Leadership and the New Science: Discovering Order in a Chaotic World Revised [Paperback]

The book could have been kept to under 100 pages without all the extra examples. Then again, I see how many examples can engage someone, especially if he is not familar with organizations. Nevertheless, if she would have stuck to her point that our current paradigm in understanding organizations is from the seventeenth century and illusionary that would have sufficed.

The book does not offer any concrete examples for working with systems instead of parts, which is the main point the author drives home. The author does offer a theoretical framework. The framework is a lot better because it is meant to apply to many situations.

This book is worth reading if one is familiar with old models of organizations and leadership. Otherwise, reading it will be too abstract and meaningless.

She exposes the bright conclusions from her experience of working as a consultant, and these conclusions are confirmed by quantum physics as well:

- The things we fear most in organizations - disruptions, confusion, chaos - need not be interpreted as signs that we are about to be destroyed. Instead, these conditions are necessary to awaken creativity.

- What is critical is the relationship created between two or more elements. Systems influence individuals, and individuals call form systems.

- There is no objective reality; the environment we experience does not exist "out there". It is co-created through our acts of observation, what we choose to notice and worry about.

- Acting should precede planning.

- Instead of the ability to analyze and predict, we need to know how to stay acutely aware of what's happening now, and we need to be better, faster learners from what just happened.

- We need fewer descriptions of tasks and instead learn how to facilitate process.

- Power becomes a problem, not a capacity. People use their creativity to work against these leaders, or in spite of them; they refuse to contribute positively to the organization.

- Those who have used music metaphors to describe working together, especially jazz metaphors, are sensing to the nature of this quantum world. This world demands that we be present together, and be willing to improvise.

- If a manager is told that a new trainee is particularly gifted, that manager will see genius emerging from the trainee's mouth even in obscure statements. But if the manager is told that his or her new hire is a bit slow on the uptake, the manager will interpret a brilliant idea as a sure sign of sloppy thinking of obfuscation.

- In quantum world, what you see is what you get.

- Every time we go to measure something, we interfere.

- A place where the act of looking for certain information evokes the information we went looking for - and simultaneously eliminates our opportunity to observe other information.

- Every observation is preceded by a choice about what to observer.

- We all construct the world though lenses of our own making and use these to filter and select.

- It simply doesn't work to ask people to sign on when they haven't been involved in the planning process.

- Roles mean nothing without understanding the network of relationships and the resources that are required to support the work of that person. In this relational world, it is foolish to think we can define any person solely in terms of isolated tasks and accountabilities.

- What is distinguishable and important, he says, are the kinds of connections.

- Our old views constrain us. They deprive us from engaging fully with this universe of potentials.

Based on the parallels above mentioned, Margaret J. Weathley brings lot of compelling ideas about the leadership and organizational management. This book isn't a collection of dos and don'ts, but invigorates deep creative thinking.

However, the reasons for applying these principles developed from science to organizations are not well established in this book, in my opinion. The applications may be valid, but a strong case for them is not made here. For example, one claim made to justify one conclusion is that "organizations are open systems and are responsive to the same self-organizing dynamics as all other life." (p. 97). This is a bold claim, to link life sciences to management, that is not well substantiated in the book.

The author seems to revel in the ancient (and ongoing) philosophical tension between the parts and the whole, calling us to look at the whole of a system, though rejecting objective reality (an ultimate whole), and with a bit of Gnostic thinking as well: "Matter doesn't matter" (p. 153),

Also, this is not an informative work, rather its intention appears to be persuasive. The author does reference many works in the scientific literature, but it is not intended to be a review or strict proof (I hope) of her position. Some aspects of science that seem to me to contradict some of her conclusions are not discussed, such as the order imposed top-down in the theory of relativity (according to my limited understanding of it), and the fact that some changes must be wholly destructive and cannot have positive effects (e.g., certain genetic mutations).

Again, some good points are made, but their basis is not well established here. As an industrial engineer, I do not think we should throw away all the current practices, and hopefully that attitude is not simply self-serving. I cannot recommend this particular book, but hope there is a more substantial treatment of these concepts elsewhere.