Author: Manfred F.R. Kets de Vries
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 0230240364
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 257
Book Description
The four main tenets of life are explored in this unique new book that examines the issues that touch each executive, or for that matter, people in general. Based on his experiences as a psychoanalyst, professor and leadership coach, the author explores how 'Sex, Money, Happiness and Death' affect our work and our lives in general.
Sex, Money, Happiness, and Death
Author: Manfred F.R. Kets de Vries
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 0230240364
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 257
Book Description
The four main tenets of life are explored in this unique new book that examines the issues that touch each executive, or for that matter, people in general. Based on his experiences as a psychoanalyst, professor and leadership coach, the author explores how 'Sex, Money, Happiness and Death' affect our work and our lives in general.
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 0230240364
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 257
Book Description
The four main tenets of life are explored in this unique new book that examines the issues that touch each executive, or for that matter, people in general. Based on his experiences as a psychoanalyst, professor and leadership coach, the author explores how 'Sex, Money, Happiness and Death' affect our work and our lives in general.
Riding the Leadership Rollercoaster
Author: Manfred F.R. Kets de Vries
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319451626
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 182
Book Description
A collection of short, bite-sized nuggets of insight into the psychological ups and downs of the leadership journey from one of the world’s top thinkers on leadership. Leadership often means living on the edge, living a life less ordinary, leaving the straight and narrow to take a more exciting path. Like riding a roller coaster, there will be moments that take our breath away but it is in those moments that we feel truly alive. Although we may not know what is coming round the next bend or after the next rise, we have a great time on the ride. Kets de Vries’s examination of the “inner theatre” pushes leaders and their coaches to become a personal and organizational detectives, to look beyond the obvious and discover the deeper meaning of their own and others’ actions. Doing so can prevent leaders becoming prisoners of their own past, failing to recognize the repetitive patterns in their behavior, making the same mistakes over and over again. Leaders are more likely than followers to experience ups and downs, successes and failures, happy days and sad. The intensity of the experience depends on the “rider.” They can scream or enjoy the ride—or, indeed, do both. They can make the best out of the beginnings and endings, the good times and bad, or they can sink beneath them. In Riding the Leadership Rollercoaster Kets de Vries provides leaders and their coaches with the insights that can help them take some control of the ride.
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319451626
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 182
Book Description
A collection of short, bite-sized nuggets of insight into the psychological ups and downs of the leadership journey from one of the world’s top thinkers on leadership. Leadership often means living on the edge, living a life less ordinary, leaving the straight and narrow to take a more exciting path. Like riding a roller coaster, there will be moments that take our breath away but it is in those moments that we feel truly alive. Although we may not know what is coming round the next bend or after the next rise, we have a great time on the ride. Kets de Vries’s examination of the “inner theatre” pushes leaders and their coaches to become a personal and organizational detectives, to look beyond the obvious and discover the deeper meaning of their own and others’ actions. Doing so can prevent leaders becoming prisoners of their own past, failing to recognize the repetitive patterns in their behavior, making the same mistakes over and over again. Leaders are more likely than followers to experience ups and downs, successes and failures, happy days and sad. The intensity of the experience depends on the “rider.” They can scream or enjoy the ride—or, indeed, do both. They can make the best out of the beginnings and endings, the good times and bad, or they can sink beneath them. In Riding the Leadership Rollercoaster Kets de Vries provides leaders and their coaches with the insights that can help them take some control of the ride.
Leadership Unhinged
Author: Manfred F. R. Kets de Vries
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030793451
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 156
Book Description
The recent proliferation of populist movements worldwide — along with the often dangerous, demagogic leaders that accompany them — have prompted questions about the underlying conditions that give rise to such troubling developments. Leadership Unhinged: Essays on the Ugly, the Bad and the Weird examines what is going on at a deeper level, both collectively and individually, between leaders and followers. Employing theories derived from psychoanalytic psychology, developmental psychology, neuroscience and evolutionary psychology, these essays help to unravel and expose the pathological leader-follower dynamics that generate such movements. The book is infused with Kets de Vries’s now famous and inimitable style of analysis, which draws from myths, creates fairy tales, and uses irony and metaphor to bring his conclusions into greater relief and trigger new insights. As Kets de Vries explains, effective leaders have the capacity to bring people together and even make them better, stronger. Doing so suggests that those leaders are value driven, able to set a moral tone. Yet, when such a tone is absent or, at worst, twisted toward the destructive, leadership quickly becomes dangerous. History has shown the devastation left in the wake of unhinged leaders who have gone unchecked. To become fully conscious of the conditions that allow for the emergence of such leaders has become a moral requirement of our time. In ways both moving and entertaining, Kets de Vries’s new contribution puts us in a better position to fulfil that requirement.
