Part 2

Adaptive and Engaging Leadership With Purpose in a Shifting World

Adaptive and Engaging Leadership With Purpose in a Shifting World

James R. Calvin, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Management
Department of Management
Carey Business School
The Johns Hopkins University

Abstract
The uncertainty of changing times will lead to new global realities for all communities during the present era and globalization journey that will continue as will the shifting and changing of national leaders, human crises, the ups and downs of commerce and innovation, and community and public desires for solutions and outcomes that are both found and missed as time comes and time moves on forward. In this vein, there is the daily reality of survival in many communities while considering how and why and when to engage the state of what already is and the factors to consider for what is possible to happen locally, regionally and because of the rapid and far reaching influence of world events that will undoubtedly present challenges from which there will also rise opportunity as evidenced by informal and formal gatherings such as the World Economic Forum, United Nations activities, European Union activities and other forums in future years to come. As such, the current time provides context and background for several coexisting trends that are impacting everybody living on the planet directly through the advent of raging human crises, sovereign wealth funds now pouring into the United States to offer financial stability to linked world markets that are being shaken by collateralized debt obligations (CDO’s) that are fueling a global credit and financial crisis. At the same time there is the continued rise money remittances, a further expansion of Hip-Hop as culture exchange and business that began in the United States continues to go global into many lands and across many cultures from New York, Atlanta and Los Angeles to Buenos Aires, Mumbai, Shanghai, Moscow and Paris. Moreover, the trend to transportable knowledge and skills continues to heighten as education and knowledge parity between East and West is becoming more common and practical. Still, there are serious conflicts with some conflict situations being cataclysmic in scope in a growing number of places and regions in the world in Africa, the Middle East, Eastern Europe and other places as countries, racial, ethnic and cultural groups are engaged in deadly conflict.

Moreover, the interrelated questions of adaptive leadership in finding and pursuing purpose in communities that are newly adapting to arising life circumstances and situations spanning business, economic and social infrastructures and networks to manage into the future given the aforementioned situations and others still to arise. Thus, the expressed voices of Amartya Sen in Rationality and Freedom (2002) Percy Miller also known as Master P in Guaranteed Success, 2007, Alan Greenspan in The Age of Turbulence (2007), Ronald Heifetz & Marty Linsky in Leadership on the Line (2002), Niall Ferguson in The War of the World (Twentieth Century Conflict and the Descent of the West, 2006), Frances Hesselbein & Marshall Goldsmith in The Leader of the Future (Visions, Strategies, and Practices for the New Era, 2006) among others have been brought together as foundation building elements and thought resources for this view that seeks to encourage future thinking and the engaging of multiple options for multi-cultural human groups and societies that can grasp and apply adaptive, cultural and leader and follower ideation for shaping individual and group engagement perspectives toward community level pursuits and future attainment in the years to come.

Author(s)

James R. Calvin

James R. Calvin, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Management
Department of Management
Carey Business School
The Johns Hopkins University

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