Blessed are the flexible
The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing your Organization and the World is about possibility, yet not a baseless or pie-in-the-sky sort. But one grounded in a realistic kind of possibility which demands working hard to lead in a fast-changing environment. Drawing from a total of more than 60 years of leadership training, consulting and writing, the authors explore adaptive leadership in 23 chapters clustered into five sections.
The key takeaways include the following key lessons. First, how to diagnose the system within which one operates as a leader. This entails several things including identifying stakeholders’ interests, fleshing out the real reasons behind unhealthy corporate practices, and even naming the elephant in the room. Heifetz, Grashow and Linsky define a system as “any collective enterprise (small group, organization, network of organizations, nation, or the world) with shared challenges that has interdependent and therefore interactive dynamics and features.”[1]
Subsequently, the authors discuss mobilizing the system, or putting one’s ideas into action. As an example of this Heifetz, Grashow and Linsky point out that in one case a school advisory board was so “frustrated in its attempt to persuade the school administration to broaden its focus to incorporate new technology,” that they decided to take the radical step of resigning en masse.[2]
Third, Adaptive Leadership recommends reflection. According to a South African Christian leader I spoke with last year, the practice of serious reflection is grossly lacking among many emerging leaders today. No wonder there is very little manifestation of effective leadership within the low-income communities where I serve. One remarkable biblical model of reflection is Nehemiah, who, after being informed about the broken walls of Jerusalem, took what seems like a whole day to reflect before launching into prayer. No wonder he was able to lead an outstanding reconstruction effort for the beloved city.
Next, Adaptive Leadership, promotes the importance of connection. Specifically, connecting with one’s purpose as a leader. Jim Collins explains the same idea using different words. According to him, a level five (or adaptive) leader is “incredibly ambitious, but their ambition is first and foremost for the cause, for the organization and its purpose, not themselves.”[3] Connection also highlights the need to courageously engage the problem regardless of whether this is personal, corporate or community related. Ultimately, connection refers to really knowing people by spending quality time and speaking from the heart, thereby reinforcing the first part of Warner and Wilder’s four-fold RARE Leadership model: building relationships.
In closing, Heifetz, Grashow and Linsky urge leaders to thrive through self-care. They say this can be fleshed out through growing one’s personal network beyond the organization one leads to confidants and other communities outside of work.[4] According to the authors, thriving also includes self-renewal through pursuing work-life balance, gratitude that is rooted locally and cultivated daily, and an outlook that is both realistic and optimistic.
Adaptive Leadership reminds me of the maxim, blessed are the flexible for they shall not be broken. Yet, this is a type of flexibility that is rooted in time-tested principles that result in real change. Following his near-death experience, Jonah changed his mind about responding to God’s call and helped lead Nineveh back to God. Likewise, contemporary leaders need to adapt, especially to the promptings of God’s Spirit and the principles of scripture, to effectively wield the influence needed to move our world forward.
[1] 307
[2] 109
[3] Jim Collins, Level Five Leadership, Accessed at https://www.jimcollins.com/concepts/level-five-leadership.html#:~:text=Level%205%20leadership%20is%20a,and%20its%20purpose%2C%20not%20themselves.
[4] 289,290
About the Author
Henry Gwani
Follower of Jesus, husband, father, community development practitioner and student of leadership working among marginalized communities in South Africa2 responses to “Blessed are the flexible”
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Hi Henry. Thank you for your engagement with the leadership work of Heifetz et.al. I really appreciated your summary of their key concepts and sections and your naming of Nehemiah and Jonah’s leadership journeys and how they lift up some of the concepts in this book. I’m curious is there is one section of the book that particularly spoke to your current leadership work that you are wanting to more specifically make use of and/or apply?
Henry, I loved reading your blog. Your summary of the book in the way of your takeaways is great. I particularly noted your comments about leaders’ failure to practice the discipline of reflection: “the practice of serious reflection is grossly lacking among many emerging leaders today.” What are some practical benefits that leaders would gain through the practice of reflection?