Bestselling author Margaret Wheatley issues the call for leaders to restore sanity in an insane time and become the presence of insight and compassion in the face of chaos. This book offers a path for leaders to engage well and wisely with the destructive dynamics of this time. Deepening the insights in her classic book, Using a combination of commentary, practices, quotes, and stories, Wheatley addresses questions like, what is good leadership in this crazed, conflicted world? What skills and sensitivities do leaders need in order to serve well this time? How do we lead as an Island of Sanity, creating the conditions for people to be generous, creative, and kind? Three new chapters provide richer and deeper insight for informing our choices as leaders and citizens. The first two explain why uncertainty, confusion and conflicts can only increase, touching on topics like the weaponization of information and the loss of a shared reality as we retreat to our own bubbles. The last offers practices for leaders willing to become what she calls Warriors for the Human Spirit: decent human beings serving an indecent, inhumane time.

Autorentext

Margaret J. Wheatley

Klappentext

In a world we cannot recognize, how do we find a way forward? In this world we do not understand, how do we know what to do? When so little is comprehensible, what is meaningful work? What is genuine contribution?

Bestselling author Margaret Wheatley has summoned us to be courageous leaders who strengthen community and rely on fully engaged people since her 1992 classic book, Leadership and the New Science, and eight subsequent books. In response to how quickly society is changing and the exponential increase in leadership challenges, this second edition of her latest bestseller is 80% new material.

How do we see clearly so that we can act wisely? Wheatley brings present reality into clear and troubling focus using multiple lenses of Western and Indigenous sciences, and the historic patterns of collapse in complex civilizations. With gentle but insistent guidance to face reality, she offers us the path and practices to be sane leaders who know how to evoke people’s inherent generosity, creativity, and kindness.

Skillfully weaving science, history, exemplars, poetry, and quotes with stories and practices, Wheatley asks us to be Warriors for the Human Spirit, leaders and citizens who stay engaged, choose service over self, stand steadfast in the midst of crises, and offer our reliable presence of compassion and insight no matter what.