The Science of Successful Organizational Change: How Leaders Set Strategy, Change Behavior, and Create an Agile Culture

9. Leading with Science

“Sparse and poor popularizations of science create ecological niches that pseudoscience promptly fills.”

—Carl Sagan

Toward a Science-Based Craft

In this final chapter, I want to flesh out the concept “leadership as a science-based craft” that has been the backdrop for everything covered to date. In introducing that concept, I do not wish to denigrate any other aspect of leadership, nor compete with the dozens of other leadership models. I merely want to highlight a gap in what those models say and address a lack of balance in the treatment of leadership by business writers.

The idea of a science-based craft has parallels in other disciplines. Surgeons describe surgery as a craft, but the methods and procedures are based ...