An ouline of Chris's new book, The Wiggly World of Organization - Muddling through with purpose, courage and skill, can now be found on the Routledge website. Offering "... a radically different way of thinking about, and engaging with, the irreducible complexity of organization and management practice", it is currently scheduled for…

Chris Rodgers recently took part as a member of the judging panel for the Henley Forum 2020 Awards. The Henley Forum is an academic research centre within Henley Business School and the Awards are part of its 20th Anniversary celebrations, which will take place in February 2020. Chris was a member of the panel…

For the past several weeks, work has been progressing on the production of a special, OD-themed edition of the online journal e-Organisations and People (e-O&P). This has been put together in recognition of the upcoming 20th Anniversary of the formation of the OD Innovation Network (ODiN), which I helped to found in…

The Company's "Management in Five Acts" graphic features in a new book by the University of Hertfordshire's Head of Leadership and Organisational Development, Kevin Flinn. Entitled Leadership Development - A complexity perspective[1], the book presents a radical challenge to conventional leadership development methodologies. In a welcome contrast to the usual…

Chris Rodgers Consulting Ltd was 18 years old on 20 August 2016. We wish to thank the many clients, fellow consultants, and others with whom we have worked over the years. Having 'come of age' we now look forward to doing some grown-up consulting, rather than all of this 'wiggly'…

I recently attended a meeting to discuss some emerging ideas on leadership and performance in the public sector. At one point, the topic of “best practice transfer” arose. This was unsurprising, given that this features in most of the high-profile enquiry reports that have been produced over recent years in…

Conventionally, "performance management" systems focus on the so-called ‘people management’ bits of the overall process, with a heavy emphasis on numerical target setting, formal assessment of performance against targets, and the comparative rating and ranking of individuals for payment and/or other purposes.  However, the underlying dynamics of performance mean that…

I was reminded recently of a meeting I attended some 25 years ago, in the run-up to the privatisation of the UK Electricity Supply Industry. It was a regular get-together of a working group that had been set up to look at the new organizational practices required to operate effectively…