Page 13 - Appreciative Leadership

xii Foreword

such as the brain, the economy, medicine, housing, education, and

so on. In effect, we carve our world into separated units or domains.

Further, we treat these domains as static. That is, we presume that by
continued study, we can accumulate knowledge of their nature and
function. Such a presumption feeds from a view of the world in which
the units remain the same over time.
Now consider the world from the standpoint embedded in the
present account of Appreciative Leadership. As Whitney, Trosten-
Bloom, and Rader propose, the success of the organization does
not reside in the actions of individual actors but in the relationships
among them. It is when these relationships thrive that participants
are engaged, inspired, and committed. And if these relationships are
mutually supportive, the potentials for creative change are maximal. In
today’s world, where global flows in ideas, values, people, and materi-

als generate continuous challenges to routine and reason, an organiza-
tion’s potential for creative change is absolutely vital. And, should we
extend the arts of appreciation to include all our relations—including
peoples and environment—we may indeed move toward a viable and
nurturing world.

Kenneth J. Gergen
President
Taos Institute