Richer Earth

The Subtle Difference in Leadership of, in, and with the System

Martin Luther King, Jr. is an example of leading with the system.

Interview with Julie Bargmann, Brownfields Diva

Julie Bargmann discusses the leadership challenges in brownfield reclamation. Read the interview.

Lessons for Leaders: Situational Awareness

The Deepwater Horizon spill provided many lessons for leaders in fast-moving situations.

The Nation’s First Green Restaurant District?

Washington Square in Brookline could claim this honor.

Leaders: Agents of Their Own Destiny?

Leaders like NYC's Mayor Bloomberg get the credit, but the work is rarely theirs alone. Photo from makeroadssafe on Flickr.

Latest From Richer Earth

The Subtle Difference in Leadership of, in, and with the System

I recently completed a paper on the challenges of leading social change in meta-systems. Organizational change was one of the evergreen topics when I worked at Harvard Business School Publishing, i.e. you could sell books and articles about it forever as no one ever got it right. Move up to the level of a meta-system where you are trying to inspire global change in response to the big, hairy … [Read More...]

Interview with Julie Bargmann, Brownfields Diva

I had the good fortune to interview Julie Bargmann a couple of months back. I spoke with her about the leadership challenges she faces in brownfield reclamation projects. Bargmann is a landscape architect extraordinaire and nationally known brownfield reclamation expert. Brownfields are “real property, the expansion, redevelopment, or reuse of which may be complicated by the presence or … [Read More...]

Lessons for Leaders: Situational Awareness

I have spent significant time studying the leadership challenges presented by the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. It started with time spent in the Gulf with my colleague, Dr. Leonard Marcus, in the early days of the spill. It continued with the writing of a case history and then a case study that I co-taught with Rear Admiral Peter Neffenger, USCG, to the most recent … [Read More...]

The Nation’s First Green Restaurant District?

It started as a assignment in the Envisioning Sustainable Cities class I took at Lesley University this fall: craft a proposal for a sustainability project for my home city. As a foodie and a neighborhood booster, I had the idea for a green restaurant district in Washington Square. After all, we are home to the Boston area's first green restaurant -- The Fireplace -- and many other eateries from … [Read More...]