The Search for Unrational Leadership: Using Rational and Irrational Methods to Change Your Life [Paperback]

Charles Fleetham (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 2005

The book opens with a treasure map, an invitation to leave your comfort zone and learn intuitive leadership techniques. This journey takes you from today's antiquated leadership thinking to the unexplored regions of the unconscious to discover how to lead from your right brain. It's an inspirational and creative trip through fairy tales, plays, and case studies that explore how the holistic leadership can solve today's complex problems. For 500 years we've approached challenges by thinking and acting rationally, but the leader of the future needs an intuitive approach. Take this journey and find the treasure.

Product Details

• Paperback: 364 pages
• Publisher: Right Brain Books, LLC (April 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 097638681X
• ISBN-13: 978-0976386810
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,061,665 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A different, better, wholistic perspective, October 17, 2005

By 

Judy A. Muhn (Wixom, Michigan) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Search for Unrational Leadership: Using Rational and Irrational Methods to Change Your Life (Hardcover)

A familiar theme in alcohol/drug abuse therapy (my former career field)is "Your best thinking brought you here"...referring to the error in thought that made anyone feel that they could continue to use their mistaken, thoughtful arrogance in solving a current problem. Organizations, systems, and a variety of government institutions continue to analyze data, create strategic and operational plans, and develop/deliver programs following the logic, the rational approaches of "old school" management. In studying the "Positive Organizational Scholarship" studies of the University of Michigan's School of Business, and now Charlie Fleetham's "Search for Unrational Leadership", I've found many tools to support the development of my managerial and leadership skills. While friends have commented that reading the fairy tale within this book seems childish and pointless, I would counter with the way the story opens up a part of the brain that we neglect - the unconscious, and how it responds to symbols and images. OK, so maybe a management team isn't going to have a "dream circle" in the board room, but it certainly makes sense to discuss dreams in the context of planning, problem-solving, and creation of new programs or initiatives. If our best thinking brought us here - to high gas prices, global famines, multi-national disease possibilities, inadequate government and non-profit support systems to help victims of crisis, wars - we are obligated to find a new way. And Charlie's "new" way may not be so new after all - Native cultures across the world have incorporated many of the techniques that Charlie is reminding us of. Why wouldn't we want to incorporate our entire brain into our decision-making, planning and organizational management issues? Makes sense to me!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A New Path Forward, August 1, 2005

By 

Dean Robb (Plainfield, NJ USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Search for Unrational Leadership: Using Rational and Irrational Methods to Change Your Life (Hardcover)

I am a consultant who works with senior executives to help them build enterprises capable of remaining innovative, alive and vital over a very long period of time - rather than devolving into stagnant, bureaucratic institutions. The underpinnings of my consulting practice are derived, in part, from Jungian principles - although they are not necessarily explicitly labeled as such with all clients. The ultimate theoretical basis for my work is a collective of individuating Selves, or a Conscious Community. At any rate, I recently came across a book written by a consultant - Charles Fleetham - whose practice complements mine.

In his book The Search for UnRational Leadership: Using Rational & Irrational Methods to Change Your Life, Charles Fleetham has created a path for practitioners to apply Jungian principles to leadership development and organizational change at a much-needed time in our cultural life. The author throws a harsh (and honest) spotlight on the deep cultural and business problems created by our current culture's over-reliance on cognitive rationality, and offers a much-needed antidote via the royal road to the wisdom of the unconscious. The author has created a practical road map for leaders to use Jung's principles in day-to-day organizational decision-making, as well as in times of collective crisis and future visioning. Fleetham has developed a wide variety of tools derived from Jung's principles, including dream work, ancestor visualization, couplings, mandalas, the hero's journey and the I Ching. He has also presented a wide variety of actual case studies, at both the individual and collective levels, where managers and leaders have overcome their initial resistance to using such "strange" tools, and in so doing have created extraordinary and powerful changes in their workplaces and private lives.

Interspersed throughout the book is a newly-created fairy tale, which is (most of the time) fun. Its noble purpose is to engage the reader's unconscious and stimulate a deeper, experiential understanding of the book's concepts. Sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn't.

Overall, this book is excellent. It is a pioneering book in that it pushes the boundary of Jungian thinking and practice into organizational life, which heretofore has been regarded in many Jungian circles at least with deep suspicion, and very often as simply heretical to everything Jung stood for. My recommendation? Individuate: Buy it and decide for yourself.

Dean Robb, Ph.D.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Thought Provoking, June 6, 2005

By 

Laura Gibboney - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Search for Unrational Leadership: Using Rational and Irrational Methods to Change Your Life (Hardcover)

An Outstanding Book! Allows the reader to look at and rely on their "darker" (or irrational) side in the decision making process. It teaches you how to confront and partner with your unconscious. Learn how to listen to "the voice that defies reason" and learn the five signs that your unconscious is confronting you. The reader learns how to look into dreams for signs or answers from the unconscious. This book walks you through the stages of life and shows you how to apply leadership to each one. I especially found the chapter on morals and ethics insightful. Charlie Fleetham uses real life situations to support his theory and surprises the reader with a riveting fairy tale! This book not only applies to your professional life, but your personal life as well. I recommend this book to anyone who is willing to look beyond conventional methods to improve leadership skills.