Spotlight on Richard T. Pascale

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to record an interview with Richard T. Pascale, an international business consultant.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper uses an interview technique to reveal Richard T. Pascale's views on the relevance of complexity science to management.

Findings

The paper reveals that Pascale believes that there are some common properties to all living things that have great relevance to business. These are: prolonged equilibrium is a precursor to death; innovation occurs near the edge of chaos; all living things exhibit the capacity for self‐organisation and emergence (most recently popularised by the idea of the tipping point); and when you tamper with living things, you confront the law of unintended consequences. All four of these ideas have begun to penetrate managerial consciousness.

Originality/value

This paper provides some usual views on the relevance of complexity science to management from a well‐known international business consultant.

Citation

Powell, S. (2006), "Spotlight on Richard T. Pascale", Management Decision, Vol. 44 No. 7, pp. 973-979. https://doi.org/10.1108/00251740610680622