Better Under Pressure

8

Setting the Virtuous Flywheel in Motion

Throughout this book, I have challenged the notion that human beings are fixed entities whose behaviors can be understood as existing distinct from their situation. Complexity theory and interactionist models reveal human identity to be a fluid, cocreated interaction between individuals and their environment. The implications for leadership are striking. Because the patterns of people’s behaviors are undeniably a reflection of their interaction with the system that has been created around them, their success or dysfunction is very much a consequence of the patterns of that system. No longer can people ...