Strategic Leadership and Systems Thinking

This book is about a new strategic leader – one who, inspired by General Systems Theory (GST), envisions an organization in which people and groups work together interdependently across organizational divides to reach a shared, rewarding future. GST has dramatically influenced physics, biology, economics, healthcare and environmental science, but has not as yet had any significant influence on the way companies work and are structured. This new, systems way of working promises a break from the influence of Sir Isaac Newton and René Descartes – thinking that has dominated worldviews for almost 400 years – and offers workers the opportunity to find greater purpose and meaning in their work.

This book is also about leadership that recognizes the potential of enhanced organizational performance that results from the movement of the organization as system, to a new desired destination. Engaging and empowering employees, the leader unleashes their unique talents and energy and uses the previously unrecognized power of strategy processes to bridge functional silos.

Offering the latest knowledge on strategic leadership, Strategic Leadership and Systems Thinking will be of interest to researchers, academics, practitioners, and students in the fields of leadership and organizational studies.

Peter S. DeLisi is President of Organizational Synergies and former Academic Dean of the Information Technology Leadership Program at Santa Clara University, USA.