEO WALPOLE, BRITISH LUXURY SUMMIT
“Kev was the perfect keynote speaker for our annual UpWorld conference. We loved having him, and the participants really loved hearing him”
LOTTIE UNWIN
FOUNDER, UPWORLD