The new science aspect provides the frame of reference of quantum physics and chaos theory. Leadership and the New Science: Learning about Organizations from an Orderly Universe by Margaret Wheatley does a good job of exploring how to view organizations as a system. MORE

However, systems thinking, chaos theory, power laws, and the like are not enough. It's not typically the wickedness of leaders (or of boards, for that matter) that gets companies into trouble. It's their failure to effectively manage the wickedness of the problems they face — problems that resist obvious solutions. MORE

According to Chaos Theory (a mathematical field of study), its main premise is gaining understanding of the “ behavior of dynamical systems that are highly sensitive to initial conditions “ This is nearly a definition of organizational culture in its most simplistic form. MORE

Books Management OD Podcasts and Webcasts Science Workplace Happiness business books chaos theory john kay obliquityAre you a fox or a hedgehog? Check out this podcast! During this 24 minute podcast, I chat with John Kay , author of Obliquity: Why Our Goals are Best Achieved Indirectly. MORE

Economic theories based on rational behavior have been called into doubt by recent events. If you want to learn about the subject, in fact, Hector's article is probably better — it's clearer in its descriptions of the relevant theories. But does that mean their theories and their way of going about their work are about to undergo wholesale change? The other big idea in the 1988 article was chaos theory. MORE

I was talking with a very smart friend of mine last week about some of the complexities involved with USING systems theory and chaos theory in organizational systems. MORE

The butterfly effect is a popularized interpretation of one of the key elements of chaos theory and has its roots in something that mathematicians refer to as “extreme sensitivity to initial conditions” (small and seemingly insignificant changes at the start of a process can produce wildly different and practically unpredictable results). Within chaos hides possibility…. Here’s the thing – and one reason why I find chaos so interesting - we don’t know which flaps matter. MORE

The Butterfly Effect is a scientific theory that essentially says that a small change at one place in a complex system can have large effects elsewhere. The Butterfly Effect. MORE