Blog

Jul 07

Leading = Mobilizing a Movement

“At its most basic, the ‘essence’ of leadership - as an individual leader - leaves out followers, and without followers you cannot be a leader. Indeed, this might be the simplest definition of leadership: ‘having followers’.” Keith Grint, Leadership: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford Press There is 1000 years of... read more →
Jun 30

The “Art” of Work Avoidance

Work avoidance: The conscious or unconscious patterns in a social system that distract people’s attention or displace responsibility in order to restore social equilibrium at the cost of progress in meeting an adaptive challenge. Ron Heifetz, The Practice of Adaptive Leadership Heifetz is kindly academic in his definition of work... read more →
May 21

Wynton Marsalis: Homage to an Adaptive Band Leader

From “Dare to Rest” Penn Baccalaureate Address, Sunday May 17, 2009 by Dr. Kirk Byron Jones. In University of Pennsylvania Almanac Supplement, May 26, 2009.  On a Tuesday evening in late August 2001, Pulitzer Prize winning trumpeter and composer, Wynton Marsalis was playing at the Village Vanguard – one of... read more →
May 20
Apr 12
Apr 01

Vaclav Havel: A Warning Ignored

"The communist type of totalitarian system has left both  our nations, Czechs and Slovaks...a legacy of  countless dead, an infinite spectrum of human  suffering, profound economic decline, and above all,  enormous human humiliation.... (Yet) our experience and the knowledge that has come from it....The specific experience I'm talking about has... read more →
Feb 14

Be My Valentine

Theresa and I began dating around September 1989. I use the word “dating” in the loosest sense of the word. Theresa had been diagnosed with breast cancer that summer; for the remainder of 1989 and most of 1990, our dates were to see surgeons, chemo doctors and radiation treatments. It... read more →
Sep 21

The Grand Départ

I’m a big bike rider, so I love the Tour like football fans love the World Cup. The Tour de France always begins with “The Grand Depart”. The title they give to the first stage of the great bike race. It is also a phrase that signals that the hard... read more →
Sep 11

Donald Schon: The Swamp

“There is a high, hard ground overlooking a swamp. On the high ground, manageable problems lend themselves to solution through the use of research ­based theory and technique. In the swampy lowlands, problems are messy and confusing and incapable of technical solution. The irony of this situation is that the... read more →
Aug 02

Space

Whether we’re letting our imaginations run wild or focusing on what’s in front of us, our day-to-day lives are defined by space: living space, personal space, outer space. We make space. We claim space. We practice social distancing. We turn spaces into homes, into communities, into refuges, and we forge... read more →