Steve Hock - was born in Klamath Falls, Oregon in 1952 and grew up in a small town in the foothills of the Cascade Mountains in Washington State.  His formal education was in English literature & writing (BA 1974, University of Washington) and law & economics (JD 1977, University of Chicago), graduating with honors.

His lifelong interest in the nature of organizations, leadership and management springs primarily from his relationship with his father, Dee Hock, Founder and CEO Emeritus of VISA International, one of the few living Laureates of the Business Hall of Fame and author of Birth of the Chaordic Age (Berrett-Koehler 1999).  At the same time Dee Hock was conceiving and implementing the innovative form of organization that became VISA (now the largest commercial enterprise in the world), Steve was launching a 20-year career as an advisor to and trial attorney for a wide variety of corporations and other organizations.  Steve and his father shared ideas regarding the nature of the VISA organization during its formation and growth, and Steve and his law firm (now known as Thelen, Reid & Priest LLP [“Thelen”]) had the opportunity to serve as counsel to VISA in a variety of matters.

In 1992 the partners of the Thelen firm elected Steve to serve as Managing Partner for a term of five years, during which he was responsible for operations and strategic direction of the 500+ person law firm and their offices in San Francisco, San Jose, Los Angeles, Newport Beach, Houston, Washington, D.C., New York City and Hong Kong.  During this time he was able to put into practice new ideas, many of which were derived from his experience with VISA and his father, concerning organization, leadership and management, with extraordinary results for the firm.  At the expiration of his term as Managing Partner in 1997 Steve chose to become Of Counsel to the Thelen firm in order to devote most of his time to hands-on work helping to create new forms of organization and to public speaking. 

Since then Steve and his father have worked together closely in more fully developing and implementing new concepts of organization in diverse fields, including fisheries, geographic information systems & services, agriculture, health care, computer technology, public interest law, the Internet and others.

Steve has always enjoyed public speaking and discussion and has served as a keynote speaker at dozens of conferences and other events concerning organization, complexity and leadership.  Some recent examples include the US Army Joint General Officers Conference (Alexandria, VA, 2001); the Singapore Civil Service Conference (Singapore, 2001); the Applied Conflict Resolution Organizations Network Conference (Wye River, MD, 2001); the Connecticut School Principals Academy (Hartford, 2001); the EuroManagement Conference (London, 2000); the Association of Oregon Counties (Portland, OR, 2000); the Intermountain GIS Conference (Kalispell, MT, 2000); and a series of Year 2000 Symposia (London, Amsterdam, Tokyo, Rome, Paris, New York, San Francisco, Minneapolis, Chicago, Boston, Dallas, New Orleans, Washington, D.C. and elsewhere, 1997-1999). 

Steve has received widespread recognition for his work, including testimony before the United States Senate, appearances on ABC World News Tonight, CNBC, MSNBC, PBS and other national and international broadcasts, as well as coverage in business, technological and legal periodicals such as The New York Times, Forbes, Business Week, Newsweek, Time, The Washington Post, USA Today, CIO Magazine, the ABA Journal, Corporate Legal Times and other publications.