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German legal historians of nineteenth and twentieth centuries defined the main characteristics of the corporations and believed that one renaissance institution, the Casa di San Giorgio at Genoa (1407–1805), was similar to the corporations of later centuries. This paper proposes to reverse this perspective: did the founders of early modern corporations know the financial model of the fifteenth century Casa di San Giorgio? The research shows the connection between the model of the Casa di San Giorgio and the Mississippi Company of John Law (1720), the famous financial scheme and bubble. The history of the Casa di San Giorgio was mainly transmitted through a passage of Machiavelli’s History of Florence (VIII, 29). The paper offers new biographical evidence that Law had been to Genoa and introduces sources connecting the genesis of Law’s scheme for the Mississippi Company in France with the model of the Casa di San Giorgio.

For several decades, leaders have recognized that the ethos and language of our social, business, and governance structures have become barren, too small, and insufficient for the many challenges and opportunities facing contemporary leaders and the myriad contexts in which they serve. “Designing Leadership Like Jazz” addresses these concerns.

“Designing Leadership Like Jazz” is about understanding the centrality of leadership formation in shaping, or designing, leaders as well as understanding leadership as an art. In this chapter, I identify what leadership formation is and is not. Drawing on the language of jazz music and related arts, I also surface strategies and lessons that can be used by anyone who leads or aspires to lead. Not only can the lessons be applied by anyone who leads or aspires to lead but they also can be applied anywhere, at any time, and in any context. The lessons apply to us as individuals, in intimate relationships with family and friends, in community settings, in workgroups, among team members, in organizations and institutions, and in nations.

Sequestered in their boardroom, Morgan Donne, the CEO of a struggling financial services company, recounts their past successes. Determined to help her inner circle remember what it is like to be part of a winning team, she invites them to share a story about their strengths. Morgan begins. Then the CFO shares his story.

This chapter draws from research on aesthetic labour, gender, management and organisation studies and research on women's careers. We base our analysis on two empirical data sets, namely interviews with women mid-managers in Finland and Scotland, and interviews with highly positioned expert women in Finland in knowledge work. Women in different phases of their careers and life experience manifold pressures on appearances, and are increasingly aware of the demands to ‘look good and sound right’. We address how these pressures impact on women managers' and experts' well-being and career plans.

Research indicates that faculty of color in the United States face numerous challenges in the academy. To complicate their experiences further, children significantly impact academics’ work. Additional difficulties can arise in balancing work with familial responsibilities. Indeed, strategies to navigate parental obligations while engaging in professional activities are seldom examined among minority parents, across genders and institution types. In response, the current study investigates the intersectionality of race, gender, and parenthood on navigating a work–life balance in academia. This study examines 13 male and female minority parents from an array of institutions and explores their strategies for navigating professional advancement while managing familial obligations.

Our data suggest that parents of color often develop timesaving strategies to complete their work more efficiently. However, in order to do so, they tend to engage in professional and social isolation and to recalibrate personal expectations of work and accomplishments. Of importance, the study uncovered significant gender differences. While fathers faced comparable challenges, the findings indicate that familial responsibilities can disadvantage women more so by impacting their ability to foster professional relationships and potentially harm their emotional well-being. While most faculty of color face difficulties in the workplace, we argue that those with children, especially mothers, face additional challenges that should be addressed by home institutions to foster more equitable opportunities for professional growth.

Over the past three decades, new off-grid electrification infrastructures – as micro-grids and other solar solutions – have moved from innovative initiatives, conducted by NGOs and private stakeholders, to a credible model promoted by international organizations for electrification of rural areas in developing countries. Multiple conditions support their spread: major technological advances in the field of renewable energies (panels, batteries), intensive Chinese industrial production allowing lower prices, institutional reforms in Africa including these solutions in major national electrification programmes, and, finally, an opening to the private sector as a supposed guarantee of the projects’ viability. However, while the development of this market calls for significant investments, a vast set of calculations and a strong “micro-capitalist” doctrine, all involved in their design, experts admit that a large proportion of projects hardly survive or even fail.

This chapter investigates these failures by exploring the ecology of such infrastructures, designed for “the poor.” It discusses “thinking infrastructures” in terms of longevity by focusing on economic failures risks. The authors argue that the ecology of the infrastructure integrates various economic conversions and exchanges chains expected to participate in the infrastructure’s functioning. By following energy access solutions for rural Africa in sub-regions of Senegal and Madagascar, from their political and technical design to their ordinary life, the authors examine the tensions and contradictions embedded within the scripts of balance supposed to guarantee their success.

“Being second” refers to a state of mind, an acceptance of circumstance, being content knowing that you are living your life, and not relying on others to dictate what your “best life” should look like. Sometimes, it takes a lifetime to make this journey. This chapter recounts Battalion Chief Jodi Gabelmann’s journey to peace and pride in a well-lived career in the male-dominated, family-centric world of fire and emergency medical services. Dr Judith Glick-Smith ties Chief Gabelmann’s story to the theoretical underpinnings of her story.

Leaders in the public service are continually challenged with the requirement to enhance citizen-centered services while decreasing the cost to provide them. Administrative processes and approvals require significant lead-up time to engage the public, discuss proposals and changes with numerous staff levels, public advisory committees, and finally, Council. Implementation is a whole other process. Often issues are cross-sectoral and require multidisciplinary actions to be effective. The labyrinth of achieving success and better outcomes is exciting and requires courage, innovation, and a certain nimbleness. This chapter speaks to the experiences of a senior level public servant who has the way. Concepts such as leadership styles, value-driven teams, appreciative inquiry, pride, and alignment, managing change, and self-care are discussed.

As the social scientists of modern society, sociologists find themselves in a peculiar situation. Human civilization appears on the brink of collapse; the ravages of global capitalism are turning natural and social orders upside down. Some theorists are declaring the “end of history,” while others wonder if humans will soon become extinct. People find themselves increasingly shouldering burdens on their own, strangers to themselves and others. Struggles for recognition and identity are forged in harsh landscapes of social dislocation and inequality. The relationship of the individual to the state atrophies as governmental power becomes at once more remote and absolutely terrifying. How are we as sociologists expected to theorize under such circumstances?  What implications result for the mission of sociology as a discipline and area of study? What political initiatives, if any, can counter these trends?

This chapter provides an immanent critique of sociology as a profession, vocation, and critical practice. Sociology today (in the US and around the globe) faces fierce social, economic, and political headwinds. The discipline continues to be a perilous choice as a vocation for independent researchers as much as the shrinking professoriate. Yet while the traditional functions of sociology are thrown into doubt, there has been an increase in critical practices on the part of some sociologists. As institutional norms, values, and traditions continue to be challenged, there will be passionate debates about the production of social worlds and the validity claims involved in such creation. Sociologists must play an active role in such discourse. Sociology is needed today as a mode of intervention as much as occupational status system or method of inquiry.