Purpose – This paper seeks to explore the concept of adaptive change. It aims to examine the literature on the subject and draw out some of the key lessons to be considered when seeking to manage change within an evolving world of work and it seeks to shed light on the increasing practice for...

In the new millennium, organisations are going through rapid changes and the role of strategic management is challenged. When the organisation is threatened by environmental changes such as crises or competition as a result of information technology development or increased customer demands, the...

Purpose – In the last five years more and more scholars have drawn on insights from the complexity sciences as a way of understanding the process of managing and organising in the NHS differently. This paper aims to describe working methods derived from the theory of complex responsive...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to describe a way for leaders to lead chaotic change. By chaotic change it is meant changes in an organization when the external and internal complexity and uncertainty are high. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is based on a conceptual...

Purpose – When coping with complex, but also possibly disruptive and open‐ended social dynamics, the anticipatory system idea, which was developed by Rosen in the realm of physical and biological system observation, remains a reference framework, but one that may need to be reinforced by...

Purpose – Following Polanyi, this paper aims to suggest that the Industrial Revolution marked a break‐point between pre‐industrial society (characterised by integration) and industrial society (characterised by differentiation). Design/methodology/approach – As a conceptual paper, the...

Purpose – The aim of this contribution is to describe a new complexity‐science‐based approach for improving safety, quality and efficiency and the way it was implemented by TenarisDalmine. Design/methodology/approach – This methodology is called “a safety‐building community”. It...