Tag Archives: ecosystem

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Snakes and Ladders: Making Ecological Sense of Liberal Democracy

A Multi-dimensional Game of Snakes and Ladders There is a contradiction at the heart of liberal democracy: while democracy requires social equality, the engine of capitalism creates both wealth and inequality. While direct democracy – the purest form – thrives … Continue reading →

Posted in Change, General | Tagged capitalism, change, complex systems, democracy, ecological perspective, ecosystem, liberal democracy, narrative, renewal | Comments Off on Snakes and Ladders: Making Ecological Sense of Liberal Democracy

Toggling Between Two Worlds: Making Sense of Organizational Change (abridged)

“And twofold always. May God us keep From single vision and Newton’s sleep.” William Blake This is a summary of a longer article I have just posted on Medium to mark forty years since the publication of my first (and … Continue reading →

Posted in Change, General, Leadership, Strategy | Tagged adaptive cycle, change, complex systems, context, crisis, destruction, ecocycle, ecological perspective, ecology, ecosystem | Comments Off on Toggling Between Two Worlds: Making Sense of Organizational Change (abridged)

The Ecology of Digital Transformation: Sense-Making in Silicon Valley

I have just returned from a week of “educating” in Palo Alto, where the third residency module of the 2022 De Groote EMBA Digital Transformation was taking place. Palo Alto is, of course, the epicentre of the great disruption known … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged adaptive cycle, banyan, Bildung, ecological perspective, ecology, ecosystem, Goethe, Hannah Arendt, Hewlett-Packard, Holling, narrative, Palo Alto, Peter Drucker, rationality, reason, sequoia, Stanford, Stephen Toulmin, Vernunft, Verstand | Comments Off on The Ecology of Digital Transformation: Sense-Making in Silicon Valley

Podcast “Lead Like a Gardener: An Ecological Approach to Wicked Problems

Last week I did a podcast with Toby Corballis of Wicked Problems. Toby is an agile business transformation specialist based in The Hague in the Netherlands. I had been attracted to his site by his earlier excellent interview with Keith … Continue reading →

Posted in Change, General, Strategy | Tagged adaptive cycle, bureaucracy, complex systems, Dealingwith Darwin, ecocycle, ecological perspective, ecology, ecosystem, Geoffrey Moore, hierarchy, narrative, navigating, panarchy, product lifecycle, The New Ecology of Leadership, Toby Corballis, wayfinding, wicked problems | Comments Off on Podcast “Lead Like a Gardener: An Ecological Approach to Wicked Problems

Democracy, Capitalism and Donald Trump: An Ecological Perspective Part I: Midnight Reckoning

Back in November 2016 I wrote a blog in the immediate aftermath of Donald Trump’s election. As a Canadian I thought the Americans had had an awful choice to make but was just as surprised as many others were, when … Continue reading →

Posted in Change, General, Uncategorized | Tagged change, click-bait, complex systems, Demockracy, Donald Trump, ecocycle, ecological perspective, ecosystem, Lawrence Lessig, Lyn Nottage, narrative, Norman Orenstein, power, QAnon, Reading Pa., social enterprise, Sweat, systems trap, Thomas Mann | Comments Off on Democracy, Capitalism and Donald Trump: An Ecological Perspective Part I: Midnight Reckoning

Wading Through the Swamp – the Radical Power of Ecosystems-as-Processes

The respected management scholar, Donald Schön, began his 1987 book, The Education of the Reflective Practitioneras follows: “In the varied topography of professional practice, there is a high, hard ground overlooking a swamp. On the high ground, management problems lend … Continue reading →

Posted in Change, General, Leadership, Strategy | Tagged #GPDF19, attractors, complex systems, Descartes, Drucker Forum, ecocycle, ecological perspective, ecosystem, ecosystems, emergence, Goethe, meaning, narrative, Peter Drucker | Comments Off on Wading Through the Swamp – the Radical Power of Ecosystems-as-Processes

Lead Like A Gardener: The Movie

This is the video of my short plenary presentation at the 10th Annual Global Peter Drucker Forum held in Vienna on November 28 and 19 in Vienna. For all the video from the conference see: Global Peter Drucker Forum 2018 … Continue reading →

Posted in Change, General, Leadership, Strategy, Uncategorized | Tagged adaptive cycle, change, community, complex systems, ecocycle, ecological perspective, ecological rationality, ecology, ecosystem, Henry Mintzberg, leadership, meaning, means and ends, metaphor, mission, narrative, Pope Francis, The New Ecology of Leadership | Comments Off on Lead Like A Gardener: The Movie

The Ecodynamics of Donald Trump: Can The Centre Hold?

The rise of Donald Trump has been a puzzle to many political pundits and a shock to observers around the world. What explains his appeal and his ability to mobilize people who, for a long time have felt excluded from … Continue reading →

Posted in Change, General, Leadership | Tagged Bernie Sanders, Carrier, change, destruction, Donald Trump, ecological perspective, ecosystem, Hillary Clinton, Indianapolis, Lawrence Lessig, Mancur Olson, Mexico, narrative, Norman Orenstein, political ecology, Republican Party, social ecology, Thomas Mann | Comments Off on The Ecodynamics of Donald Trump: Can The Centre Hold?

The Ecology of Innovation

A few weeks ago I delivered a keynote presentation at the Innovation Congress in Villach Austria. I spoke for about 30 minutes on the topic of The Ecology of Innovation to a group of over 600 participants. I began by … Continue reading →

Posted in Change, General, Leadership | Tagged body language, ecological perspective, ecology of innovation, ecosystem, enterprise, exploitation, exploration, Innovation Congress, KPI, MIT, Sandy Pentland, Social Physics, steering, sweet zone, systems perspective, villach | Comments Off on The Ecology of Innovation

Double Vision: “Boxes and Bubbles” Thirty Years On [Part II]

This is the second blog on the thirtieth anniversary of my article “Of Boxes, Bubbles and Effective Management” appearing in the May-June 1984 issue of the Harvard Business Review. I had been inspired to write the article when I read … Continue reading →

Posted in Change, General, Leadership, Strategy | Tagged Accelerate, adaptive cycle, Boxes & Bubbles, change, Chuang-tzu, Crisis & Renewal, ecocycle, ecological perspective, ecosystem, Holling, Kotter, McGilchrist, Tao Te Ching, Taoism, The New Ecology of Leadership, yang, yin | Comments Off on Double Vision: “Boxes and Bubbles” Thirty Years On [Part II] ← Older posts