Complexity science has seriously challenged long-held views in the scientific community about how the world works. These ideas, particularly about the living world, also have radical and profound implications for organizations and society as a whole. Available in paperback for the first time, this insightful book describes and considers ideas from

Focusing on the essential uncertainty of participating in evolving events as they happen, this book considers the creative possibilities of such participation from a complexity perspective.

Introducing the principles of complexity science, this innovative text illustrates how different kinds of organizational can become more effective, democratic and sustainable by using these powerful ideas.

The Industrial Revolution provided many tools that have made our current way of life possible. With over 100 years of success, they became the assumed, natural, "correct" ways to make change happen. For all of the benefits those tools offer, they are no longer sufficient to address today's complex systems and organizations. There are too many variables; too many changes happening too quickly; too much change -- to believe every issue can be deconstructed, decomposed, analyzed, prioritized, and the "one best, guaranteed way" implemented to address all of that complexity. We believe an additional set of concepts and tools is required to make sense of this complexity. We've named them the "Complexity Space Framework" and believe it offers a new lens for teams and organizations looking to survive and prosper in a complex world."

Complexity science has seriously challenged long-held views in the scientific community about how the world works. These ideas, particularly about the living world, also have radical and profound implications for organizations and society as a whole. Available in paperback for the first time, this insightful book describes and considers ideas from complexity science and examines their use in organizations, especially in bringing about major organizational change. Author McMillan explores how organizations, their design, the way they operate and, importantly, the people who co-create them, a.

Approaches to leadership and management are still dominated by prescriptions – usually claimed as scientific – for top executives to choose the future direction of their organization. The global financial recession and the collapse of investment capitalism (surely not planned by anyone) make it quite clear that top executives are simply not able to choose future directions. Despite this, current management literature mostly continues to avoid the obvious – management’s inability to predict or control what will happen in the future. The key question now must be how we are to think about management if we take the uncertainty of organizational life seriously. Ralph Stacey has turned to the sciences of uncertainty and complexity to develop an understanding of leadership and management as the ordinary politics of daily organizational life. In presenting organizations as a series of complex responsive processes, Stacey’s new book helps us to see organizational reality for what it actually is – human beings engaged in many, many local conversational interactions and power relations in which they negotiate their ideologically based choices. Organizational continuity and change emerge unpredictably, rather than as a result of any overall plan. This is a radically different picture from the one painted by most of the management literature, which explains "organizational continuity and change" as the realization of the global plans and choices of a few powerful executives within an organization. Providing a new foundation for understanding complexity and management, this important book is required reading for managers and leaders wanting to understand the reality of complexity in organizations, including those engaged in postgraduate studies in leadership, organizational behaviour and change management.

The challenge of transforming organizational culture is at the heart of many key movements in contemporary healthcare, and understanding culture change has become a core leadership competency. However, much current practice is based on antiquated and psychologically unsophisticated theories, leaving leaders inadequately prepared for the complex task of implementing change. Leading Change in Healthcare presents relationship-centered administration, an effective new evidence-based alternative to traditional culture change methodologies. It integrates fresh insights and methods from complexity science, positive psychology and relationship-centered care, enabling a more spontaneous and reflective approach to change management. This fosters greater organizational awareness and real participation, as well as improved productivity and creativity, as well as staff recruitment and retention. Case studies drawn from primary care, hospitals, long-term care, professional education, international NGOs and other settings, rather than emphasizing the end results, are demonstrations of how to apply relationship-centered administration in everyday practice. Leading Change in Healthcare is a key resource for all practitioners, students and teachers of healthcare management, medical educators, and leaders in all areas of healthcare provision. 'We need a new way of seeing, a new way of leading - and the authors provide a clear guide and resources for the path ahead. Leading Change in Healthcare offers hope - and a method. A daily dose is just what the change doctor ordered.' from the Foreword by Carol Aschenbrener

Available in paperback for the first time, this book describes and considers ideas and insights from complexity science, and examines their use in organizations, especially in bringing about major organizational change.

Organizations are complex entities that must adapt the practices of their employees and management to meet the demands of a dynamic environment. Organizations are behavioral systems that coordinate interactions among its members and environment. Changing practices in one area of an organization can generate a reaction throughout the entire system, thus affecting the behaviors of those working within other areas, the experience of customers, and important organizational results. Behavioral Systems Analysis (BSA) focuses on these complex contingencies from the macro system all the way down to individual behavior. This book contains articles by internationally recognized experts in Behavioral Systems Analysis who discuss the role of organizational practices in their study of performance improvement and cultural change from both practical and conceptual perspectives. Business and non-profit managers will find tools and case studies to help understand and diagnose their organization’s dynamics. Scholars will appreciate articles’ theory and real-world descriptions when considering their own research direction. Finally, all students of management theory, behavior analysis, and human resources will find this collection a thought-provoking tool for their understanding of behavioral systems and their application in organizations. This book was published as a special issue in the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management.

Complexity theory is generating increasing interest amongst strategic thinkers. This fascinating book covers issues such as predictability, creativity and relationships as it considers how complexity, and its central principles of emergence and self-organization, are being used to understand organizations. The book: introduces the variety of views put forward by different writers on complexity and management outlines and critiques the way that complexity theory is frequently interpreted purely in the context of systems thinking draws a new perspective on using complexity sciences to understand organizational stability and change by focusing on the emergence of novelty and creativity in the course of everyday processes calls for a radical re-examination of management thinking. Timely and controversial, Complexity and Management is essential reading for anyone interested in strategy, systems thinking, organization and management theory, and organizational change.