The Book Tod Bolsinger Wants Leaders to Read
Occasionally, a book hits the zeitgeist at just the right time with the right words. Over the last several years, Tod Bolsinger’s Canoeing the Mountain and Tempered Resilience have been those books for church leaders. But if you talk to Tod, which I have on two occasions for the CBF Conversations Podcast (first interview and second interview), he’d tell you that he’s trying to channel the wisdom of Ronald Heifetz. If that’s not evident enough, check how often Heifetz is cited in both of Bolsinger’s popular books.
Heifetz, the founder of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard’s Kennedy School, has authored numerous books on leadership. However, his magnum opus is The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World. The book focuses on helping leaders understand the nature of change and how to prepare to lead through it. “Adaptive leadership is an approach to making progress on the most important challenges you face in your piece and part of the world, presumably in your professional life but perhaps in your personal life as well,” noted Heifetz. [1]
Heifetz breaks down understanding and adapting to change with a two-by-two diagnosis matrix: Diagnosis/system, Diagnosis/self, Action/system, Action, self. [2] What the scholar is trying to convey is the importance of differentiating between an individual and the organizational system. As we see from Freidman, “The struggle between individuality and togetherness exists in every relationship system, and is a far more basic issue for compatibility in relationships than any other (social science) difference.”[3] At the same time, in diagnosing change correctly, one must also understand how an organization works and functions.
Understanding the difference between technical problems and adaptive challenges is critical to the adaptive leadership system. “The most common cause of failure in leadership is produced by treating adaptive challenges as if they were technical problems,” Heifetz argued. [4] Technical problems have known solutions implemented by current know-how, while adaptive challenges “can only be addressed through changes in people’s priorities, beliefs, habits, and loyalties.”[5]
Another critical aspect of leading an organization through adaptive challenges is assessing the layered complexity of stakeholders, individuals connected to the challenges, and solutions that have an investment in the matter. Heifetz conveyed that stakeholders have critical values (commitments and beliefs), loyalties (to customers or other members of the organization), hold losses of risk (potential loss of status, resources, and a positive self-image), and hidden alliances (other major stakeholder groups). [6] Whether or not a leader is comfortable with it, leadership must require a political savvy with the ability to listen, see, and speak with people, especially people that stand in the way of change.
Adaptive challenges require change, inevitably bringing about a certain degree of loss, resistance, and discomfort. However, adaptive leaders navigate these matters by helping the organization stay connected to their purpose. Healthy organizations have an apparent purpose, while many challenged organizations have many underlying purposes espoused by different members of the organization. [7] The role of the leader is to take the time to fully understand those underlying purposes, even negotiating a new purpose if necessary. Therefore, adaptive leadership will require balancing listening and inspiring people, negotiating and being decisive, relational and administrative.
Heifetz stressed that adaptive leadership is not for the faint of heart. This is difficult work. The leader faces the engrained systems and history of the organization, along with the entrenched values, emotions, and memory of individuals within the organization. “You do not have to go it alone, and you should not. Without moral support and counsel from others, you become vulnerable to your own weaknesses and to opponents who are challenged by your perspective,” urged Heifetz, adding that resilience some from inner adaptability and sustaining relationships. [8]
As an advocate for congregations, clergy, and partner colleges and seminaries, I have accessed just how ill-prepared most clergy and congregational leaders are for adaptive leadership. This is no fault of their own but the failure of institutional education systems to adapt their curriculum to address the inevitability of change. For far too long, seminaries were preparing ministers for yesterday’s church rather than today’s church. The COVID-19 pandemic awakened this reality for everyone. So how will they adapt to prepare leaders for what is next? Luckily, in my role as a denominational leader, we are beginning to ask this question with our partner educators and work together to find new solutions.
The Practice of Adaptive Leadership is theoretical and practice book for understanding organization psychology. Heifetz balances providing deep insight into responses to organizational change while supplying practical stories and exercises for the leader to rehearse.
[1] Ronald Heifetz, The Practice of Adaptive Leadership (Boston: Harvard Business Press, 2009), 3.
[2] Ibid., 6.
[3] Edwin Friedman, A Failure of Nerve (New York, Church Publishing, 1999), 172.
[4] Heifetz, The Practice of Adaptive Leadership, 19.
[5] Ibid., 19.
[6] Ibid., 91.
[7] Ibid., 239.
[8] Ibid., 289.
About the Author
Andy Hale
Associate Executive Coordinator of CBF North Carolina, CBF Podcast Creator and Host, & Professional Coach7 responses to “The Book Tod Bolsinger Wants Leaders to Read”
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Andy: Great summary and analysis of this book. I like the point you bring out from the authors that stress adaptive leadership requires an individual NOT to go it alone, but to surround yourself with wise counsel: “Without moral support and counsel from others, you become vulnerable to your own weaknesses and to opponents…” In this day of remote work and zoom calls, isolation seems to becoming more commonplace. I feel I have to become deliberate in finding friendships and mentorships.
Interesting! I will have to check out those podcasts. You should interview Heifetz! As a congregational leader, how do you envision equipping the church (and its leaders) to be more adaptive?
An essential for leadership preparation is training in emotional intelligence. Having a better understanding of your emotional triggers and how to differentiate between yourself and the organization you lead has tremendous implications for church leaders.
So much about our inability to lead through change is our lack of understanding of how we emotionally, cognitively, spiritually, and socially respond to it, let alone how we read others’ emotional capacities.
Andy, this is a great summary and interaction with many of the key ideas from the book. I appreciate how you reference some implications for the church and its leaders. You wrote, “For far too long, seminaries were preparing ministers for yesterday’s church rather than today’s church.” I agree with that statement. What two or three things would you recommend to seminaries to better prepare leaders for today’s church and culture?
See above for my applicable response to Eric.
If you were to have Heifetz on your podcast, what topic or question would you most want to discuss at length with him?
What ways do you see Friedmans call to understand the tension between individuality and togetherness actually help utilize Heifetz’s adaptive leadership approach? In what ways may it hinder?