Covert Processes at Work


Book Description

The first and only guide to diagnosing and dealing with the hidden or covert factors that can ruin even the most meticulously planned change processes. Organizational change initiatives often fail because they focus exclusively on the rational, overt aspects of change, overlooking the powerful role played by concealed or irrational factors. It’s well known that these covert processes—such as hidden agendas, blind spots, office politics, tacit assumptions, secret hopes, wishes and fears—frequently sabotage change efforts, but up until now nobody has offered a rigorous, consistent way of identifying and dealing with them. Drawing on over thirty years of experience as an organizational change consultant to global corporations and government agencies, Robert J. Marshak shows precisely how to bring these hidden processes to light and deal with their negative impact. Marshak identifies five different dimensions of covert processes, presents an integrated model to explain the ultimate source of all of them, and shows how to diagnose whether any covert processes might be at work in your organization. He then offers specific tools and techniques for engaging and managing these “under-the-table” processes and for creating the kind of organizational environment in which such hidden dynamics are unable to flourish. Covert Processes at Work is a comprehensive and practical guide that managers, leaders, and consultants can use to deal with the hidden dynamics that are often at the root of many organizational problems. “Adding these tools…will take both your practice and your clients to a whole new level of capability and impact.” —Karen Boylston, PhD, Managing Director, Duke Corporate Education




Our Hopes, Our Future


Book Description

How can we overcome crises and shape our common future? Since the beginning of the Corona pandemic, we have all been put to an immense test. This shows how humanity can successfully and constructively deal with such situations and make the best of them. And we learn that the future is not something that happens to us, but that we can actively and constructively shape it. The basic prerequisite for this is an attitude of openness, mutual helpfulness and hope. This non-fiction book vividly reports on the currently prevailing images of the future and the common longings as well as on people's capacity for hope and action. It reveals the power of desirable images of the future and of a collective hope as the opposite of general helplessness or of blind and naïve optimism. The central statements of this book are based on the experiences of thousands of people in more than ten countries who participated in the scientific study of the Hope Barometer in 2019 and 2020. In a unique way, this combines lived practice with the latest findings of social science futurology, positive psychology and pragmatic philosophy. Target groups: This book is for anyone who wants to look to the future with hope. It offers concrete answers to key questions and shows how crises can be overcome while shaping a better future for individuals and society as a whole. About the author: Dr. Andreas M. Krafft teaches at the University of St. Gallen and at the Free University of Berlin. As co-president of swissfuture, the Swiss Association for Futures Research, and as a board member of the Swiss Society for Positive Psychology, he leads the international research network of the Hope Barometer.




Talking to the Sky


Book Description




A Personal Tao


Book Description

Science is factReligion is faithMagic is perceptionKnow these boundaries to discover what lies beyond.What is the Tao? Don't ask. The Tao cannot be described, yet a person will express it simply by being alive. It is possible to list definitions from the dictionary, from various documents. Each definition: a set of words, echoes of reality. A common mistake is to think of the Tao as a state of mind, hence it can be touched through words. Tao is a state of existence and nonexistence, it's mental, spiritual, and physical states all blending together. Living to Tao will never be summarized in the mathematics of word play. Poetry, philosophy, literature all offer only helpful guidance but never the actual Tao. A simple analogy would be swimming under the water. It's possible to read about snorkeling or diving, but until diving under the water, feeling the pressure, experience seeing undersea life, having lungs squeeze outside-in yet feeling inside-out from pushing down as deeply as you can dive, only to resurface to feel a sudden gasp of wet air... all in 60 seconds of a run on sentence: it's an idea approximated by a reader but only grasped by the experiencer. When this last line was read by a friend of mine, she said: but when you snorkel the pressure doesnt feel like that. Surprised, I asked her if she ever dove to about 25 feet while snorkeling, she said no, at which moment we both realized how personal the experience becomes due to differences in the path taken. This example touches why discovering the Tao is a personal living experience.Why learn the Tao? Knowing of the Tao technically should not change anything. But it does, it's the same difference as: knowing yourself really shouldn't change who you are. Yet it does. It's the difference between, being yourself or the reflection in the mirror. When the answer is we are both, more and less..... The Tao is every contradiction, every truth and each of the standard circular Yoda Yoga mystical answer...leaving us with holding flowing water in a single hand. Try to grasp it, and its gone, yet our hands are wet. So accept the fact, we are each a contradiction, this is the truth being described when these mystical answers are bantered about: using one impossible statement to prove another impossible statement. The key for writing and reading this document comes down to a single reason: Words are never about the Tao, words are always about us. Sometimes to understand ourselves, we need to write aloud a personal truth as its human nature and hence the Tao to do so. The point becomes this: the Tao, itself isn't a path -- the path is living. Being human, living includes the experience of expression and introspection through words and speaking out. This is about discovering personal truth and how to flow with oneself. Yet learning is always a process of sharing. Reflections in this document become one possible outline out of many to help myself be... myself, while giving others a chance to comment and add their own personal style to the overall document. This then becomes a circular process between, author, reader and everyone involved to help define and discover a personal Tao.So....Move, tumble, stumble, spin poetry, swirl, dance: all this is about the Tao and us.




