Manfred F.R. Kets de Vries
Distinguished Clinical Professor of Leadership Development and Organizational Change, INSEAD
Monday June 14th, 10:30am
We live in a world that emphasize the rational and the objective. We cling dearly to objective facts, rigorous thought and rational decisions. In doing so, we risk losing sight of the internal world and our emotional and intuitive aspects. Understanding our “inner theatre” is essential, but also an uphill challenge, fraught with difficulties and anxieties. In this conversation, Manfred F. R. Kets de Vries explores the essential need to build self-understanding and the difficulty in doing so.
Our discussion will consider some of the darker impulses that have gained prominence in recent years, and that have particularly come to the foreground in 2020. We will reflect on the struggle and challenge that managers, leaders (and scholars) have experienced in not just dealing with the disruptions in working experiences as a result of the pandemic, but also in their personal lives, influencing relationships and connections with individuals, communities and humanity. We will also examine the feelings of frustration, loss, anger, stress, depression and despair that the year has prompted, and how to give voice and space for consideration of them in general in our lives. Finally, we will consider what an understanding of the interior world and inner theatre of our lives can offer for management scholars in considering their research; not just how it might influence research approaches, but how it shapes what we research and study, and in particularly how we relate, communicate, disseminate and demonstrate the relevance of our research to the world.
Dr. Manfred F.R. Kets de Vries is Program Director of INSEAD’s top management program, “The Challenge of Leadership: Creating Reflective Leaders,” and the Founder of INSEAD’s Executive Master Program in Change Management. As an educator, he has received INSEAD’s distinguished teacher award six times. He has held professorships at McGill University, the École des Hautes Études Commerciales, Montreal, the European School for Management and Technology (ESMT), Berlin, and the Harvard Business School. He has lectured at management institutions around the world. The Financial Times, Le Capital, Wirtschaftswoche, and The Economist have rated Manfred Kets de Vries among the world’s leading management thinkers and among the most influential contributors to human resource management.
Kets de Vries is the author, co-author, or editor of 50 books. In addition, Kets de Vries has published more than 400 academic papers as chapters in books and as articles (including digital). He has also written approximately 100 case studies, including seven that received the Best Case of the Year award. He is a regular writer for various magazines. His work has also been featured in such publications as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, Fortune, Business Week, The Economist, The Financial Times and The Harvard Business Review.
In his work, Kets de Vries explores the interface between management science, psychoanalysis, developmental psychology, evolutionary psychology, neuroscience, psychotherapy, executive coaching, and consulting. His specific areas of interest are leadership (the “bright” and “dark” side), entrepreneurship, career dynamics, talent management, family business, cross-cultural management, succession planning, organizational and individual stress, C-suite team building, executive coaching, organizational development, transformation management, management consulting.
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