Synopses & Reviews
Praise for The Age of Heretics"A remarkable job of showing how revolutionary change in management originated. These are no mere 'currents of change,' but rather a thundering waterfall of intellectual and moral forces reshaping business."
—Peter Senge, author, The Fifth Discipline and coauthor, The Necessary Revolution
"Any twenty-first-century leader interested in creating the organizations of the future will find this book compelling. Art Kleiner lays out the evolution of the most significant management tools, theories, and concepts in a very accessible manner."
—Ram Charan, advisor to CEOs and author, Leaders at All Levels and The Game Changer
"The extensively revised and updated edition of The Age of Heretics is long overdue. Kleiner offers a brilliant synthesis of business history, thought leadership, and power politics."
—Robert Morris, management consultant and business book reviewer for Amazon, Borders, and others
"Art Kleiner has uncovered a kind of secret history that links the medieval monastic orders, the counterculture of the sixties, and the key agents of corporate change in the modern world. I think it's a landmark for people inside and outside the most influential institution of the modern age—the corporation."
—Howard Rheingold, author, Virtual Reality, Virtual Communities, and Tools for Thought
"Corporate change continues to accelerate these days unaware of its own history. Art Kleiner's lucid account shows how the revolution began in the ideas and passions of a handful of revolutionaries."
—Stewart Brand, founder, Whole Earth Catalog and Long Now Foundation
"The Age of Heretics is a primer of great interest, one that will move people within organizations to widen their sense of the possible."
—Doug Carlston, founder of Broderbund Software and chairman, Public Radio International
Review
Voted a "Best Business Book of 2008" by the Miami Herald
Review
"An inspiring and enlightening reading for any business person who fears their ideas may face initial rejection." (
The Midwest Book Review, October 2008)
Voted a "Best Business Book of 2008" by the Miami Herald
Synopsis
Radical behavior is rarely acknowledged as a characteristic of the corporate world, where status quo is generally king and revolutionary thought usually banished to the fringes. This book shows that a powerful group of progressive thinkers really did develop within the realm of traditional business during the tumultuous 1960s. These figures actually helped transform that environment just as their better-known antiestablishment allies were reshaping other institutions throughout society.
In 1996, when The Age of Hereticswas first published, it was read and reviewed by a devoted audience. They saw in it a bolstering and expansion of their own efforts to understand and reform the modern-day corporation. And today, even though it is out of print, there is still a strong community of followers in the business community who demand the book.
The world is in a different place than it was in 1996. The wars in Iraqand Afghanistan, along with the failures of many companies after the dot-com bubble burst, have explicitly demonstrated the importance of good management in achieving results – and how countercultural good management can be in many settings. The evolution of the World Wide Web, the successes of open-system projects like Linux, the growing importance of corporate environmentalism, the increased cachet of high-performance management, and the need of global enterprises to implement cross-boundary initiatives have all brought legitimacy to management approaches that would have been unthinkable in most companies fifteen years ago. This edition will update and expand on the success of the first edition.
Synopsis
The Age of HereticsWhen the first edition of The Age of Heretics was published to wide critical acclaim in 1996, it was considered the definitive account of the revolution in management from the 1940s to the current time.
In this second edition of his bestselling book, author Art Kleiner explores the nature of effective leadership in times of change and defines its importance to the corporation of the future. He describes a heretic as a visionary who creates change in large-scale companies, balancing the contrary truths they can't deny against their loyalty to their organizations. The Age of Heretics reveals how managers can get stuck in counterproductive ways of doing things and shows why it takes a heretical point of view to get past the deadlock and move forward.
This engrossing history lesson for business change agents and reformers is filled with groundbreaking management thought and compelling stories of the heretics of our time. Some of the figures, such as W. Edwards Deming, Kurt Lewin, Amory Lovins, and Saul Alinsky, are familiar to many, while others may be less widely known but influential behind the scenes. While these heretics were underappreciated in their time—and often demoted for their radical ideas—the ideals they fought for live on in the everchanging American corporation.
