Richard David Hames
About Richard David Hames
Speech topics
The Five Literacies of Global Leadership
The art and practice of leadership is one of today’s most talked about, important and controversial topics. Fully one third of all management textbooks published during the past decade have been about some aspect of leadership. Most of these are identical in almost all their underlying contentions, models and philosophies. Each year vast sums of money are spent on leadership development based upon the dogma these books promulgate. Yet for all the words, all the talk, and all the resources allocated to the nurturing of leaders and the practice of leadership, very little actually changes. Truly great leaders are still in the minority. Authentic, effective leadership, it seems, is a vanishing art. Meanwhile the cry for more leaders and better leadership grows stronger.
Over the past two decades Dr. Richard Hames and his colleagues from The Hames Group have made it their business to work alongside and study some of the world’s most remarkable and uncommonly successful leaders – from all walks of life and in every part of the world. The findings from their research reveal a conventional wisdom that is flawed; misguided in even its most basic assumptions.
In analyzing the exceptional performance, passion, unbounded energy, creativity and longevity of human beings at the peak of their powers, Richard and his team have unraveled a code that still remains a mystery to most of us – hidden even to those who aspire to leadership and even less visible, it would seem, to those who actually write about it.
People who are as loved in their private lives as they are engaged in their public roles, Hames discovered, instinctively apply a set of principles and a philosophy that go far beyond the orthodoxies of current leadership practice. Five Literacies leaders are the harbingers of a new consciousness, accessing tenets and a state of being that can be learned and practiced by anyone assuming a leadership role in today’s complex world.
The Five Literacies exposes this code, describing an uncommon cognitive and behavioral alchemy in which wisdom, ambient intelligence, collaboration and know-how come together to create potent conditions for change.
Speaking videos
Books by Richard David Hames
“ Heresies: Essays on the Future of Humanity” (2013)
Heresies are seminal ideas that are at fundamental variance with the established order. Over the many years I have been advising governments and corporations I have often been branded a heretic. I have invariably taken this as a compliment. In the quest for alternative wisdom and new ways of knowing, this short book of essays examines the future of humanity from a mindfully contrarian perspective. The world's inhabitants, a population of seven billion people and growing, are living on the hinge of history. Arising from a set of intuitive responses to unprecedented life-conditions - prior to and following the globalization of communications and trade - dilemmas now abound that need urgent resolution. Our prevailing attitude is to continue on the current course, doing what we are doing, or to ignore the issues, hoping they will go away. But it is not that simple any more. The issues confronting us are dynamically complex. Orthodox problem-solving methods can actually make matters far worse. From the devastation being wreaked by climate change on the one hand and the industrial war machine on the other, to the anxiety and despair of those who simply cannot find sufficient water for their most urgent needs; and from the cancer people trafficking, to an international economy based upon compound debt; our world-system is imploding, and our species is faced with the need to approach societal design with far greater wisdom and cultural inclusion. Tragically we are not set up for collaboration. In an age where we urgently need radical empathy and cooperation, our dominant mindset is one of competition - across all strata and sectors of society. This book by a philosopher-activist explores a few seminal ideas: critical propositions that, while heretical today, will need to be adopted and applied by successive generations as we consciously evolve the human story over the next one thousand years.
“Open Heart - Open Mind” (2012)
The 10 years of action research that ultimately gave rise to The Five Literacies of Global Leadership (published by Jossey-Bass in 2007) shattered outdated myths and preconceptions concerning what constitutes effective leadership. Open Heart - Open Mind is a primer for government and business executives who want to access and practice Five Literacies leadership in their own organizations. Those men and women inhabiting the corridors of corporate and government power and who practise obsolete forms of leadership are bluffing. They cannot resolve the most critical issues of our time. If they could, they would have done so by now. This book is based on the premise that an organization’s ongoing success will be shaped by people exhibiting a very different suite of leadership competencies than prevail in most organizations today. Five Literacies leaders recognize that new ways of understanding, analyzing and responding to change is required in business, and that this also demands a different style of leadership. This style is characterized by a shift from short-term, anthropomorphic, narrowly economic and control-orientated thinking to a longer-term, systems-based, evolutionary perspective where humankind is but a part of the global ecosystem. The key to such leadership is reintegrating human knowledge, and posing sharper and more perceptive questions based on an appreciation of the interdependent, ever-shifting dynamic between issues (content) and the framework in which those things interact (context). Open Heart - Open Mind is a primer for business executives who want to access and practice Five Literacies leadership in their own organizations.
“The Five Literacies of Global Leadership: What Authentic Leaders Know and You Need to Find Out” (2007)
New research has exposed our leadership paradigm as a outdated mess of flawed models and practices. By working with great leaders and observing their common attitudes and behaviours, Richard Hames has cracked a universal code based on intelligence, appreciation and collaboration. This code unlocks Five Literacies of Global Leadership. These behaviours are the trade secrets of the artists and alchemists among us. Often instinctively, these leaders charge others with energy, search for new perspectives and embrace diversity. And they are driven by dialogue. This book reveals approaches and attitudes that they all share - and that can make anyone an exceptional leader.
“Burying The Twentieth Century: New Paths For New Futures” (1997)
Drawing from the principles of ecological systems and social science, this book explores a new way of organising human interactions and interdependencies, one which gives meaning to our work and dignity to our lives. They offer tools which individuals and organisations can use to restore the preeminence of social and intellectual capital.
“The Management Myth: Exploring the Essence of Future Organizations” (1994)
The Management Myth – Exploring Essence of Future Organisations, was frame-shattering book from first-time author. The book is three parts. Part One is contextual; it attempts make sense of state world and the complexity human as created. Part Two proposes alternative way of perceiving and designing organizations as result of changed context. Part Three proposes a new theory of management based upon humanistic principles, cybernetic governance and systemic emergence.
At a glanceRichard David Hames
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