Computational Leadership

Chapter 4Mastering the Bubbles and Tightropes of Sustainability

W hile I was writing this chapter, the phrase “something's gotta give” kept repeating in my mind. It's a simple concept. If business and society prioritize short‐term self‐interest over long‐term group interest, then something's gotta give.

This isn't about the Johnny Mercer song “Something's Gotta Give.” It's an undeniable truth that humanity will suffer if we don't align individual and group interests. I recall, for example, an oceanography professor who told me, many years before Hurricane Katrina, about the pending threat to New Orleans and what needed to be done to avoid catastrophe. Unfortunately, we know how that played out. The city sustained billions of dollars in property damage and suffered a significant loss of life because decision‐makers wanted to save millions of dollars in flood wall design. Then, in the midst of recovering from Katrina, the world was rocked by the 2007–2008 financial crisis. Here, again, short‐term, self‐interested practices—in this case, predatory lending and excessive financial risk‐taking—significantly damaged the long‐term sustainability of society as a whole.^1,2

Now, moving to the present day, let's look at how COVID‐19 came into being. Hyper‐urbanization, though economically beneficial in the short term, is known to increase the risk of contagious disease in the long term. The increasing proximity of certain animals to humans—arguably driven by the benefits of short‐term, ...