A New Psychology for Sustainability Leadership: The Hidden Power of Ecological Worldviews

Steve Schein is a senior leadership consultant and member of the faculty at the School of Business at Southern Oregon University. His primary areas of consulting, teaching, and research include leadership development, corporate strategy, high-performance cultures, and sustainable business practices. He is a certified public accountant (CPA) and former CEO with more than 30 years of leadership, business development, and senior management experience in several industries.

During the last decade, the sustainability position in multinational corporations has grown in influence. Much literature has explored how corporations can play an important role in solving the environmental challenges facing the planet. However, until now, there has been little research on sustainability leadership at the individual level.

In this book, Schein explores the deeper psychological motivations of sustainability leaders. He shows how these motivations relate to overall effectiveness and capacity to lead transformational change and he explores the ways in which the complexity of sustainability is driving new approaches to leadership. Drawing on interviews with 75 leaders from over 40 multinational corporations and NGOs, Schein explores how ecological worldviews are developed and expressed in global sustainability practice.

By applying key theories from developmental psychology, integral ecology and eco-psychology to sustainability practice, Schein encourages us to think about leadership in a different way. A New Psychology for Sustainability Leadership will be of interest to an interdisciplinary audience of social scientists, educators, corporate executives, and social entrepreneurs. The insights from this book can be usefully integrated into leadership curriculum and development programs to help the next generation of leaders respond to global challenges.