A leadership scholar and psychologist discusses growing up in the Netherlands, his writings on leadership, and his time at INSEAD.
Manfred Kets de Vries
Featured Leadership Topics
Understand Leadership
“[Y]ou have to realize I was born during the war, and it was a very difficult period in Holland. That's probably why my interest in leadership is related to that because I've written initially in the first part of my career quite a bit on the darker side of leadership" ”
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Storytelling
“One difficult part for me has been the crowd, which is really the group as a whole, and how to sense that you have to go from the individual to the group as a whole to create progress in the process of what you're trying to do.”
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About Manfred Kets de Vries
Manfred Kets de Vries earned his M.B.A. (1968) and his Ph.D. in business administration (1970) from Harvard University. He completed psychoanalytic training at the Canadian Psychoanalytic Institute in 1982, which included four years of supervised clinical work.
Kets de Vries is a leading scholar of leadership. Over his long career he has authored or co-authored more than 30 books, several hundred articles, and book chapters relating to leadership and management. He held the Raoul de Vitry d’Avaucourt Chair in Leadership Development at INSEAD in Paris, France (1992–2013). Kets de Vries is the founder of INSEAD’s Global Leadership Center, program director of INSEAD’s top management seminar, and scientific director of the executive master’s program in consulting and coaching for change. He has also held professorships at McGill University, the Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales in Montreal, and the Harvard Business School. Kets de Vries is a recipient of the International Leadership Association Lifetime Achievement Award.
Explore the complete oral history of Manfred Kets de VriesBorn or Made?
“Yeah, I mean, leaders, to quote Napoleon, (are) “merchants of hope,” to speak to the collective imagination of the people to create a group identity is an important function. And you don’t have to be charismatic, some of them are bureaucrats.”
Leaders Are Readers
“So I still remember it very clearly because the first assignment was to read a historical, Jones’ biography of Freud. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen it. It’s very big, and my English was not very good. So I spent the whole week reading that book. It was actually two volumes. Nobody had read it of course except me; I was too naïve. But I also had to read The Ratman, The Wolfman and The Psychotic Dr. Schreber, which is very different from reading economics. So I got fascinated.”
Books I Recommend
- Snakes in Suits, Revised Edition: Understanding and Surviving the Psychopaths in Your Office
—by Dr. Paul Babiak and Dr. Robert D. Hare - Chasing Daylight: How My Forthcoming Death Transformed My Life
—by Eugene O’Kelly
Books I’ve Written
- Down the Rabbit Hole of Leadership: Leadership Pathology in Everyday Life
- Telling Fairy Tales in the Boardroom: How to Make Sure Your Organization Lives Happily Every After
- Riding the Leadership Rollercoaster: An Observe's Guide
- A Life Well Lived: Dialogues with a “Kabouter”
- The CEO Whisperer: Meditations on Leadership, Life, and Change (The Palgrave Kets de Vries Library)
- Leading Wisely: Becoming a Reflective Leader in Turbulent Times
- The Hedgehog Effect: The Secrets of Building High Performance Teams
- The Leader on the Couch: A Clinical Approach to Changing People and Organizations
- Mindful Leadership Coaching: Journeys into the Interior (INSEAD Business Press)
- Leadership Unhinged: Essays on the Ugly, the Bad, and the Weird
- The Darker Side of Leadership: Pythons Devouring Crocodiles
- Leaders, Fools and Impostors: Essays on the Psychology of Leadership
- Organizations On The Couch: A Clinical Perspective on Organizational Dynamics
- The Daily Perils of Executive Life: How to Survive When Dancing on Quicksand
- Quo Vadis?: The Existential Challenges of Leaders (The Palgrave Kets de Vries Library)
- The Neurotic Organization: Diagnosing and Changing Counterproductive Styles of Management
- Sex, Money, Happiness, and Death: The Quest for Authenticity
- You Will Meet a Tall, Dark Stranger: Executive Coaching Challenges
- Mindful Leadership Coaching: Journeys into the Interior (INSEAD Business Press)
- The Path to Authentic Leadership: Dancing with the Ouroboros
- Are Leaders Born or Are They Made?: The Case of Alexander the Great
- Reflections on Leadership and Career Development: On the Couch with Manfred Kets de Vries
- Reflections on Character and Leadership: On the Couch with Manfred Kets de Vries
- Life and Death in the Executive Fast Lane: Essays on Irrational Organizations and Their Leaders
- Organizational Paradoxes: Clinical approaches to management
- Reflections on Groups and Organizations: On the Couch With Manfred Kets de Vries
- The New Global Leaders: Richard Branson, Percy Barnevik, David Simon and the Remaking of International Business
- Lessons on Leadership by Terror: Finding Shaka Zulu in the Attic
- Family Business on the Couch: A Psychological Perspective
- Unstable at the Top
- The Leadership Mystique: Leading Behavior in the Human Enterprise
- The Happiness Equation: Meditations on Happiness and Success
- Struggling With the Demon: Perspectives on Individual and Organizational Irrationality
- Prisoners of Leadership
- Family Business: Human Dilemmas in the Family Firm : Text and Cases
- Coach and Couch: The Psychology of Making Better Leaders
