From Round to Square (and back)

For The Emperor's Teacher, scroll down (↓) to "Topics." It's the management book that will rock the world (and break the vase, as you will see). Click or paste the following link for a recent profile of the project: http://magazine.beloit.edu/?story_id=240813&issue_id=240610

A new post appears every day at 12:05* (CDT). There's more, though. Take a look at the right-hand side of the page for over four years of material (2,000 posts and growing) from Seinfeld and country music to every single day of the Chinese lunar calendar...translated. Look here ↓ and explore a little. It will take you all the way down the page...from round to square (and back again).
*Occasionally I will leave a long post up for thirty-six hours, and post a shorter entry at noon the next day.

Sunday, August 11, 2013

The Art of Warning—Introduction (f): Managing It All

[a] Facing Forward RF
The next few posts will introduce a new series on Round and Square—one that is intimately linked to my large project called "The Emperor's Teacher" (the management book that will change the world. This series focuses intently on the ways in which Sima Guang's great historical work, the Comprehensive Mirror, "works." You've read the Art of War, perhaps. Now get ready for the main course—the Art of Warning. 

Click here for other sections of this introduction to The Art of Warning.
Warning 1          Warning 2          Warning 3          Warning 4          Warning 5          Warning 6

From Arts of Warning to Managing it All
In conclusion, let’s think about the ideas behind the Comprehensive Mirror and its “art of warning.” How do we put it all together? As we have seen, the Comprehensive Mirror shows that we are always accountable to others, and frequently we sense an invisible hierarchical grid in the background. Remember the term used to refer to the emperor of China—he was the Son of Heaven. Think about that. Even the emperor was “junior” in one of his relationships. As I often say, it is rare that any of us ever serves as Secretary of This or That. Almost all of us are, all of the time, undersecretary. The Comprehensive Mirror can teach us to know our many roles, and function well in an undulating, hierarchical, corporate terrain. If we can ever learn to give advice and even warning in a clear, effective manner, we will be well on the way, as the Chinese sayings go, to managing, ourselves, our families, and all under heaven.

Stay tuned to this series (and the companion Twitter account), which will be filled with bits-and-pieces from the vast managerial tradition of the Chinese historiography.

Click here for other sections of this introduction to The Art of Warning.
Warning 1          Warning 2          Warning 3          Warning 4          Warning 5          Warning 6
[b] Managing RF

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