Artful Leadership: Awakening The Commons Of The Imagination

Artful Leadership: Awakening the Commons of the Imagination

"As an accomplished musician and composer, Michael Jones brings a unique sensibility to the subject of leadership. While other writers address style, process ands leadership issues, Michael illuminates the deep parallels between leadership and the creative process." Peter M Sengeauthor of The 5th DisciplineFounding Chair, SoL (The Society for Organizational Learning) Senior Lecturer, and MIT Sloan School of Management.In the future we need to envision a new leadership story - one that involves a transformation in awareness from performance to presence, from uniformity to uniqueness, from abstraction to beauty, from efficiency to improvisation and from instrumentality to the expressive power of story and voice. Together they awaken a commons of the imagination - a collective field of possibility that transforms our mechanistic view of the world to a more sustainable and transcendent vision that is creative, organic and whole.The primary purpose of Artful Leadership is to explore these fundamental shifts in awareness in the context of cultivating a mind that is more subtle, refined, undefinable, and free flowing - a mind that can perceive underlying patterns of meaning and therefore offer a portal for creating new understandings in an interconnected world.Michael Jones explores this journey of awakening in the form of a series of conversations with John, a successful senior leader who is searching for greater meaning and purpose in his work. As the conversation unfolds it becomes clear that this journey cannot be achieved alone. Instead leaders will need to come together to reclaim the commons - a space of wholeness and possibility in the personal and public imagination - in order to explore the less tangible dimensions of leadership as preparation for engaging a more complex and changeable world.In this original and thought - provoking book, Michael Jones foresees a renaissance in leadership practice, one based upon mindful attention, authentic inquiry, an aliveness to the artistic creation and an abundant curiosity for exploring whatever is fresh and new.Review"Words matter. Artful leadership is a superb example of how much. The writing is a work of art in itself; it is like viewing a masterpiece and each time you return to it you see something more. I felt that I had been on a retreat for the soul when I finished reading each chapter. The conversational tone draws the reader in and you feel as though you are walking with Michael on a path that will lead you to a greater depth of understanding, not just about leadership, but about yourself. I recommend this book for all who have a passion for leadership and whose heart's desire is to make the world a better place."---- Katherine Tyler ScottManaging Partner, Ki ThoughtBridge LLCBoard Member, The International Leadership Association"As an accomplished musician and composer, Michael Jones brings a unique sensibility to the subject of leadership. While other writers address style, process, and leadership issues, Michael illuminates the deep parallels between leadership and the creative process.He reminds us that, beyond all techniques and advice, leading is about bringing forth new realities in line with our deepest aspirations. Leading arises from awakening us as human beings, from developing our unique gifts and cultivating our sense of connection -- with one another, with our work, and with the Universe. And leading ultimately manifests in the health of the whole, the commons that defines that connectedness.Herein lies the core paradox of leading: When we learn how to recognize and nurture the commons, what is most personal becomes most universal, and the ego's obsession with the self gives way to the being's commitment to presence and to the future."---- Peter M. Senge, author The 5th DisciplineFounding Chair, SoL [Society for Organizational Learning}Senior Lecturer, MIT, Sloan School of Management"Michael Jones has produced a