As our world grows smaller, opportunities
for conflict multiply. Ethnic, religious, political,
and personal differences drive people apart—with potentially
disastrous consequences—and it's the task of perceptive
leaders to bring them together again. World-renowned
mediation expert Mark Gerzon argues that leaders have
failed to rise to this challenge. Our organizations,
schools, and governments remain filled with divisive
dictators and everyday managers, instead of what he
calls mediators--leaders who transform conflict so
that everyone can move forward together. Through absorbing
examples drawn from decades of work with organizational,
political, and global conflicts of all kinds, Leading
Through Conflict provides a powerful new framework
for the leader as mediator and outlines eight specific
tools these leaders use to transform seemingly intractable
differences into progress on deep-seated problems.
Both practical and passionate, this book makes the
tools of cross-border leaders accessible to anyone
who wants to help create healthier companies, communities,
and countries.
“An absolutely brilliant analysis! As the world
becomes more complicated, interdependent and conflicted,
the need for “mediating leadership” increases
exponentially. Mark Gerzon’s tools and guidelines
are immensely practical and beautifully illustrated – in
developing the needed mindset and skill set in transforming
protective, defensive energy into creative, collaborative
energy which seeks a higher third alternative for
the good of the whole.”
—Dr. Stephen R. Covey, author, The
7 Habits of Highly Effective People and The 8th Habit:
From Effectiveness to Greatness
“This is an extraordinary
and original reach into the stuff of leadership.
Rather than being a technical treatise, Leading
Through Change is a fascinating story of human beings
wrestling with the attitudes and levers that move
others together and forward.”
—Congressman Amory Houghton (R-NY),
U.S. House of Representatives and former CEO of Corning
Glass
“The best leaders don’t
manage conflict, they transform it. Mark Gerzon,
in Leading Through Change, shares powerful insights,
experiences, and practical tools to help leaders
see the big picture and become instruments of positive
change.”
—Annie McKee, Co-Chair of
the Teleos Leadership Institute, and coauthor of
Resonant Leadership
“Leading Through Conflict
bridges the fields of mediation and leadership,
pushing the frontiers insightfully, practically,
and powerfully. I found it eminently useful and inspiring.”
—Ronald Heifetz, Cofounder,
Center for Public Leadership, John F. Kennedy
School of Government, Harvard University, and coauthor
of Leadership on the Line: Staying Alive through
the Dangers of Leading
“I found Leading Through Conflict to be surprisingly
useful and provocative. Everyone complains about ‘leaders’—in
politics, business, the media, social movements—who
primarily magnify conflict for their own purposes,
rather than thinking of the common good. Mark Gerzon
suggests a practical and specific approach toward a
more constructive outcome.”
—James Fallows, author of
Breaking the News: How the Media Undermine American
Democracy
“Martin Luther King Jr. wisely counseled that
we must learn to live together as brothers (and sisters)
or perish together as fools. We may readily see this
truth and yet with painful honesty ask, “How
do we learn to live together?” In Leading Through
Conflict, Mark Gerzon provides answers that are compellingly
practical and clear.”
—Rev. W. Douglas Tanner Jr., Cofounder and President,
The Faith & Politics Institute, Washington, DC
“Leading Through Conflict
is a timely and important book that inspires the
hope that the impossible may be possible and provides
a combination to open the lock of intractable conflict.”
—Shelly
Wilsey, Associate Director, International Leadership
Association, and Deputy Director, James MacGregor
Burns Academy of Leadership, University of Maryland