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030793451
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 156
Book Description
The recent proliferation of populist movements worldwide — along with the often dangerous, demagogic leaders that accompany them — have prompted questions about the underlying conditions that give rise to such troubling developments. Leadership Unhinged: Essays on the Ugly, the Bad and the Weird examines what is going on at a deeper level, both collectively and individually, between leaders and followers. Employing theories derived from psychoanalytic psychology, developmental psychology, neuroscience and evolutionary psychology, these essays help to unravel and expose the pathological leader-follower dynamics that generate such movements. The book is infused with Kets de Vries’s now famous and inimitable style of analysis, which draws from myths, creates fairy tales, and uses irony and metaphor to bring his conclusions into greater relief and trigger new insights. As Kets de Vries explains, effective leaders have the capacity to bring people together and even make them better, stronger. Doing so suggests that those leaders are value driven, able to set a moral tone. Yet, when such a tone is absent or, at worst, twisted toward the destructive, leadership quickly becomes dangerous. History has shown the devastation left in the wake of unhinged leaders who have gone unchecked. To become fully conscious of the conditions that allow for the emergence of such leaders has become a moral requirement of our time. In ways both moving and entertaining, Kets de Vries’s new contribution puts us in a better position to fulfil that requirement.
Tricky Coaching
Author: K. Korotov
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 0230362966
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 258
Book Description
Bringing together cases written by experienced leadership and executive coaches from all over the world, this project explores the most demanding and challenging situations they have faced in their professional practices. By analysing and reflecting on the real life case studies the authors show how to deal with these situations in daily life.
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 0230362966
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 258
Book Description
Bringing together cases written by experienced leadership and executive coaches from all over the world, this project explores the most demanding and challenging situations they have faced in their professional practices. By analysing and reflecting on the real life case studies the authors show how to deal with these situations in daily life.
A Life Well Lived
Author: Manfred F. R. Kets de Vries
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1003802354
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 146
Book Description
Manfred Kets de Vries wears many “hats”—psychoanalyst, executive coach, consultant, management educator, researcher, writer—but he has noticed that whichever hat he is wearing, every question he is asked boils down to one thing: “How can I live a well-lived life?” Over many years of practice in all these disciplines, Professor Kets de Vries has realized the unsurpassed value of stories in tackling human dilemmas and providing answers to this question. The book is, therefore, one of the most important books he has written for coaches, students, leaders, managers, educators—or anyone seeking a more reflective text to guide them through the multitude of questions that we face in work and in life. He draws on a long literary tradition of the unexpected encounter with a wise “other,” fantastic or magical—think The Little Prince, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, The Once and Future King, the Harry Potter novels—to animate an exploration of the deepest questions and concerns of human beings. He constructs an extended Socratic dialogue between his two “selves”; the first a naïve traveler, lost in the Siberian wilderness, and the second a reflective avatar who comes to his aid. The avatar takes the form of a “kabouter,” a familiar figure in Dutch folklore whose counterpart can be found in different cultures around the world and throughout centuries of storytelling. Through stories, riddles, and puzzles, the kabouter challenges the traveler to question and reflect upon his life and values, guiding him—and readers—toward the insights that will help them achieve a life well lived.
