One of the many things that impressed me about Richard s last book, Liberating the Corporate Soul: Building a Visionary Organization, was the epigraph written by the late Willis Harman, who was co-founder of the World Business Academy. Willis wrote:

Business has become the most powerful institution on the planet. The dominant institution in any society needs to take responsibility for the whole. But business has not had such a tradition. This is a new role, not well understood or accepted. Built on the concept of capitalism and free enterprise from the beginning was the assumption that the actions of the many units of individual enterprise, responding to market forces and guided by the invisible hand of Adam Smith, would somehow add up to desirable outcomes. But in the last decade of the twentieth century, it has become clear that the invisible hand is faltering. It depended on a consensus of overarching meanings and values that is no longer present. So business now has to adopt a tradition it has never had throughout the entire history of capitalism: to share responsibility for the whole. Every decision that is made, every action that is taken, must be viewed in light of that responsibility.

I found out later, when I met Richard, that he and Willis were good friends. I am not surprised. Richard and Willis share the same lucid, logical visionary approach to their work.

I have to admit, I was so impressed by Richard s last book I could not put...