Fusion Leadership: Unlocking the Subtle Forces That Change People and Organizations

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Summary: Six subtle forces of fusion leadership
Review: "What are specific subtle forces that might be unlocked by fusion? They are drawn from people's basic humaness...The subtle forces are not the body; they are in the mind, heart, and spirit within the body. In our review of the literature on leadership, and through our consulting and classroom experiences," Richard L.Daft and Robert H.Lengel write, "we have observed many subtle expressions of mind, heart, and spirit. For the purposes of our discussion of fusion leadership, we have identified six subtle forces that embrace the essence of human potential and ingenuity. The subtle aspects of intellect are captured in mindfulness and vision. The subtle forces of emotion are revealed through heart and communication. And the subtle forces of spirit are reflected in courage and integrity. These six forces define the underlying potential for leadership and change" (p.20).

In this context, to describe organizational leadership by reference to principles of fusion (joining together) rather than fission (splitting apart, separating), throughout the book, by making extensive use of stories, parables, and metaphors, they discuss six subtle forces of fusion leadership. The ideas about these forces are briefly summarized as below:

1. Mindfulness: See subtle forces, take position as beginner, maintain open mind, be tentative, set aside opinions, ask questions, create labels and categories, challenge assumptions, welcome opposites, see subtle flows and relationships, see whole and part, and encourage multiple approaches.

2. Vision: Create future, facilitate hopes and dreams, pursue higher purpose that touches the heart, inspire people, focus on values and yearnings, consider dreams concrete and reliable, think big and do the impossible, cherish vision as motivating and energizing, and live by hope and personal experience.

3. Heart: Stay emotionally connected with people and work, base choices on finding bliss, look for hidden potentials, seek out people who express emotions, hold that emotions are truth, be collaborative and interdependent, and pay attention to ideas and people with emotional power.

4. Communication: Listen, discern other's needs, focus on big picture, frame of reference and meanings, transmit symbolic images and stories, cultivate face-to-face contract, celbrate completed task, direct message to heart, and ask questions.

5. Courage: Assert nonconformity, follow higher purpose, seek to serve, act as iron, feel fear and admit failure, support failure as way to grow and learn, name demons and speak truth, disagree and say no, act on faith and trust, and accept support from others.

6. Integrity: Inspire trust, share information, power and resources, seek interdependence, meet unstated needs, serve others, affirm, build and mentor others, acknowledge other's great deeds, empower others and faith in others, set high moral standards, and deepen insight into self.

Finally, they write that "Each of these subtle forces can be released to provide powerful motivation for leadership and change. These forces can transform organizations, and fusion is the process through which they are unlocked."

Highly recommended.

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Summary: Fusion Leadership Review
Review: ? Fusion Leadership is a book on how to look at change within an organization by beginning within yourself, and projecting humanistic qualities into those changes. Daft and Lengel believe that there needs to be a new way to view and carry out change in today?s organization. Change needs to be brought about by ?thinking outside the box? and opening yourself and the organization to new ideas and emotions. Initially, employees need to incorporate personal fusion by means of mindfulness, vision, heart, communication, courage, and integrity. Those qualities then need to be mixed with the organizational fusion aspects of microcosm, connection, dissatisfaction, vision, and action. Though these ideas are well presented, there seems to be a lack of application materials. Nothing extraordinary jumps out at you, and there seems to be a lot of regurgitated material. Overall, the book is made more interesting with good stories, analogies, and real-life examples.

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Summary: Fusion Leadership Review
Review: ·Fusion Leadership is a book on how to look at change within an organization by beginning within yourself, and projecting humanistic qualities into those changes. Daft and Lengel believe that there needs to be a new way to view and carry out change in today?s organization. Change needs to be brought about by ?thinking outside the box? and opening yourself and the organization to new ideas and emotions. Initially, employees need to incorporate personal fusion by means of mindfulness, vision, heart, communication, courage, and integrity. Those qualities then need to be mixed with the organizational fusion aspects of microcosm, connection, dissatisfaction, vision, and action. Though these ideas are well presented, there seems to be a lack of application materials. Nothing extraordinary jumps out at you, and there seems to be a lot of regurgitated material. Overall, the book is made more interesting with good stories, analogies, and real-life examples.

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Summary: New ideas from established researchers
Review: Daft and Lengel are established teacher/scholars in the organizational sciences, and that's part of what makes this book so effective. While the ideas may seem to be "New Age," they stem from writers I would not associate with much of the fluff writing on the market. This book is an excellent and credible model of a new and more powerful vision for what leadership is. By beginning with a model for how to make personal change, the authors offer a model that empowers the reader for personal action rather than circumstances beyond her or his immediate control.

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Summary: A Good Read!
Review: Richard L. Daft and Robert H. Lengel present a new model of leadership. They contrast fusion leadership with traditional fission leadership that is based upon dividing the workplace into roles and tasks based on position and function. The book draws on many of the new ideas in management and leadership based on notions of chaos, change, creativity, intuition, personal empowerment, dialogue, future search and other principles. It mixes new science, spirituality and New Age thinking. While some readers may view these ideas as a welcome change from the traditional, rational approach to management, others may find them overly mushy and touchy-feely. However, within the growing genre of soft-leadership style books, it is well-written and well organized. We at getAbstract recommend this book to executives interested in non-traditional leadership approaches.

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Summary: Pluses and Minuses
Review: The purpose of the book is to present an alternative style of management, know as fusion, to help facilitate change not only in an organization but also within one's self.

There are three main points to the book; the first is that fusion starts with each person by combining physical and mental abilities with one's passion, creativity, vision, enthusiasm, morals and values. Secondly, there are six subtle forces that one needs to unlock for the transformation to begin including mindfulness, vision, heart, communication, courage and integrity. Finally, there is organizational fusion; this usually involves an event where barriers between different parts of the organization are reduced. Organizational fusion occurs when people in the organization use subtle forces to share information and break down barriers.

This book did an excellent job of presenting ideas for self improvement because it was thought provoking and it encourages evaluating individual values and beliefs. It also provides good examples of the difference between a leader and manager. Metaphors, stories and parables help bring to life the concepts and ideas in the book and motivate individuals to evolve from a transactional manager to a transformational leader, as well.

The down side to the book is that the authors failed to present any negatives to fusion leadership, or did they discuss how to overcome obstacles that may be encountered when trying to transform an organization into a fusion style of operation. The book made the assumption that everybody in the organization is a type Y personality, and that all people are motivated by the same things. Also, there was no real data to support the idea that a fusion organization is superior to a traditional, objective and rational, organization. The authors also failed to state any personal risk that may be involved if a middle manager attempts to change to a transformational leader in an organization that supports traditional style managers/leaders. This implies that the book was written for top-level leaders in an organization, and the only way for this to be successful is if it is implementation from the top down.