Myself and Other More Important Matters

Charles Handy is perhaps best known outside the business world as a wise and warm presenter of Radio 4’s ‘Thought for the Day’. Long recognised as one of the world’s leading business thinkers (over a million copies of his books have been sold around the world), in MYSELF AND OTHER MORE IMPORTANT MATTERS he leaves the management territory he has so effectively and influentially mapped in the past to explore the wider issues and dilemmas - both moral and creative - raised by the turning points of his long and successful life. Here he investigates the big issues of how life can best be lived as they have emerged from the unfolding of his life and his unique and influential understanding of what really matters. From supplying oil by boat to an area larger than England as a bullish young Shell executive in Borneo to realising that there was a big difference between describing the development of a ‘portfolio’ life (made up of a variety of activities for a range of purposes and pay) in theory and actually himself leaving behind full-time employment, from helping to start up the London and Open business schools to listening and talking to people all over the world about how they want to manage their lives, Handy’s telling of his experiences proves both revealing and significant. Ultimately his thoughtful questioning of his own life is designed to inspire our own u what do we really value? Is it money? Time? Family and community? What is the role of work in our lives? What do we find fulfilling?In his wonderfully engaging and drily witty telling of his own story, Charles Handy provides us with the opportunity to learn life-lessons from one of our wisest contemporaries u and ultimately to inform and influence our own making of life’s major decisions.