Systemic Leadership

By Cynthia Cherrey and Kathleen E. Allen

Book Overview

Systemic Leadership examines how technology has fostered an era of collaboration, connectedness, and networked knowledge that demands a new systemic approach to leadership and change in organizations. This book offers four strategies for organizational leadership to lead, learn, relate, and influence change. Allen and Cherrey seamlessly integrate these strategies as a guiding light in the complex and dynamic world of management and higher education administration. Of interest to college leaders, managers, and student affairs practitioners in higher education, for-profit and non-profit organizations. Co-published with American College Personnel Association and National Association for Campus Activities.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1883485207
• ISBN13: 9781883485207
• Release Date: March 2000
• Publisher: University Press of America
• Length: 152 Pages
• Weight: 0.54 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 6.3" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Small book, big ideas

Allen & Cherrey make deft and appropriate use of systems, chaos, and complexity theories as metaphors to put forward a new conception of relationships and getting things done in organizations. But they do so in a remarkably jargon-free and reader-friendly manner. The book is oriented particularly to student-affairs professionals in colleges and universities, but would be helpful to anyone seeking to be more effective within the academy, or indeed in any contemporary organizational culture.

Systemic Leadership: Enriching the Meaning of Our Work

The relevance of this book goes beyond academia and transends into organizations and businesses of all types and sizes. The importance of understanding the implications created by moving from the Industrial to the Knowledge or Communications era is critical to personal and professional success in the new Century. The authors present complicated material in an understandable and concise way. It should be a mandatory read for all college students entering this rapidly changing workforce.

Calling All "Out of the Box" Thinkers

In their book, Systemic Leadership--Enriching the Meaning of Our Work, Allen and Cherrey pose the question: "Would the CEO of the Internet please stand up?" With that question, the authors embark on an intellectual and practical inquiry about the future of leadership in higher education and organizations. Their work suggests that our traditional, hierarchical processes and structures that many of our organizations currently operate with are no longer applicable. Allen and Cherrey propose that with the current "Networked Knowledge Era" that exists today, we need to look at and adapt to new ways of leading, influencing change and learning in our organizations. By integrating these new ways of doing our work, the authors propose,we will enhance the meaning of our work and contribute to the common good of our organizations. The authors set the stage by describing the shift from the industrial era to the knowledge based era. This shift requires us to look at a networked orientation as opposed to a hierarchical one in the management of our organizations. In our knowledge based era of today, effective leaders in an organization will require the development of systemic thinking. This will involve new ways of relating with those we lead which include the ability to create and foster relationships across the boundaries of our institutions and between our institution and the community. Systemic leaders' new ways of influencing change involve viewing realities and expectations in the organization as more organic and less mechanistic. This view implies understanding how the dynamics of a network function and where the key points of influence are in the system. Allen and Cherrey describe eleven individual and organizational capacities needed for the practice of systemic leadership. Applying these capacities and the views of systemic thinking, we will be able to transform ourselves and the organizations in which we work. Thought provoking questions are provided at the end of each chapter and the authors create imaginative and innovative examples to characterize their ideas. The book designs for us a unique way of looking at the future of our organizations and provides us with creative strategies to lead in our dynamic and chaotic organizations. Although the book is focused on college student affairs administrators, the ideas are very much applicable to business and corporate managers, non-profit administrators and anyone who wants to have a better understanding of the complexities of organizations in the 21st century. A must read for those who embrace cutting edge idesa and for innovative thinkers.