18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Fantastic, Moving and Inspirational!!!, 15 Nov 2000
I have just finished this amazing book! M. J Wheatley explores some very alien and difficult concepts about the nature of the universe with amazing clarity and perception.The world of new science has opened up to me, I have dipped into and reeled in chaos theory, quantam physics, fields, space and atoms. I have been helped to understand how this new knowledge can help me become a new kind of leader in a chaotic world. If you have been wondering why your management techniques don't work in an ever changing environment and you have instinctively felt a clanging with the environment you work in, then pick up this book and read! The ideas in this book will reassure you that anything is possible.
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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Inspired and inspirational, 16 Jan 2010
I enjoyed the book immensely and heartily recommend it to anyone wishing to challenge the way they see things, frustrated at the failure of current approaches to improvement or bemused by a world that fails to make any real sense.
The `new science' of the title are the advances in physics, biology, chemistry, quantum physics and elsewhere that reflect a change in understanding about how the world works.
Underpinning the book Margaret uses the contrast between the perspectives of this new science and that of traditional or Newtonian Science.
Her argument is that Newtonian Science served a purpose, but was always founded on compromise. A Newtonian view of the world is one appropriate to understanding the world through static snapshots and approximations. It creates a world that is separated and disconnected, a world based on prediction and knowing and on clearly defined roles of cause and effect.
Modern scientific thinking increasingly recognises the interconnected nature of the world, the reality that nothing exists in isolation, that cause and effect are illusions that exist only in a dissected world, and thus we live in a world in which we must foresake certainty and understand probabilities.
Margaret asserts that in attempting to give itself credence Business Management has adopted the artefacts of science, the techniques of measurement and of analysis. But this scientific approach is deeply rooted in a Newtonian view of the world, a view that is increasingly irrelevant as the world becomes ever more deeply interconnected.
If you are looking for some quick answers, tools and techniques, or wish to remain cosy in your current thinking, this is a book to avoid. If however you need room on your bookshelf, this might convince you to discard your current library of business books and perhaps your current thinking. An inspirational read.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Inspirational and enlightening, 31 Mar 2010
This review is from: Leadership and the New Science: Discovering Order in a Chaotic World (Paperback)
I was given this book by a colleague and friend and have enjoyed reading it immensely. The way she links science with how we operate as organisations is really interesting and her insights are valuable to anyone wishing to move away from old structures that don't work anymore. I am attending a course with her soon, can't wait!
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