This book highlights a frequently neglected element of leadership--personality. Of the many accounts by, or about, leaders who have guided organizations, few say much about how leaders felt as a person or how their charisma and passion affected their colleagues. Based on candid in-depth interviews with prominent leaders, including Ian MacLaurin of Tesco, Richard Ide of Volkswagen and Tim Waterstone of the Waterstone bookselling chain, the authors explore the emotional impact of being a leader.
Throughout history corporations have organized themselves according to strict hierarchical lines of authority. Everyone was a subordinate to someone else—employees versus managers, marketers versus customers, producers versus supply chain subcontractors, companies versus the community. There was always someone or some company in charge, controlling things, at the "top" of the food chain. While hierarchies are not vanishing, profound changes in the nature of technology, demographics, and the global economy are giving rise to powerful new models of production based on community, collaboration, and self-organization rather than on hierarchy and control.
