Each chapter of the book takes as its starting point a myth, a legend, a story or a fable and explores its contemporary relevance for a world of globalization, organizations and consumerism. Each contributor is inspired by a relatively short but rich text which is then used as a springboard for an analysis of contemporary social and organizational realities. The idea behind this book is that by looking at contemporary society through the prism of pre-modern narratives, certain features emerge in sharp relief, while others are found to be entrenched in societies across the ages. The texts that have inspired the authors of this collection differ-some are myths, some are stories, one is a children's tale. The origins of these texts differ, from the scriptural to the folkloric, from high art to oral tradition. What all the texts have in common is a distinct and compelling plot, a cast of recognizable characters with an ability to touch us and speak to us through the ages, and above all, a powerful symbolic aura, one that makes them identifiable landmarks in storytelling tradition. The driving force behind this project was each author's love for their narratives. It is not an exaggeration to say that the book is a true labor of love. The chapters are introduced by the editor and are arranged in four parts, each with its own introduction. The chapters in each part spring from stories that share a narrative character, and are labeled as Knowledge Narratives, Heroic Narratives, Tragic Narratives and Reflective Narratives. The book offers a set of probing, original and critical inquiries into the nature of human experience knowledge and truth, the nature of leadership, power and heroic achievement, postmodernity and its discontents, and emotion, identity and the nature of human relations in organizations. Different chapters deal, among pother things, with the nature of leadership in the face of terrorism, friendship, women's position in organizations, the struggle for identity, the curse of insatiable consumption and the ways the hero and heroine are constructed in our times.

Each chapter of this book takes as its starting point a myth, a legend, a story or a fable, and explores its contemporary relevance for a world of globalization, organizations and, consumerism. Each contributor is inspired by a relatively short but rich text which is then used as a springboard for an analysis of contemporary social and organizational realities. The idea behind this book is that by looking at contemporary society through the prism of pre-modern narratives, certain features emerge in sharp relief, while others are found to be entrenched in societies across the ages. The texts that have inspired the authors of this collection differ - some are myths, some are stories, one is a children's tale. The origins of these texts differ, from the scriptural to the folkloric, from high art to oral tradition. What all the texts have in common is a distinct and compelling plot, a cast of recognizable characters with an ability to touch us and speak to us through the ages, and, above all, a powerful symbolic aura, one that makes them identifiable landmarks in storytelling tradition. The driving force behind this project was each author's love for their narratives. It is not an exaggeration to say that the book is a true labour of love. The chapters are introduced by the editor and are arranged in four parts, each with its own introduction. The chapters in each part spring from stories that share a narrative character, and are labelled as Knowledge Narratives, Heroic Narratives, Tragic Narratives, and Reflecive Narratives. The book offers a set of probing, original and critical inquiries into the nature of human experience knowledge and truth, the nature of leadership, power and heroic achievement, postmodernity and its discontents, and emotion, identity and the nature of human relations in organizations. Different chapters deal, among other things, with the nature of leadership in the face of terrorism, friendship, women's position in organizations, the struggle for identity, the curse of insatiable consumption and the ways the hero and heroine are constructed in our times.

This book is the story of how four busy executives, from different backgrounds and different perspectives, were surprised to find themselves converging on the idea of narrative as an extraordinarily valuable lens for understanding and managing organizations in the twenty-first century. The idea that narrative and storytelling could be so powerful a tool in the world of organizations was initially counter-intuitive. But in their own words, John Seely Brown, Steve Denning, Katalina Groh, and Larry Prusak describe how they came to see the power of narrative and storytelling in their own experience working on knowledge management, change management, and innovation strategies in organizations such as Xerox, the World Bank, and IBM. Storytelling in Organizations lays out for the first time why narrative and storytelling should be part of the mainstream of organizational and management thinking. This case has not been made before. The tone of the book is also unique. The engagingly personal and idiosyncratic tone comes from a set of presentations made at a Smithsonian symposium on storytelling in April 2001. Reading it is as stimulating as spending an evening with Larry Prusak or John Seely Brown. The prose is probing, playful, provocative, insightful and sometime profound. It combines the liveliness and freshness of spoken English with the legibility of a ready-friendly text. Interviews will all the authors done in 2004 add a new dimension to the material, allowing the authors to reflect on their ideas and clarify points or highlight ideas that may have changed or deepened over time.

In this business bestseller, how companies can adapt in an era of continuous disruption: a guide to responding to such acute crises as COVID-19. Gold Medalist in Business Disruption/Reinvention. When COVID-19 hit, businesses had to respond almost instantaneously--shifting employees to remote work, repairing broken supply chains, keeping pace with dramatically fluctuating customer demand. They were forced to adapt to a confluence of multiple disruptions inextricably linked to a longer-term, ongoing digital disruption. This book shows that companies that use disruption as an opportunity for innovation emerge from it stronger. Companies that merely attempt to "weather the storm" until things go back to normal (or the next normal), on the other hand, miss an opportunity to thrive. The authors, all experts on business and technology strategy, show that transformation is not a one-and-done event, but a continuous process of adapting to a volatile and uncertain environment. Drawing on five years of research into digital disruption--including a series of interviews with business leaders conducted during the COVID-19 crisis--they offer a framework for understanding disruption and tools for navigating it. They outline the leadership traits, business principles, technological infrastructure, and organizational building blocks essential for adapting to disruption, with examples from real-world organizations. Technology, they remind readers, is not an end in itself, but enables the capabilities essential for surviving an uncertain future: nimbleness, scalability, stability, and optionality.

The third volume in a series of three focuses on myth in everyday organizational life. The mythical narratives presented in this volume serve as metaphors of an organizational issue that can take inspiration from or be better understood through the myth to reveal an archetypal dimension of organizing and organizations.