Contrary Visions

The Quest for Fitness

The Quest for Fitness: A rational exploration into the new science of organizations follows the tradition of Frederick Taylor and W. Edwards Deming by rationally applying scientific principles and processes to understanding the nature of organization. The book recognizes that the environment has changed drastically since Taylor applied Newtonian principles to describe the industrial organization. The synthesis forces the reader to change his/her view from considering how an organization can be created to take control of its environment to how one can be created to survive over time in a changing environment. The Quest for Fitness leaves the reader with a vision of organizations as complex adaptive organisms striving to stay fit on an ever-changing landscape. There is an ongoing search to optimize one’s position in an uncharted wilderness. Survival is not dependent upon the strongest but upon the ability to adapt as the landscape changes. The leaders of such organizations are no longer commanders, but explorers, who create network infrastructures enabling information to be received, integrated, and shared throughout the organization so that individual parts can best respond to immediate conditions, without the total system flying apart.

Carolyn Kreiter-Foronda Greatest Hits

The Fifth Discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization

A million-copy bestseller, The Fifth Discipline reveals how systems thinking can transform the culture of any organisation. We cannot afford to view organisations as mechanical structures where each worker is just a cog in a machine. On an individual level, this thinking snuffs out our curiosity, and on an organisational level, it inhibits us from recognising the true value of our co-workers. How do we instead create organisations that are living, breathing and dynamic? In The Fifth Discipline, Peter Senge introduces the principles every organisation needs to expand its creative capacity, nurture new patterns of thinking and learn collaboratively – all to make the whole organisation more effective than the sum of its parts. Mastering the disciplines will: - Reignite the spark of learning, driven by people focused on what truly matters to them - Transform mere teamwork into a culture of collective creativity, or ‘macro-creativity’ - Liberate team members from confining assumptions and mindsets Drawing on science, spiritual values, psychology and case studies from leading companies like Apple, Harley-Davidson and Shell, this bestselling business classic is the definitive guide to growth, personal development and management coaching.