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1003802354
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 146
Book Description
Manfred Kets de Vries wears many “hats”—psychoanalyst, executive coach, consultant, management educator, researcher, writer—but he has noticed that whichever hat he is wearing, every question he is asked boils down to one thing: “How can I live a well-lived life?” Over many years of practice in all these disciplines, Professor Kets de Vries has realized the unsurpassed value of stories in tackling human dilemmas and providing answers to this question. The book is, therefore, one of the most important books he has written for coaches, students, leaders, managers, educators—or anyone seeking a more reflective text to guide them through the multitude of questions that we face in work and in life. He draws on a long literary tradition of the unexpected encounter with a wise “other,” fantastic or magical—think The Little Prince, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, The Once and Future King, the Harry Potter novels—to animate an exploration of the deepest questions and concerns of human beings. He constructs an extended Socratic dialogue between his two “selves”; the first a naïve traveler, lost in the Siberian wilderness, and the second a reflective avatar who comes to his aid. The avatar takes the form of a “kabouter,” a familiar figure in Dutch folklore whose counterpart can be found in different cultures around the world and throughout centuries of storytelling. Through stories, riddles, and puzzles, the kabouter challenges the traveler to question and reflect upon his life and values, guiding him—and readers—toward the insights that will help them achieve a life well lived.
The Hedgehog Effect
Author: Manfred F. R. Kets de Vries
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1119973368
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 325
Book Description
In The Hedgehog Effect, Manfred Kets de Vries presents the case for leadership group coaching as an experiential training ground for learning to function as a high performance team. His group coaching model, incorporating living case studies, has been developed over more than 20 years of delivering programs to top-level executives and sets the standard in the field of leadership group coaching. Written for coaches, consultants, leadership development directors, and anyone working in or with teams, The Hedgehog Effect begins with an in-depth analysis of what teams and groups are all about. The intricacies of leadership coaching are illustrated with an elaborate example of a team coaching intervention. In Part Two, the author applies a psychodynamic lens to the dynamics of teams and groups, taking a close look at relationship patterns, how groups evolve, and the phenomenon of the group-as-a-whole. Part Three takes a more systemic perspective, addressing the challenges that change processes pose for people in organizations, and how to create best places to work. Kets de Vries supports the whole with the story of an organizational change initiative accomplished through group coaching.
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1119973368
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 325
Book Description
In The Hedgehog Effect, Manfred Kets de Vries presents the case for leadership group coaching as an experiential training ground for learning to function as a high performance team. His group coaching model, incorporating living case studies, has been developed over more than 20 years of delivering programs to top-level executives and sets the standard in the field of leadership group coaching. Written for coaches, consultants, leadership development directors, and anyone working in or with teams, The Hedgehog Effect begins with an in-depth analysis of what teams and groups are all about. The intricacies of leadership coaching are illustrated with an elaborate example of a team coaching intervention. In Part Two, the author applies a psychodynamic lens to the dynamics of teams and groups, taking a close look at relationship patterns, how groups evolve, and the phenomenon of the group-as-a-whole. Part Three takes a more systemic perspective, addressing the challenges that change processes pose for people in organizations, and how to create best places to work. Kets de Vries supports the whole with the story of an organizational change initiative accomplished through group coaching.
Coaching and Supervising Through Bereavement
Author: Julia Menaul
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000645452
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 170
Book Description
This book presents a pragmatic guide for coaches and supervisors working with grief and bereavement, providing both useful case studies and practical techniques to aid professionals in embracing the complexity of working with these topics in a coaching context. Coaching and Supervising Through Bereavement clearly delineates the boundary between bereavement issues requiring specialist counselling and 'normal' bereavement topics within coaching. It addresses how to coach clients through all different forms of bereavement, not just through death but also other losses such as job loss and relationship loss, and enables coaches to shine a light on their own bereavement journeys for the benefits of themselves and their clients. The authors also offer a guide for coaching supervisors to aid the ethical and emotional support required for their own supervisees and themselves. This book debunks the myth that bereavement should not be discussed in coaching, and so will be a valuable resource for any practicing coach or supervisor of all levels of experience or expertise.
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000645452
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 170
Book Description
This book presents a pragmatic guide for coaches and supervisors working with grief and bereavement, providing both useful case studies and practical techniques to aid professionals in embracing the complexity of working with these topics in a coaching context. Coaching and Supervising Through Bereavement clearly delineates the boundary between bereavement issues requiring specialist counselling and 'normal' bereavement topics within coaching. It addresses how to coach clients through all different forms of bereavement, not just through death but also other losses such as job loss and relationship loss, and enables coaches to shine a light on their own bereavement journeys for the benefits of themselves and their clients. The authors also offer a guide for coaching supervisors to aid the ethical and emotional support required for their own supervisees and themselves. This book debunks the myth that bereavement should not be discussed in coaching, and so will be a valuable resource for any practicing coach or supervisor of all levels of experience or expertise.
