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George Bernard Shaw observed that the reasonable
man adapts himself to the world while the unreasonable man
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. In this
eloquent and highly readable book, Charles Handy argues
that today's organizations need more unreasonable men and
women. In an era when change is constant, random, and --
as Handy calls it -- discontinuous, it is essential that
we break out of traditional ways of thinking in order to
use change to our advantage. We have entered the Age of
Unreason -- a time of great risk, but of even greater opportunity.
Handy shows how dramatic changes are transforming
businesses, education, and the nature of work. We can see
them in astounding new developments in technology, in the
shift in demand from manual to cerebral skills, and in the
virtual disappearance of lifelong, full-time jobs. Handy
maintains that discontinuous, upside-down thinking. We need
new kinds of organizations, new approaches to work, new
types of schools, and new ideas about the nature of our
society.
Handy provides an incisive look at the kinds
of organizations that will thrive in the future: the "shamrock
organization," based around a core of essential executives
and workers, supported by outside contractors and part-time
help; the "federal organization," with a central
function that is concerned primarily with long-term strategy
and leaves day-to-day decision making to independent units;
and the "Triple I organization" which focuses
on intelligence, information, and ideas as primary sources
of competitive advantage, Handy graphically illustrates
how these changing organizations will affect every aspect
of our lives, from how we think about our careers to how
we educate our children. He demonstrates that what has worked
in the past won't work in the future; it is time for bold
imaginings, for thinking the unlikely and doing the unreasonable.
The Age of Unreason offers profound
insights into the world we live in at the end of the twentieth
century. It should be read by anyone wondering how to prepare
for life in the twenty-first.
Charles Handy is visiting professor at
the London Business School and a consultant to a wide variety
of organizations in business, government, education, and
health. In 1977 he was appointed Warden of St. George's
House in Windsor Castle, and currently he is Chairman of
the Royal Society of Arts. His published books include Understanding
Organizations, Gods of Management, The Future
of Work, and The Making of Managers.
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