Shows how individuals and corporations are using a model in which women, men and nature are linked, not ranked, to improve their relationships, communities, productivity and working environments. Executives, scientists, entrepreneurs, writers and others give voice to the ways they have successfully applied the principles of balance and partnership in their professional and personal lives. Debbie Coleman of Apple Computers, Ashley Montague and astronaut Edgar Mitchell are among those who offer practical examples for improving the future.
Alfonso Montuori is Professor at California Institute of Integral Studies. A graduate of the University of London, he is the author of several books and numerous articles on creativity and improvisation, complexity, and education. Alfonso also consults with organizations and individuals on creativity and professional and personal development.
Born of an Italian father and Dutch mother, Alfonso was born in Holland, and grew up living in Lebanon, Greece, and England before coming to the United States in 1983. In London Alfonso worked as an interpreter for Scotland Yard (The London Metropolitan Police) and then as a professional musician on saxophone and flute, making numerous recordings with his own band and as a session-man, and gigging extensively throughout England for several years. Today, Alfonso continues his passion for music through his collaboration with his wife, the jazz singer Kitty Margolis, as producer of her award-winning recordings. He is a voting member of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (The Grammys).
Alfonso has taught at the College of Notre Dame, the Saybrook Institute, and South-Central University in Changsha, Hunan Province, in the People's Republic of China, where he developed and taught the first course in management and organization theory.
In 2003-2004 he was Wiepking Distinguished Professor in the Fine Arts department at Miami University.
He is the author of numerous books and articles on leadership, creativity and innovation, including Evolutionary Competence (1989), From Power to Partnership (with Isabella Conti, 1993) Creators on Creating (co-edited with Barron & Barron, Putnam, 1997) and Social Creativity, vols. 1-2 (co-edited with Ronald E. Purser, Hampton Press, 1999). Alfonso has contributed chapters to the International Encyclopedia of Organization Studies, the Encyclopedia of Creativity, and Encyclopedia of the Sciences of Learning, and he has written articles in publications such as Academy of Management Review, Futures. The Journal of Policy, Planning, and Future Studies, Human Relations, Journal of Management Education, and Journal of Humanistic Psychology and is a member of numerous editorial boards of management and education journals. In 2006 Alfonso became a San Francisco Library Laureate.
Alfonso has consulted on executive and management development and creativity and innovation with numerous international corporations, including Procter & Gamble, Network Appliance, Training Vision (Singapore), Pacific Bell, Stentor Group (Canada), Kaiser Permanente, Interstate Insurance, Omnitel-Olivetti (Italy), ENEL (Italy), U.S. Department of Labor, University of Missouri Kansas City, Nestle Beverage, Pilkington Barnes Hinde, 3Com, Progressive Insurance, and others.
Alfonso is the founding editor of Advances in Systems Theory, Complexity, and the Human Sciences at Hampton Press, which has published important works by Gregory Bateson, Gianluca Bocchi & Mauro Ceruti, Edgar Morin, Ervin Laszlo, and other leading thinkers; he is Associate Editor of World Futures: The Journal of General Evolution; and is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Transformative Education; Pluriverso (Italy); Narrare il Gruppo; Integral Review; Integral Leadership Review; Complessità; and Elites. Alfonso is also a member of the General Evolution Research Group, and on the scientific board of the Edgar Morin Center for Complexity at Ricardo Palma University in Lima, Peru.
