Rating: 
Summary: A book that will change our world. A must read!!!!
Review: Sorry, but is not a another book on how to make more money in business. This book is a must read for all. It changed my life. Dee Hock is a true visionary and leader for the new millennium. Certainly everyone who feels that there must be a better way to approach the myriad of problems our world is experiencing will delight at the liberating possibilities that Hock presents here. Please read it and know that there is a path to bring our collective societal behavior into harmony with our values by employing the very organizing principles that are found throughout nature. I deeply thank Dee Hock for having the courage and perseverance it took to bring this message to the world.
Rating:
Summary: A Must Read Book
Review: The Birth of the Chaordic Age is the most exciting and hope filled secular book I've read in my 80 years of political life.
Rating: 
Summary: Almost, No Cigar
Review: The underlying science used to rationalize the voracity of 'chaordic' organizational archictures is missed completely. Chaordic is a poor buzzword. A HOLONIC approach to the balancing act between hierarchy and heterarchy as well as self-organization and autocatalytic evolution is most appropriate. Do a web search if you want more on holonics. The reulting science of such behavior was 1st published by Auther Koestler in his landmark book "The Ghost In The Machine" (c)1967. Appendix 1 of this work is something that would serve to cleanse this authors apparent lack of scientific prowess. This author says it all and I quote; "I do not believe that VISA is a model to emulate." pp282. It is obvious that the success of VISA and therefore this book are suspect and miss the mark. It is amazing that the Chaordic Alliance was ever funded. The book is close, but no Cigar!! One star gives credit to the sis-boom-bah rhetoric that this book is peppered with. This author doesn't have the slightest clue in the world that all he has done is to put old wine in new bottles. The wine in his new bottle is now vinegar! I doubt he knows it.
Rating: 
Summary: A Fascinating Man, a Fascinating Story & a Bit of Frustratio
Review: This is a book that is fascinating and frustrating by turns. It's about one of the most fascinating and effective and least written-about business executives in the world, Dee Hock.
Hock is the founder and CEO Emeritus of Visa. Visa is an organizational form unlike anything anyone had ever seen or, for that matter since. It combined the efforts of organizations that were normally at each other's competitive throats. But that's not all.
In the process of getting Visa to work, Hock and the other folks that he worked with, also managed to create the payment system that is Visa. To realize how big an achievement this is, consider the fact that the check-clearing system in the Federal Reserve still does not work with a fraction of the efficiency of the Visa-approval and payment-clearing process.
I'd known about Dee Hock for years, and I was fascinated by him and by the process that must have gone into establishing, actually inventing, Visa. I snatched up this book when it came out hoping that it would contain the story of Hock and the Visa adventure. It did. That story is compelling and well written.
But there's more to this book than that story, and the "more" includes lots of bits of value and many bits of frustration.
Take the title. Birth of the what Age? "Chaordic." Try looking that up in the dictionary. It's not there. Do we need a brand-new word to describe what Hock is describing? Maybe, but I'm not sure.
I'm quite sure I don't need some of the other strange things that he does with language in the book. There is, for example, "Thee Ancient One." That turns out to be a tractor. Then there's "old monkey mind."
Old monkey mind is the term that Hock uses in several different ways throughout the book. Sometimes it's used to refer to logical, linear, left side of the brain. Sometimes it's used to refer to old thinking patterns. Sometimes it seems to be a kind of alter ego for Hock with whom he has conversations.
That kind of language is cute but it's more appropriate to a book of whimsy. Here it gets in the way of understanding. And there's a lot here to understand.
Whatever else Dee Hock is, he is certainly one of the most fascinating intellects that I've come across. He's clearly a man of principle. He's had an amazing life, starting from poverty, rising to heights of business where he created one of the great financial institutions in the history of the planet. Then he walked away from that achievement with less ongoing compensation than Jack Welch's apartment rentals. Hock's mind is supple and rich and dips into sources that span time and geography and cultures.
Hock's life and the story of Visa are fascinating, and it pulls us along, but there's real meat in his observations about organizations and how they work and how they ought to work. There are penetrating insights into the ways that organizations have an impact on the Planet, on the economy, and on individual lives. There are insights and observations about what it means to be human.
In the end, I think this is really two books. One book is a story that goes from start to finish. It's the story of Dee Hock. It's the story of Visa. It's a fascinating story, filled with lessons and examples. It's worth buying the book that's between the cover for.
Then there's the other book that is a collection of bits of observation and thought. They're not presented in a coherent way, just plopped down into the story in separate chapters throughout the book. This is a book with less organization and more random insights. It, too, is interesting and worth the price of the book.
In the end, you can get two books - both wonderful, for the price of one.
Rating:
Summary: Out of Control - In to Order
Review: This is a profound book.Dee Hock created the largest business enterprise on earth - the VISA credit card network. More precisely, he created the organization/system/environment that allowed and encouraged the creativity and passion of thousands of people to create VISA. Hock has coined the term "chaordic," meaning chaos and order at the same time; the harmonious interplay of both is necessary for all vital, adaptable systems. He makes the critical distinction between control and order. Control is imposed, an attempt to eliminate chaos, and stifles creativity and the human spirit. Order arises naturally out of a shared purpose that engages people at the core of their being and brings forth the best they have to offer. Hock states it exquisitely, "Simple, clear purpose and principles give rise to complex, intelligent behavior. Complex rules and regulations give rise to simple, stupid behavior." Hock offers a new way of organizing human activity, one that can alter our headlong rush toward social and environmental disaster. It is not merely theoretical but imminently practical - applicable to all sizes and types of organizations from individual to global for-profit and non-profit endeavors of every kind. This new chaordic understanding nurtures the human spirit, the biosphere, and a sustainable future. And it comes just in the nick of time. Maybe we CAN create a livable future for all of the grandchildren.
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