Mindfulness-Based Strategic Awareness Training
Author: Juan Humberto Young
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 111893797X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 416
Book Description
Mindfulness-Based Strategic Awareness Training: A Complete Program for Leaders and Individuals is the first book to link mindfulness training and positive psychology to the leadership, strategy and management issues faced by individuals and organizations. Sets out a complete program in Mindfulness-based Strategic Awareness Training (MBSAT), a new form of strengths-based business mindfulness training which enhances participants’ ability to perceive opportunities, adapt and grow Draws on research from neuroscience, positive psychology, behavioural finance and management to show how leaders, managers and individuals can build and maintain more resonant relationships and adapt to constant change Includes real-life vignettes, specific instructions and a wealth of resources designed to guide experiential learning including background information, exercises, guidelines, hand-outs, graphics, and guided audio meditations Mindfulness training is increasingly used in organizational contexts – the author is a pioneer in designing and delivering training that applies mindfulness and positive psychology to the strategic challenges of management and business Reviews by Experts This book is important for all who seek to lead organizations, showing how mindfulness can be combined with the findings from positive psychology for the benefit of all. The book is not just good theory. It also provides a step-by-step practical program to cultivate a balance between motivation for outcomes on the one hand, and compassion toward self and others on the other. Here are skills that can be learned; skills that can truly inspire and sustain wise leadership. —Mark Williams, Emeritus Professor of Clinical Psychology, University of Oxford, was also the Founding Director of the Oxford Mindfulness Centre. Now Senior Research Fellow at the Department of Psychiatry of Oxford University. Author of "Mindfulness: An Eight week Plan for Finding Peace in a Frantic World", Co-author with Zindel V. Segal and John Teasdale of "Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy for Depression". In today's disruptive times, it is happy and loyal customers that count. This rich and practical book provides an exceptionally smart learning tool to help consumers make mindful decisions that lead to happiness. And for any leader and manager it is a key reading for making wise business and marketing decisions that create value.—Bernd Schmitt, Ph.D., Professor, Columbia Business School, New York. Author of "Experiential Marketing: How to Get Consumers to Sense, Fell, Think and Act, Relate to your Company and Brands" and "Happy Customers Everywhere: How Your Business Can Profit from the Insights of Positive Psychology." Juan Humberto Young is the first to integrate positive psychology and mindfulness with a results-oriented focus on business strategy. In today's ever-changing organizations, leaders need clarity and flexibility to adapt and succeed. Built on leading-edge science, this book offers a step-by-step program that will light your path not only to greater strategic awareness but also to greater well-being.—Barbara L. Fredrickson, Ph.D., Kenan, Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Author of the two bestsellers "Positivity: Top-Notch Research Reveals the Upward Spiral That Will Change Your Life" and "Love 2.0: Finding Happiness and Health in Moments of Connection". Juan Humberto Young integrates mindfulness practices, positive psychology, and extensive business experience to design a practical training program that improves personal and professional decision-making. This book offers tools to make decisions that increase subjective well-being because the sources of much unhappiness are poor decisions. For business leaders, lawyers, negotiators, and everyone who wants to improve their quality of life, this book presents a path to achieve the capacity of strategic awareness, consisting of mental lucidity, emotional clarity, and bodily awareness, which results in skillful decision-making. This book provides readers an ideal way to find happiness, personal balance, and professional success.—Peter H. Huang, J.D. Ph.D., Professor and DeMuth Chair of Business Law, University of Colorado Law School. Author of numerous articles integrating Positive Psychology, Mindfulness and Law.
