The Chaos Imperative: How Chance and Disruption Increase Innovation, Effectiveness, and Success

by Judah Pollack, Ori Brafman Narrated by Drew Birdseye

Overview

People and organizations tend to approach chaos as if it were an unruly beast-something that needs to be reined in, or avoided at all costs. But what if there's a benefit to chaos? What if it's actually crucial for inspiring industry innovation?

In The Chaos Imperative organizational thinker and bestselling author Ori Brafman and management consultant Judah Pollack dramatically demonstrate how even the best and most efficient organizations-from Fortune 500 companies to today's US Army-can become more innovative by allowing a little unstructured space and “contained chaos” into their planning and decision-making.

Through their consulting work, they realized that while structure and hierarchy are essential both in large corporations and small groups, too much of either can stifle creativity.

Weaving together stories and case studies with insights from areas as far-reaching as neuroscience, medieval history, and video gaming, Brafman and Pollack reveal how creating pockets of chaos within organizations can inspire the creative leaps that lead to new growth.

Editorial Reviews

Booklist

Thought-provoking insights. . . . A must read.”
—Booklist [HC starred review]

From the Publisher

This useful and practical book will be welcomed by managers looking for new ways to innovate.” -Publishers Weekly

Kirkus Reviews

2013-09-01
Pop psych meets pop business in Brafman's (co-author: Click: The Forces Behind How We Fully Engage with People, Work, and Everything We Do, 2011, etc.) latest outing in the land of counterintuition, written with the assistance of leadership expert Pollack. Business types live and breathe for data, analysis and endless planning. Yet, as Joseph Schumpeter observed, there's something irresistibly compelling about cleaning house, resetting priorities and otherwise changing course by means of what he called "creative destruction." Brafman doesn't quite counsel burning down the house, but he isn't shy of introducing a little bubonic plague into the equation, either. Drawing on the results of a three-year consultancy with Martin Dempsey, now chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Brafman urges that we consider the bright side of chaos and calamity: The Black Death may have brought about all manner of death and destruction, but "it was actually instrumental in bringing about Europe's ascent to greatness." Post–James Gleick, the word "chaos" has been applied and misapplied in all sorts of half-baked, Gladwell-ian ways, and Brafman plays it a little loose at times. Nonetheless, this book has value in encouraging a rethinking of how things get done, particularly in heavily institutionalized cultures. For instance, in the military, there's a manual for everything, including one on the proper way to change a tire on a tuck. But why read a manual when a YouTube video would do? Such useful ideas come from what the author calls "casual downtime," the thinking time that institutions too often don't budget for. And what situation wouldn't benefit from more thinking about it, as long as it's not perfectly unbroken? For some readers, there won't be much news here, but for others--particularly those down the chain from Dempsey--there's much good food for thought in Brafman's sometimes-brash assertions.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940171731335
Publisher:	HighBridge Company
Publication date:	08/13/2013
Edition description:	Unabridged

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