Thomas Friedman’s The World is Flat was a defining look at the dynamic of globalization that enabled the reader to embrace the largest global dynamics and understand how they worked together.  In Failure of Nerve: Leadership in the Age of the Quick Fix, Edwin Friedman accomplishes much the same feat inregard to leadership as he puts forth a different and challenging way of understanding and exerting leadership.  Ed questions the “assumption that human beings function solely according to their nature, gender, or background. Rather, he believed they function according to the position they occupy within the emotional processes of their relationship system, whether family, church, or business. Ed asserted that from the perspective of the emotional process view of reality, the way most leadership programs understand the human phenomenon is tantamount to still assuming that the world is flat” (Kindle Location 72-75).

I found this book to be very challenging because the author downplays much of the more common perspectives regarding the development, exercise, and evaluation of leadership.  Though challenging it was also refreshing because Friedman put a good deal of emphasis on the importance personal development, which he calls “self-differientation”, and relationships.  His thesis is “that leadership in America is stuck in the rut of trying harder and harder without obtaining significantly new results” (Kindle location 139).  When I read his thesis I wanted to agree but did not have an objective reason for doing so.  By the end of the book I found myself agreeing and being able to articulate some reason to do so!

I especially liked his strong emphasis on the leader’s self development.  He calls upon leaders to “focus first on their own integrity and on the nature of their own presence rather than through techniques for manipulating or motivating others” (Kindle location 313).  I resonated with his focus and found it consistent with the focus of the ministry of Jesus Christ as reflected in the four gospels.  His attention to his relationship with his Father and his exacting holiness was the foundation upon which he lead.  The kind of leader, according to the author, that is needed is one he calls the “self differentiated leader.”  He defines this person as being one “who has clarity about his or her own life goals, and, therefore, someone who is less likely to become lost in the anxious emotional processes swirling about. I mean someone who can be separate while still remaining connected, and therefore can maintain a modifying, non-anxious, and sometimes challenging presence. I mean someone who can manage his or her own reactivity to the automatic reactivity of others, and therefore be able to take stands at the risk of displeasing” (Kindle location 341).

The one topic of the book I found most interesting was the one on relationships.  He posits that there is no such thing as a two person relationship (Kindle location 3736) and that relationships are always defined by at least one other person, issue, or event that functions as a third relationship that forms an emotional triangle.  The third relationship serves as a ‘punching bag’ or ‘garbage dump’ or whatever seems to right given the emotional dynamics of the moment.  I thought about this in relationship to the ministry of discipleship.  It is my experience that one on one discipleship is not the optimum formula.  It is acceptable and even appropriate at times, but most often, an additional person or two serves a positive role.  When there are only two an outside person or issue may become the emotional engine for conversation and action.  That outside person does not have opportunity to provide input and respond in ways that may promote further growth.  When the third person is present, there is opportunity for issues to be discussed with that person’s feedback and the opportunity for ‘pushback’ which most often is opportunity for growth.

A third person, the author suggests, provides an ‘objectifying dynamic” which makes it easier to see problems concretely (Kindle location 3749).  I totally concur.  Often I have experienced how a third voice promotes clarity by forcing the issue within the triangle, rather than a non-present third person becoming the emotional force and even the brunt of the conversation, taking the focus off a present person and his/her problem.  I was also intrigued by how the author described the emotional triangle dynamic in the context of families and children.  The triangles that develop between mother and son for instance, and those that develop in a childhood based on a child’s birth order.

The author writes, “Once formed, emotional triangles (1) are self-organizing; (2) are perpetuated by distance; and (3) tend to be perverse” (Kindle location 3880).  I related his thoughts to Jesus and his ‘inner circle.’  I am amazed to find all three dynamics at work in the relational network between Jesus, James, Peter, and John!  Then I reflected upon my own relationship with two other men with whom I meet with regularly for discipleship purposes.  I found examples of all three dynamics at work at some time!

Have you found the emotional triangle dynamic at work in your marriage?  In your ministry, perhaps with staff?  Are you in a discipleship relationship?  If so, is it with one or more people and how does the emotional triangle dynamic serve as a positive and negative dynamic?

Great book!  Perhaps one of the best on leadership I have ever read!