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 111893797X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 416
Book Description
Mindfulness-Based Strategic Awareness Training: A Complete Program for Leaders and Individuals is the first book to link mindfulness training and positive psychology to the leadership, strategy and management issues faced by individuals and organizations. Sets out a complete program in Mindfulness-based Strategic Awareness Training (MBSAT), a new form of strengths-based business mindfulness training which enhances participants’ ability to perceive opportunities, adapt and grow Draws on research from neuroscience, positive psychology, behavioural finance and management to show how leaders, managers and individuals can build and maintain more resonant relationships and adapt to constant change Includes real-life vignettes, specific instructions and a wealth of resources designed to guide experiential learning including background information, exercises, guidelines, hand-outs, graphics, and guided audio meditations Mindfulness training is increasingly used in organizational contexts – the author is a pioneer in designing and delivering training that applies mindfulness and positive psychology to the strategic challenges of management and business Reviews by Experts This book is important for all who seek to lead organizations, showing how mindfulness can be combined with the findings from positive psychology for the benefit of all. The book is not just good theory. It also provides a step-by-step practical program to cultivate a balance between motivation for outcomes on the one hand, and compassion toward self and others on the other. Here are skills that can be learned; skills that can truly inspire and sustain wise leadership. —Mark Williams, Emeritus Professor of Clinical Psychology, University of Oxford, was also the Founding Director of the Oxford Mindfulness Centre. Now Senior Research Fellow at the Department of Psychiatry of Oxford University. Author of "Mindfulness: An Eight week Plan for Finding Peace in a Frantic World", Co-author with Zindel V. Segal and John Teasdale of "Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy for Depression". In today's disruptive times, it is happy and loyal customers that count. This rich and practical book provides an exceptionally smart learning tool to help consumers make mindful decisions that lead to happiness. And for any leader and manager it is a key reading for making wise business and marketing decisions that create value.—Bernd Schmitt, Ph.D., Professor, Columbia Business School, New York. Author of "Experiential Marketing: How to Get Consumers to Sense, Fell, Think and Act, Relate to your Company and Brands" and "Happy Customers Everywhere: How Your Business Can Profit from the Insights of Positive Psychology." Juan Humberto Young is the first to integrate positive psychology and mindfulness with a results-oriented focus on business strategy. In today's ever-changing organizations, leaders need clarity and flexibility to adapt and succeed. Built on leading-edge science, this book offers a step-by-step program that will light your path not only to greater strategic awareness but also to greater well-being.—Barbara L. Fredrickson, Ph.D., Kenan, Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Author of the two bestsellers "Positivity: Top-Notch Research Reveals the Upward Spiral That Will Change Your Life" and "Love 2.0: Finding Happiness and Health in Moments of Connection". Juan Humberto Young integrates mindfulness practices, positive psychology, and extensive business experience to design a practical training program that improves personal and professional decision-making. This book offers tools to make decisions that increase subjective well-being because the sources of much unhappiness are poor decisions. For business leaders, lawyers, negotiators, and everyone who wants to improve their quality of life, this book presents a path to achieve the capacity of strategic awareness, consisting of mental lucidity, emotional clarity, and bodily awareness, which results in skillful decision-making. This book provides readers an ideal way to find happiness, personal balance, and professional success.—Peter H. Huang, J.D. Ph.D., Professor and DeMuth Chair of Business Law, University of Colorado Law School. Author of numerous articles integrating Positive Psychology, Mindfulness and Law.
Tantric Impact
Author: Toine Knipping
Publisher: Balboa Press
ISBN: 1504398912
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 332
Book Description
What good is financial success if it doesnt lead to fulfillment, satsifaction, and happiness? Toine Knipping, the co-founder and CEO of Amicorp, an independent global provider of company secretarial and fiduciary services, tackles that question head-on in this book. Drawing on wisdom from Tantric masters, who said that the fabric of life can provide true and everlasting fulfillment only when all the threads are woven according to the pattern designated by nature, he reveals how to: Control your wealth and use it well. Encourage and empower employees to give back. Embrace high ethical standards and community involvement. Knipping also describes charitable projects, impact investments, and social enterprises drawn from his personal experience to provide context and show the elements involved in any one investment. From setting up an outsourcing business in India, to starting a social enterprise in South Africa to protect endangered species, to establishing a daycare center in Curacao, youll be inspired to give back with the lessons in Tantric Impact.
