Crisis

Dutch Republic through the Disaster Year

From the Union of Utrecht to the Disaster Year of 1672, the Dutch Republic coordinated war and commerce through sovereign provinces, oligarchic cities, urban credit, and chartered companies rather than one settled center; the same coalition that protected local privileges built imperial monopolies abroad and fractured under invasion at home.

How did provinces, cities, regents, merchants, and the House of Orange build common power without one sovereign center, and why did their coalition break in 1672?

Sensemaking in Organizations

Weick's account of sensemaking becomes concrete at Mann Gulch, where a crew fleeing wildfire could no longer fit a lethal situation to its roles, tools, or expectations. Foreman Wag Dodge improvised an escape fire that saved him, but the action did not become a plausible instruction to the others; the case reveals how identity and enacted evidence can coordinate action or collapse, while later research shows that leaders, stakeholders, institutions, and power shape which account becomes actionable.

The Hard Thing About Hard Things

Horowitz combines a first-person account of Loudcloud and Opsware with advice on crisis decisions, layoffs, hiring, training, management debt, and peacetime or wartime leadership. Independent research on threat rigidity, employee voice, and downsizing limits how far the founder-CEO account can travel.