For today's leaders, The Age of Heretics reveals how to make transformative strategic changes while simultaneously running a company. This new edition explores the roots of today's most prevalent management ideas: lean production, organization development, the balanced scorecard, and reengineering, as well as other key areas of change such as group dynamics, scenario planning, shareholder activism, sociotechnical systems, and corporate environmentalism. This is the guidebook for progressive thinkers who want to transform their corporations and the entire business landscape.
Synopsis
In this second edition of his bestselling book, author Art Kleiner explores the nature of effective leadership in times of change and defines its importance to the corporation of the future. He describes a heretic as a visionary who creates change in large-scale companies, balancing the contrary truths they can’t deny against their loyalty to their organizations. The Age of Heretics reveals how managers can get stuck in counterproductive ways of doing things and shows why it takes a heretical point of view to get past the deadlock and move forward.
Synopsis
Praise for The Age of Heretics
"A remarkable job of showing how revolutionary change in management originated. These are no mere 'currents of change,' but rather a thundering waterfall of intellectual and moral forces reshaping business."
Peter Senge, author, The Fifth Discipline and coauthor, The Necessary Revolution
"Any twenty-first-century leader interested in creating the organizations of the future will find this book compelling. Art Kleiner lays out the evolution of the most significant management tools, theories, and concepts in a very accessible manner."
Ram Charan, advisor to CEOs and author, Leaders at All Levels and The Game Changer
"The extensively revised and updated edition of The Age of Heretics is long overdue. Kleiner offers a brilliant synthesis of business history, thought leadership, and power politics."Robert Morris, management consultant and business book reviewer for Amazon, Borders, and others
"Art Kleiner has uncovered a kind of secret history that links the medieval monastic orders, the counterculture of the sixties, and the key agents of corporate change in the modern world. I think it's a landmark for people inside and outside the most influential institution of the modern agethe corporation."
Howard Rheingold, author, Virtual Reality, Virtual Communities, and Tools for Thought
"Corporate change continues to accelerate these days unaware of its own history. Art Kleiner's lucid account shows how the revolution began in the ideas and passions of a handful of revolutionaries."
Stewart Brand, founder, Whole Earth Catalog and Long Now Foundation
"The Age of Heretics is a primer of great interest, one that will move people within organizations to widen their sense of the possible."
Doug Carlston, founder of Broderbund Software and chairman, Public Radio International
About the Author
Art Kleiner is the editor-in-chief of the quarterly magazine strategy+business (http://www.strategy-business.com). He is the author or coauthor of several acclaimed business books, and is a faculty member at New York University's Interactive Telecommunications Program. His articles have been published in a variety of places, including Wired, Fast Company, Harvard Business Review, and The New York Times Magazine.
Table of Contents
Foreword by Warren Bennis.
Preface by Steven Wheeler and Walter McFarland.
To the Reader.
1. Monastics: Corporate Culture and Its Discontents, 1945 to Today.
2. Pelagians: National Training Laboratories, 1947–1962.
3. Reformists: Workplace Redesign at Procter & Gamble and the Gaines Dog Food Plant in Topeka, 1961–1973.
4. Protesters: Saul Alinsky, FIGHTON, Campaign GM, and the Shareholder Activism Movement, 1964–1971.
5. Mystics: Royal Dutch/Shell’s Scenario Planners, 1967–1973.
6. Lovers of Faith and Reason: Heretical Engineers at Stanford Research Institute and MIT, 1955–1971.
7. Parzival’s Dilemma: Edie Seashore, Chris Argyris, and Warren Bennis, 1959–1979.
8. Millenarians: Erewhon, the SRI Futures Group, Herman Kahn, Royal Dutch/Shell, and Amory Lovins, 1968–1979.
9. The Rapids: Hayes and Abernathy, Tom Peters, W. Edwards Deming, the Creators of GE Work-Out, and Other Synthesizers of Management Change, 1974–1982.
Bibliography.
Notes.
Acknowledgments.
About the Author.
Index.