Publisher: Balboa Press
ISBN: 1504398912
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 332
Book Description
What good is financial success if it doesnt lead to fulfillment, satsifaction, and happiness? Toine Knipping, the co-founder and CEO of Amicorp, an independent global provider of company secretarial and fiduciary services, tackles that question head-on in this book. Drawing on wisdom from Tantric masters, who said that the fabric of life can provide true and everlasting fulfillment only when all the threads are woven according to the pattern designated by nature, he reveals how to: Control your wealth and use it well. Encourage and empower employees to give back. Embrace high ethical standards and community involvement. Knipping also describes charitable projects, impact investments, and social enterprises drawn from his personal experience to provide context and show the elements involved in any one investment. From setting up an outsourcing business in India, to starting a social enterprise in South Africa to protect endangered species, to establishing a daycare center in Curacao, youll be inspired to give back with the lessons in Tantric Impact.
Reflections on Leadership and Career Development
Author: Manfred F. R. Kets de Vries
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1119965926
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 284
Book Description
Views from the interface of psychoanalysis and organizational life In the books in this series Manfred Kets de Vries failed engineer, entrepreneur manqué, reluctant economist, international management guru, psychoanalyst, wit, and outdoorsman offers an overview of his work spanning four decades, a period in which he has established himself as the leading figure in the clinical study of organizational leadership. At a key point in his career, working as he puts it, "in the twilight zone of economics, management, and psychoanalysis," he decided to strike out on a little-trodden path and "bring the person back into the organization." Now Kets de Vries occupies a unique position in the academic business world, putting leaders and companies of the couch and working at the often intimate interface where the inner theater of the individual meets the outer world of the organization. The second book in this series, Reflections on Leadership and Career Development, takes different perspectives on the intimate connection between the personality or "inner theater" of individuals and the organizational context in which they work how different personality types, in positions of leadership or as members of management teams, affect the functioning and success of organizations. Kets de Vries looks at the way basic psychological processes operate on individual and corporate performance and analyzes them in the context of case studies of leaders and organizations. He examines narcissism, dysfunctional collusion between leaders and followers, some new leadership archetypes, and the roles that "organizational therapists" (coaches or consultants) can play in their interventions. The book includes a lengthy study of Vladimir Putin, as "CEO of Russia, Inc.," an assessment of the former Russian president's performance as an organizational leader. The final part of the book examines the career life cycle and how executives cope (or fail to cope) with rites de passage like succession and retirement. "For the first time this book provides a glimpse of Manfred Kets de Vries' own 'inner theater' as the wellspring of his success as psychoanalyst, mentor and inspiration to a generation of leaders. Reflections on Leadership and Career Development offers a rare opportunity to observe Manfred on his own legendary couch, a personal perspective not to be missed." Paul McMorran, HR Director, TNK-BP
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1119965926
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 284
Book Description
Views from the interface of psychoanalysis and organizational life In the books in this series Manfred Kets de Vries failed engineer, entrepreneur manqué, reluctant economist, international management guru, psychoanalyst, wit, and outdoorsman offers an overview of his work spanning four decades, a period in which he has established himself as the leading figure in the clinical study of organizational leadership. At a key point in his career, working as he puts it, "in the twilight zone of economics, management, and psychoanalysis," he decided to strike out on a little-trodden path and "bring the person back into the organization." Now Kets de Vries occupies a unique position in the academic business world, putting leaders and companies of the couch and working at the often intimate interface where the inner theater of the individual meets the outer world of the organization. The second book in this series, Reflections on Leadership and Career Development, takes different perspectives on the intimate connection between the personality or "inner theater" of individuals and the organizational context in which they work how different personality types, in positions of leadership or as members of management teams, affect the functioning and success of organizations. Kets de Vries looks at the way basic psychological processes operate on individual and corporate performance and analyzes them in the context of case studies of leaders and organizations. He examines narcissism, dysfunctional collusion between leaders and followers, some new leadership archetypes, and the roles that "organizational therapists" (coaches or consultants) can play in their interventions. The book includes a lengthy study of Vladimir Putin, as "CEO of Russia, Inc.," an assessment of the former Russian president's performance as an organizational leader. The final part of the book examines the career life cycle and how executives cope (or fail to cope) with rites de passage like succession and retirement. "For the first time this book provides a glimpse of Manfred Kets de Vries' own 'inner theater' as the wellspring of his success as psychoanalyst, mentor and inspiration to a generation of leaders. Reflections on Leadership and Career Development offers a rare opportunity to observe Manfred on his own legendary couch, a personal perspective not to be missed." Paul McMorran, HR Director, TNK-BP