Systems Leadership, 2nd Edition

Introduction to Part 1

 

 

 

Over the years we have observed that there are almost as many ideas about what makes a good organisation as there are people. We have said that organisational design is an area that is subject to fad and fashion almost as much as dieting or child rearing. There seems to be a strong attraction towards simple solutions often expressed in terms of one aspect. Whatever is assumed to be the ‘answer’ changes from year to year. One year it is ‘leadership’, next it is ‘teamwork’ or ‘empowerment’ or ‘collaboration’ or ‘innovation’. There is a fashion to move away from ‘hierarchy’ or so-called ‘command and control’ towards an ‘organic emergent network’ or ‘holacracy’. One problem with this is that such terms are never ...