When: The Art of Perfect Timing

six

Polyphony

We can no longer depend on a story-line unfolding sequentially, an ever accumulated history marching straight forward … for too much is happening against the grain of time, too much is continually traversing the story-line laterally.

—John Berger¹

Polyphony in music is a form of composition in which multiple melodies are performed at the same time, each retaining its own individuality as it harmonizes with others. In the previous five chapters, we looked at a single time-extended pattern laid out horizontally, like a single melody, including its sequence, its rate of development or change, its overall shape, its starting and ending points, and so on. With the element of polyphony we add the vertical dimension. For most executives, ...