That's Not How We Do It Here!

The bestselling authors of Our Iceberg is Melting (more than one million sold) are back with their second business fable, this time on the eternal tensions of management vs leadership, planning vs spontaneity, big vs small.§§This short, full-color fable tackles the most fundamental questions in business: why do organizations rise and fall, and how can they rise again in the face of adversity? It distills decades of research by bestselling Harvard Business School professor and leadership consultant John Kotter.§§Once upon a time there was a clan of meerkats living in the Kalahari, a warm and dry stretch of land in the southern part of the African continent. After years of easy growth for their clan, a drought sharply reduces their resources and enables dangerous new predators. The harmony of the clan is damaged as the meerkats quarrel about possible solutions, and even whether a solution is required at all.§§One young, bright, and adventurous worker, Nadia, sets out to find other clans, to see if other meerkats have fresh ideas that could help her struggling clan. She discovers a much smaller group that does things very differently, with much more flexibility and team spirit. But not everything in the new group is as perfect as it seems at first. And they are just as likely to fall victim to some of the most dangerous words in any organization: "That's not how we do it here."§§This simple yet rich story will connect with a broad range of people who need to combine flexibility and systems in a challenging climate.