Hunters, Farmer, and Teamers: Harness Human Instincts to Elevate Impact

by Joel Hubbard, Jim Zartman

Hunters, Farmers, and Teamers by Joel Hubbard and Jim Zartman introduces a transformative framework for understanding human instincts and leveraging them to improve teamwork, leadership, and organizational success. The authors explore three instinctual drives—Hunting (innovation and risk-taking), Farming (sustainability and resourcefulness), and Teaming (collaboration and connection)—that shape our approach to work and relationships.

Through engaging stories, practical insights, and actionable advice, Hubbard and Zartman illustrate how these instincts impact decision-making, leadership styles, and team dynamics. They reveal how aligning instinctual strengths with roles can increase productivity, reduce burnout, and foster healthier workplace cultures. By understanding these drives, teams and organizations can better navigate challenges, resolve conflicts, and create lasting impact.

Key takeaways

Identifying your dominant instinct and how it influences your leadership and collaboration style.Building instinct-diverse teams to maximize creativity, adaptability, and results.Creating workplace environments that embrace instinctual diversity, fostering belonging and collaboration.Packed with real-world examples, evolutionary insights, and a fresh perspective on personal and team development, this book offers a powerful roadmap for achieving alignment, purpose, and success. Perfect for executives, team leaders, and HR professionals, Hunters, Farmers, and Teamers equips readers with the tools to transform how they work, lead, and grow together.

155 pages, Paperback

Published January 7, 2025

Reviews

[Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hunters, Farmers, Teamers is an insightful, well-written (and well narrated -- I recommend the audio version) guide to identifying and leveraging the strengths of yourself and your team to improve your business. The instincts, stemming from the Enneagram instincts of Social, Self-preservation, and One-to-one, are easy to learn and understand. After thorough explanations and relevant, relatable examples of each instinct, the authors discuss the nuances of how different combinations interact and how to maximize each person's natural talents to create an impactful team. I love their focus on using your natural gifts while being aware of areas that might need development or collaboration with others. Using relevant, real-life examples throughout, the authors present an easy-to-learn and easy-to-implemnt framework that gets at workplace dynamics ignored by other systems.

[Brenda Hettinger · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hunters, Farmers,Teamers are great terms for the skills we bring to group settings. The book offers comprehensive explanations and great examples for each. Referring to our instincts in this way had been very helpful to my understanding as I struggled to understand the instincts using the common Enneagram terminology. I highly recommend this book to grow your self awareness of when you show up as a hunter, farmer or teamer.