Embrace the Beauty of Life’s Chaos

Getting Out of Control explains why effective leaders seek to influence rather than to control. It offers six principles of the emergent mindset to help leaders in public, corporate, or private life maximize their influence and avoid the pointless pursuit of control in our complex, out-of-control world.

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Beautifully Ordered Systems Can
Exist, Even When No One’s In Control

In this ground-breaking book, Neil Chilson makes the case that the best response to complexity is an emergent mindset that seeks opportunities to “get out of control.” This mindset requires people to embrace their autonomy as individuals and admit limitations as part of something larger.

The emergent mindset confounds managers grasping for control but holds great promise for leaders willing to adopt it.

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PRAISE FOR THE BOOK

“Neil Chilson offers a much-needed examination of the foundations of sound policymaking, at a time when the failure of institutions is rampant… Chilson’s focus on a pragmatic, incremental approach based on accumulated knowledge shows the way to better policy outcomes. Experience is the best teacher, and Chilson’s book shows how regulation can best incorporate it.”

Maureen K. Ohlhausen

Former Chairman, Federal Trade Commission and Section Chair – Antitrust & Competition Law, Baker Botts

PRAISE FOR THE BOOK

“Neil Chilson’s Getting Out of Control is a readable and important corrective to the social engineering mindset that has dominated public policy since the ‘Progressive Era.’ The “emergent order mindset” he seeks to promote has significant implications not only for public policy discussions but also for opening our eyes to beautiful patterns of complex natural and social systems and hidden order they exhibit.”

Peter J. Boettke

University Professor of Economics and Philosophy, George Mason University

QUOTE FROM THE BOOK

“You sit at an intersection between emergent systems. You are a self-aware emergent system, and you are part of many larger emergent systems. Sitting at this intersection, your choices influence all of these larger emergent systems.”

Neil Chilson

Author – Getting Out of Control

QUOTE FROM THE BOOK

“If we recognize ourselves as complex systems that have emergent properties, it is easier to see that self-improvement isn’t a series of goals but an effort to improve our own conscious and unconscious processes and systems.”

Neil Chilson

Author – Getting Out of Control

QUOTE FROM THE BOOK

“History isn’t just a biography of the famous and powerful…. On the tapestry of history some vibrant threads stand out, but their path is shaped by the warp and weft of the forgotten individuals around them. Order emerges, influenced by the many, even though in retrospect the story we tell focuses on the vibrant.”

Neil Chilson

Author – Getting Out of Control

Real-world examples of successful and failed
leadership from Washington, D.C. to Silicon Valley

Tree Diagram

Challenging everything you know
about leadership and control

This book offers new perspectives on the challenges and opportunities of governance in an age of complexity. It will help you understand why we so often fail to improve ourselves and how to adapt to that. In this complex world, our hope as leaders lies not in gaining control, but in influencing the order that emerges under no one person’s control.