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Rini van Solingen - The Beekeeper
How To Lead Self-Managing Teams? A business novel on changing leadership from sheepherding to beekeeping
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This book tells you the story of Mark, an executive in a large organization that has introduced self-management. During a short holiday, Mark visited his grandfather who told him how he had switched careers from being a shepherd to a beekeeper and what he had learned along the way. These lessons applied to Mark’s situation surprisingly well. The chat helped Mark make a list of the things he needed to change and implement. The key lesson is to ‘un-manage’ and unlearn old habits. This book explains how.
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Published in 2016 | Paperback | 144 pages | ca. 40,000 words
Full English translation available
German rights sold to dPunkt Verlag 
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Rini van Solingen is the Dutch expert on Agile, a lecturer, professor, and author on agility and speed in organizations. He has written several books that have become bestsellers and have been published in English and German.
Rini is a part-time full professor at Delft University of Technology and also regularly gives lectures at Nyenrode Business University in master classes and MBAs. He is also CTO at Prowareness We-On, where, as a strategic consultant, he helps clients render their organizations fast and agile. Rini is the author of a number of management books, including The Power of Scrum (2011 - with Jeff Sutherland and Eelco Rustenburg), Scrum for Managers (2015 - with Rob van Lanen) and the management novels The Beekeeper (2016) and Formula X - How to Reach Extreme Acceleration in Your Organization (2019 - with Jurriaan Kamer).
Amir Arooni (CIO, Discover): ‘I recommend this book to all change makers, and to those who want to make an impact in a rapidly changing world!’
Svenja de Vos (CTO, Leaseweb): ‘An easy to read book that induces self-reflection and the energy to change!’
Teun van der Vorm (CIO): ‘An inspiring book in which the practical lessons from Mark’s grandfather taught me how to work with self-managing teams. Directly applicable!’
Johan van Hall (Vice President, ABNAMRO Group): ‘Thanks to this book, I’ve learned a lot about shepherds and beekeepers, and thereby got the insight that the biggest challenge is to change yourself, first.’
Lisette Oosterbroek (Vice President Innovation Excellence KPN): ‘The Beekeeper describes a journey. Not only a journey for the main character, but also for you as the reader. Inspiring, fascinating, and liberating!’
Nico Orie (Global Director, Coca Cola): ‘A management book, but with a twist. This book gives original insights into leadership of self-managing teams.’
John Heideman (ING): ‘This book helps you to understand how you can execute Agile self-organization more successfully by changing your old style of management.’
Frans van der Horst (CEO, ABNAMRO Retail): ‘Managers with shut-up-get-out-I-have-always-done-it-this-way syndrome are the greatest obstacle to attaining self-managing teams and better outcomes for customers. This is laid out very sharply in this book!’
Peter Groen (Head of IT Strategy, Security, and Control, NIBC Bank): ‘From the rush of ad hoc troubleshooting to the enjoyment of true collaboration and the results it produces. This book provides valuable insights for anyone who wants to sustainably improve by laying the foundation for Agile.’
Ronald Dähne (Technology Director of Cloud Solutions, Exact): ‘This parable of bees and the shepherd helps you to simply and clearly make the right choices when working with self-managing teams.’
Tino Scholman (Vice President of Cloud, Oracle EMEA): ‘This is a wonderful book. It explains aptly that ‘Lean’ is easily within reach. The job of a beekeeper is not to interfere with the work of the bees, but to ensure that they can execute their work.’
Foreword by Jos de Blok
1. Emergency Call
2. To the Island
3. Grandpa Marcus
4. Shearing Bees
5. Lex
6. Cabinets and Frameworks
7. Order, Structure, and Chaos
8. More by Doing Less
9. Getting Stung
10. Back to the Island
The Bee-Shepherd Model
How to lead as a beekeeper?
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
About The Author
Praise for the book
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German translation published by dPunkt Verlag:
Mehr und mehr Organisationen setzen auf die Arbeit mit selbstorganisierten Teams. Manager müssen diese Transformation initiieren und begleiten, ohne genau zu wissen, was ihre Rolle nach dem Übergang sein wird.
Und wenn sie sich selbst nicht mitverändern, können sie eher zum Hindernis als zum motivierenden Faktor werden. Dieses außergewöhnliche Managementbuch erzählt die Geschichte von Mark, einer Führungskraft in einer großen Supermarktkette, in der auf Selbstorganisation umgestellt wird. Während eines Kurzurlaubs bei seinem Großvater erfährt er von ihm, wie dieser vom Schafhirten zum Imker wurde und was er dabei gelernt hat. Seine klugen und praktischen Lektionen scheinen überraschend gut auf Marks Situation zu passen. Sie helfen ihm, seine eigenen Handlungsweisen zu überdenken und eine Liste zu erstellen, welche von ihnen er ändern bzw. abstellen muss. Denn zuallererst heißt es, zu »ent-managen« und alte Gewohnheiten zu »entlernen«. Dieses Buch erklärt eindrucksvoll und unterhaltsam, wie das geht.