Snippets

 I started this post wanting to write about Charles Handy (who turned 92 in the summer) but then, typically, got sidetracked by other writers such as management’s Henry Mintzberg, anthropologist/journalist Gillian Tett and exec coach Andy Cragg. I’ve referred to Handy’s work several times since this post in 2017; celebrated a few years later one his most recent books 21 Letters on Life and its Challenges (2020) with a post which tried to summarise each of the letters; and saluted him recently with 3 posts

• https://nomadron.blogspot.com/2021/10/a-salute-to-exemplary-man.html 

• https://nomadron.blogspot.com/2021/10/charles-handy-part-ii.html 

• https://nomadron.blogspot.com/2021/10/a-little-bit-of-history.html 

I’ve been a fan since the mid 1970s when he published the first edition of
Understanding Organisations whose 4th edition appeared in 1993 including a 

“Guide to Further Reading” which offered a 60 page section with guidance to 

useful texts for each of what became its 12 chapters
At the time he was developing the UK’s first management development 

programme and subsequently gained fame as a combination of management 

guru and spiritual guide - with frequent appearances on BBC’s “Thought for 

the Day”.
Henry Mintzberg has also retired and is now 85 but has just produced a 

fascinating book which draws on his extensive experience of studying companies 

to offer a very unusual perspective which makes extensive use of diagrams. 

It’s Understanding Organizations - Finally (2023)

Gillian Tett is the odd woman out as an anthropologist and puts it rather nicely 

in her 2021 book “Anthro-Vision – how anthropology can explain business and life”

 - “We need lateral vision. That is what anthropology can impart: anthro-vision” 

which is very much what this “Peripheral Vision” tries to do.

This book has a simple aim – to show that the ideas emanating from a discipline that many people think (wrongly) studies only the “exotic” are vital for the modern world. The reason is that anthropology is an intellectual framework that enables you to see around corners, spot what is hidden in plain sight, gain empathy for others, and fresh insight on problems. This framework is needed more than ever now as we grapple with climate change, pandemics, racism, social media run amok, artificial intelligence, financial turmoil, and political conflict.

I know this from my own career: as this book explains, since I left Tajikistan, I have worked as a journalist and used my anthropology training to foresee and understand the 2008 financial crisis, the rise of Donald Trump, the 2020 pandemic, the surge in sustainable investing, and the digital economy. But this book also explains how anthropology is (and has been) valuable for business executives, investors, policy makers, economists, techies, financiers, doctors, lawyers, and accountants (yes, really). These ideas are as useful in making sense of an Amazon warehouse as in an Amazon jungle.

Why? Many of the tools we have been using to navigate the world are simply not working well. In recent years we have seen economic forecasts misfire, political polls turn out to be wrong, financial models fail, tech innovations turn dangerous, and consumer surveys mislead. These problems have not arisen because those tools are wrong or useless.

They are not. The problem is such tools are incomplete; they are used without an awareness of culture and context, created with a sense of tunnel vision, and built assuming that the world can be neatly bounded or captured by a single set of parameters. This might work well when the world is so stable that the past is a good guide to the future. But it does not when we live in a world of flux, or what Western military experts describe as “VUCA,” short for “volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity.” Nor when we face “black swans” (to cite Nassim Nicholas Taleb), “radical uncertainty” (as the economists Mervyn King and John Kay say), and an “uncharted” future (to quote Margaret Heffernan)

Other recommended texts
The Hungry Spirit – beyond capitalism; the quest for purpose in the modern world 
Charles Handy (1998) which does exactly what the sub-title implies
Myself and other matters Charles Handy (2008). A wonderful memoir which 
rehearses various points he’s made in his various books
The Change Mindset – the psychology of leading and thriving in an uncertain world 
Andy Craggs (2022). A fascinating book inspired by Charles Handy