The Spirit-Led Leader


Book Description

In our postmodern, experience-oriented culture, people are longing for greater authenticity, integrity, and depth in their pastors and leaders. Board directors, church members, and staff alike are all eagerly seeking leaders who effectively integrate their spirituality and leadership. Pastors and executives, however, often struggle with knowing how to integrate their spiritual values and practices into their leadership and management roles. Designed for pastors, executives, administrators, managers, coordinators, and all who see themselves as leaders and who want to fulfill their God-given purpose, The Spirit-Led Leader addresses the critical fusion of spiritual life and leadership for those who not only want to see results, but who also desire to care just as deeply about who they are and how they lead as they do about what they produce and accomplish. Geoffrion creates a new vision for spiritual leadership as partly an art, partly a result of careful planning, and always a working of the grace of God




The First Six Weeks of School


Book Description

This second edition of a teacher favorite features a fresh, easy-to-use layout including color coding by grade level, more support for student engagement in academics, greater emphasis on the effective use of teacher language, and a dedicated chapter on the all-important first day of school.




Our Struggle, Our Hope, Our Victory


Book Description

Our Struggle, Our Hope, Our Victory invites you to 90-days to reflect, remember, and realize. Reflect on God’s wisdom available in the midst of any adversity, remember the victories He has already provided, and realize the hope-filled future He can give you as you rely on Him. Enjoy a variety of meditations to encourage you to grow stronger in your relationship with God and share His message of love with others.




Franklin Goes to School


Book Description

In this Franklin Classic Storybook, Franklin faces the excitement and fear of starting school.







God Has a Dream


Book Description

Nobel Laureate Desmond Tutu has long been admired throughout the world for the heroism and grace he exhibited while encouraging countless South Africans in their struggle for human rights. In God Has a Dream, his most soul-searching book, he shares the spiritual message that guided him through those troubled times. Drawing on personal and historical examples, Archbishop Tutu reaches out to readers of all religious backgrounds, showing how individual and global suffering can be transformed into joy and redemption. With his characteristic humor, Tutu offers an extremely personal and liberating message. He helps us to “see with the eyes of the heart” and to cultivate the qualities of love, forgiveness, humility, generosity, and courage that we need to change ourselves and our world. Echoing the words of Martin Luther King, Jr., he writes, “God says to you, ‘I have a dream. Please help me to realize it. It is a dream of a world whose ugliness and squalor and poverty, its war and hostility, its greed and harsh competitiveness, its alienation and disharmony are changed into their glorious counterparts. When there will be more laughter, joy, and peace, where there will be justice and goodness and compassion and love and caring and sharing. I have a dream that my children will know that they are members of one family, the human family, God’s family, my family.’” Addressing the timeless and universal concerns all people share, God Has a Dream envisions a world transformed through hope and compassion, humility and kindness, understanding and forgiveness.