Leadership and the New Science: Discovering Order in a Chaotic World (Revised and Expanded 2nd Edition)

"Leadership and the New Science is the guide to applying the new science to organizations of all types, and to our personal lives. Wheatley describes how the new science radically alters our understanding of the world, and how it can teach us to live and work well together in these chaotic times. It will teach you how to move with greater certainty and easier grace into the new forms of organizations and communities that are taking shape."--Jacket. We live in a time of chaos, rich in potential for new possibilities. A new world is being born. We need new ideas, new ways of seeing, and new relationships to help us now. New science–the new discoveries in biology, chaos theory, and quantum physics that are changing our understanding of how the world works–offers this guidance. It describes a world where chaos is natural, where order exists “for free.” It displays the intricate webs of cooperation that connect us. It assures us that life seeks order, but uses messes to get there. Leadership and the New Science is the bestselling guide to applying the new science to organizations and management. The book describes how the new science radically alters our understanding of the world, and how it can teach us to live and work well together in these chaotic times. It will teach you how to move with greater certainty and easier grace into the new forms of organizations and communities that are taking shape. "Wheatley takes the reader on a mind-opening journey into the new science. Sharing her experiences applying these ideas in a vast array of organizations all over the world, Wheatley sheds new light on issues crucial to organizing work, people, and life, including: How can systems use chaos to create order? How is order different from control? How can we reconcile individual freedom and organizational standards? How can we create more participative, inclusive, and open organizations? What are the conditions that lead to organizational learning and adaptability?" "In a new Epilogue, Wheatley relates her personal chronicle of working in the world with the ideas in Leadership and the New Science. She has come to realize that her work not only presents a new view of organizational dynamics, but challenges people's most fundamental beliefs about the way the world works."--BOOK JACKET. Introduction: Searching for a Simpler Way to Lead Organizations -- 1. Discovering an Orderly World -- 2. Newtonian Organizations in a Quantum Age -- 3. Space Is Not Empty: Invisible Fields That Shape Behavior -- 4. The Participative Nature of the Universe -- 5. Change, Stability, and Renewal: The Paradoxes of Self-Organizing Systems -- 6. The Creative Energy of the Universe -- Information -- 7. Chaos and the Strange Attractor of Meaning -- 8. Change -- The Capacity of Life -- 9. The New Scientific Management -- Epilogue: Journeying to a New World -- Further Development of These Ideas and Practices. It has taken us a long while to get here-a nine-mile hike up a gradual ascent over rocky paths.