Prof. Margaret J. Wheatley
The Berkana Institute, USA
Co-founder & President Emerita
The Berkana Institute, USA
- Her work has drawn from many different disciplines: Science, history, literature, systems thinking, organizational behavior, social policy, cosmology and theology
- A consultant and speaker since 1973, and has worked with almost all types of organizations and people and on all continents – ranging from the head of the U.S. Army to twelve year old Girl Scouts, from CEOs to small town ministers; including Fortune 100 corporations, government agencies, healthcare institutions, foundations, public schools, colleges, major church denominations, professional associations, and monasteries
- In the mid-sixties, she spent two years in the Peace Corps in Korea, teaching high school English; on returning to the U.S., she taught junior and senior high school, then became an educational administrator of programs for children and adults who were economically poor and denied traditional educational opportunities
- Served as full-time graduate management faculty at two institutions: Cambridge College in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and The Marriott School of Management, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah
- Served in a formal advisory capacity for leadership programs in England, Croatia, Denmark, Australia and the United States, and through her work in Berkana, with leadership initiatives in India, Senegal, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Mexico, Brazil, Canada and Europe
- Co-founder and President emerita of The Berkana Institute (www.berkana.org), a global charitable foundation founded in 1991, which works in partnership with a rich diversity of people around the world who strengthen their communities by working with the wisdom and wealth already present in their people, traditions and environment
- Her newest book, coauthored with Deborah Frieze: Walk Out Walk On: A Learning Journey Into Communities Daring to Live the Future Now. (2011); Perseverance, published in 2010; Co-authored, A Simpler Way (with Myron Kellner-Rogers) in 1996; Turning to One Another: Simple Conversations to Restore Hope to the Future (2002 and an expanded edition in 2009, in 7 languages); Finding Our Way: Leadership for an Uncertain Time published in 2005, in 3 languages
- Leadership and the New Science was first published in 1992, with new editions in 1999 and 2006 – the book has been translated into 18 languages and won many awards, including “Best Management Book of 1992” in Industry Week, Top Ten Business Books of the 1990s by CIO Magazine, and Top Ten Business books of all time by Xerox Corporation; the video of Leadership and the New Science, produced by CRM films, has also won several film awards
- Her articles appear in a wide range of professional publications and magazines; she also produced a number of videos, CDs on different organizational and leadership topics
