Imaginization: New Mindsets for Seeing, Organizing, and Managing

By Gareth Morgan

Book Overview

"Imaginization is typical of Gareth Morgan′s work--stimulating, thought-provoking, original, and well-written."
--Anne Golden, President, United Way of Greater Toronto

"The book is exciting. It opens up ways of developing both organization and management. It inspires ideas of excellence and achievement and gives hope for this age. You can probably open this book anywhere and find something of value."
--BUSINESS AGE

"Morgan has written an amazing book on imaginative ways of organizing and managing organizations. . . . a book about a new management theory that can self-organize, evolve, twist, turn, and perhaps change at the speed of light. The work provides a way of helping managers understand and develop their creative potential. It offers a means of finding innovative solutions to difficult problems. Anyone interested in modern-day organizations and personal empowerment should read this book....Belongs on the bookshelf of every manager seeking creative ways to transform one′s organization and oneself."
--JOURNAL OF ACADEMIC LIBRARIANSHIP

"The stories provide powerful examples of how the use of metaphors can help people in an organization understand their complex feelings and how discussion of the concepts contained in metaphors can help develop a shared sense of vision for the future. . . . Imaginization is definitely worth reading. The author strikes a responsive cord in calling for new organizational approaches to deal with a dynamic future, and he establishes credibility through numerous examples that document the use of his consulting techniques. . . . One might argue that the book lacks structure and focus. This is true if one is committed to the traditional, hierarchical way of presenting ideas. Visionaries are freed from such constraints as they allow their creativity to flow--and Gareth Morgan is indeed a visionary."
--SRA JOURNAL

"Imaginization is filled with thought-provoking metaphors (e.g., holograms for organizational design, termites for strategic planning, spider plants for flexibility and decentralization), primitive, but compelling illustrations and stimulating case studies--many of which are products of Morgan′s action-learning research on imaginization. This highly readable book rests on a solid underpinning of scholarly research, creative introspection, and originality. This is anything but pop-biz, but it sure could fool you at first glance."
--STERN′S HR MANAGEMENT REVIEW

"A valuable, interesting, and practical addition to the book collection. . . .If you are looking for an amusing and lighthearted trip through Morgan′s Metaphoric Management Manual then this is certainly worth a look. Moreover, and I think this is the real value of Morgan′s book, he doesn′t advocate a simple prescriptive solution to complex organizational problems--other than to plead for the use of more imagination on the part of those involved. To this message I can only add ′hear hear "
--WORK, EMPLOYMENT, AND SOCIETY

"Will be particularly appreciated by those who learn by, and take heart from, worked examples. . . . All the chapter titles are highly evocative and a quick scan of the excellently abstracted contents pages will help you decide whether to invest the time or not. . . . In the sense that it offers managers a ′show-how guide′ to becoming their own theorist, Imaginization is potentially radical and empowering. What it emphasizes consistently is the fact that we all have theories about the situations we face, and that it is those same inner constructs which can provide the seeds of creative transformation. . . . Following his examples could go a long way to convincing managers that the answers they seek lie within their own hearts rather than outside them in the head of some ′expert.′ It also provides a useful model of truly facilitative expert behaviour both in providing generic metaphors and models to help simplify and focus complex situations and in creating a supportive environment in which powerful inner wisdom can be evoked, shared, and creatively synthesized."
--MANAGEMENT LEARNING

"The chapters in this book are themselves imaginative, with varied presentations and opportunities for reader participation; most demonstrate imaginization in action via case studies drawn from Morgan′s experience as a consultant and leader of management workshops. Sacha Warunkiw′s clever drawings, sprinkled liberally throughout the text, support the importance of metaphor in Imaginization."
--JOURNAL OF ACADEMIC LIBRARIONSHIP

"As always, Gareth Morgan manages to put into words wonderful pictures and a good way of making concrete things that aren′t always easy to see. I have always enjoyed his writing. Provides a guideline for making the theoretical practical"
--Mary Giles, Department of Education, Manitobe Telephone System

"Imaginization shows that management is as much art form as science, providing many useful ways to tap the most important resource for competitiveness: brainpower."
--Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Professor, Harvard Business School, author of The Change Masters

"Gareth Morgan′s Imaginization is exciting stuff. It opens up new worlds for the development of organization and management. . . . This is of far-reaching importance, developing the path-breaking implications of his Images of Organization."
--Eric Trist, Professor Emeritus, late of the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

"Just one of the insights offered in this book could change the way you think about organization and manageme

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0803952996
• ISBN13: 9780803952997
• Release Date: April 1993
• Publisher: Sage Publications, Inc
• Length: 384 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Good book of management

Maybe management is the topic with the poorest quality of books in social sciences. Authors usually think that their readers are so busy or so stupid (or both) that they have to write a book for kids (they repeat the same example one hundred times) Fortunately, there are some authors as Morgan that believe posible to write a simple but interesting book like this one. I know Imaginazation is not the best book of management (even Images of Organization of the same author is better), but it is a quite intelligent one and in management this is a very rare quality.

Great fun and scholarly too!

Morgan's book is a delight to read. I couldn't wait to go out and try some of the techniques myself! While extremely readable, Morgan includes a couple of appendices that give the extensive scholarship behind his work.

So much fun, you won't realize how much you're learning.

Innovation and creativity are big buzzwords in management these days. Every second guru has a new paradigm or a new way of thinking, many of which aren't really new and may not be relevant to the situation on the ground. Many books are written on these subjects, mostly long on concepts but short on real tools.I loved this book because Gareth never falls into that trap. His approach is always created from the situation on the ground, not as manna from above. Indeed, one of his best insights is the way he neatly explodes the word "supervision" into its component parts, showing the assumption of management as people with "super vision" who can see the future. Think about the realities behind that one word, and watch many of your assumptions about managing start to change.As you might expect, Imaginization has several chapters which use real consulting experiences to illustrate the ideas presented. It's very effective at illustrating the ideas, conveying both the approach in action, and giving people the tools to actually start putting innovation and creativity to work in their workplace. It's also a very enjoyable read, as fun as its name implies.Gareth Morgan's course was the most useful and well-spent time in my entire MBA at the Schulich School of Business. END

So much fun, you won't realize how much you're learning

Innovation and creativity are big buzzwords in management these days. Every second executive has a new paradigm or a new way of thinking, many of which aren't really new and may not be relevant to the situation on the ground. Many books are written on these subjects, mostly long on concepts but short on real tools. I loved this book because Gareth never falls into that trap. His approach is always created from the situation on the ground, not as manna from above. Indeed, one of his best insights is the way he neatly explodes the word "supervision" into its component parts, showing the assumption of management as people with "super vision" who can see the future. Think about the realities behind that one word, and watch many of your assumptions about managing start to change. As you might expect, Imaginization has several chapters which use real consulting experiences to illustrate the ideas presented. It's very effective at illustrating the ideas, conveying both the approach in action, and giving people the tools to actually start putting innovation and creativity to work in their workplace. It's also a very enjoyable read, as fun as its name implies. Gareth Morgan's course was the most useful and well-spent time in my entire MBA at the Schulich School of Business. I was so impressed that I offered to create a free web site for him so that he could share his ideas more widely. If you want get a solid feel for Gareth's ideas and approach before buying the books, give it a visit! (I made sure we put lots of interesting content there, so even if you have read the book there will be new stuff for you to see): http://www.imaginiz.com/