The Unbounded Mind: Breaking the Chains of Traditional Business ThinkingGlobal markets, Japanese competition, the service economy, the sophisticated consumer--American business today faces challenges undreamed of just a few decades ago, and traditional approaches to corporate problems are becoming increasingly less effective. And yet, as the authors of The Unbounded Mind point out, MBA programs still preach--and thousands of American firms hold sacred--an antiquated system of business thinking that is wholly inadequate to the problems they face. In this groundbreaking work, two pioneering thinkers in business studies, Ian I. Mitroff and Harold A. Linstone, pinpoint the profound changes that must occur in the way business executives think, make decisions, and solve problems, if America is to remain competitive. They put forth a radically new approach--"new thinking"--and show executives exactly how to employ these special critical and creative tools to clear the hurdles businesses now face. Logic and rationality, they explain, are useful but limited. And traditional simplification often inhibits the ability to ask the right questions and recognize the true problem. But varying perspectives, multiple realities, and openness to multiple solutions are the secrets of contemporary problem-solving, and lead us to the cutting edge of innovation. Clearly and compellingly, Mitroff and Linstone weave together insights gleaned from philosophy, psychology, management science, economics, and decision science, and quote thinkers from Descartes to Robert Bly, from Alvin Toffler to Chief Seattle. In illustrating how "new thinking" differs from the usual ways in which American firms have handled problems, they analyze a wealth of examples including the decline of the American auto industry and the consequences of this country's blind exporting of technology. They also revisit and interpret some of the most grave crises corporate America has faced: the Bhopal disaster, the Tylenol scare, and the accident at Three Mile Island. Hard-hitting and insightful, The Unbounded Mind is a clarion call for American business. It argues that if we are to produce products and services that can compete in the information age, we must challenge the very foundations of our thinking, and learn how to approach decisionmaking in a truly creative way. |
Contents
The First Way of Knowing | |
The Second Way of Knowing | |
The Third Way of Knowing | |
The Fourth Way of Knowing | |
The Fifth Way of Knowing | |
Catastrophe Making | |
Surfacing and Challenging Key Assumptions | |
To See the World as an Interconnected Whole | |
Deeper Aspects of Unbounded Systems Thinking | |
Common terms and phrases
accident agreement Alvin Toffler Ambrose Bierce American analysis AnalyticDeductive IS’s assumptions basic Bhopal ceteris paribus challenge chapter Chernobyl competition complex problems consensus consider consumer corporate critical culture decision decisionmaker Delphi Delphi Method Descartes develop Dialectic discipline drug company economic empiricism engineering epistemology ethics example executive existence experience extreme factors facts failure fundamental guarantor homeless human Ideals important individual industry inputs instance involved issues Japanese kind knowledge logical machine mathematical Mitroff Multiple Perspective Concept Multiple Realities IS’s normal accidents objective observations one’s operate organization organizational output particular Paths of Change person philosophy physical plant precisely presupposes production question recognized reductionism result scientific scientists sense simple single social society solutions stakeholders Strategic structure things Three Mile Island today’s typical U.S. steel UCIL Unbounded Systems Thinking Union Carbide United West Churchman wine glass York