{"id":31558,"date":"2023-03-03T14:26:29","date_gmt":"2023-03-03T22:26:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=31558"},"modified":"2023-03-03T14:26:29","modified_gmt":"2023-03-03T22:26:29","slug":"creating-a-culture-of-adaptability-is-key-to-successful-leadership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/creating-a-culture-of-adaptability-is-key-to-successful-leadership\/","title":{"rendered":"Creating a culture of Adaptability is Key to Successful Leadership."},"content":{"rendered":"

The pace of changes has increased significantly since the beginning of the 21st<\/sup> Century, and success in organizations is becoming more about adapting to the environment. \u00a0The challenge of leadership is not just about adapting to the environment but also leading their followers to change and adapt to the environment. People have inertia and resist change; a leader has to overcome this inertia and lead people to change. Some changes are slow and predictable, but others can be both fast and unpredictable, and the leader needs to be equipped and ready to adapt, or he\/she is doomed to fail. The Covid19 pandemic in 2020 was unexpected and disrupted life, and everyone was confused and afraid; this was uncharted waters, and everyone had to figure out how to survive. Heifetz, Linsky, and Glashow\u2019s book, The Practice of Adaptive Leadership,<\/em> is a hands-on, practical guide containing stories, tools, diagrams, cases, and worksheets to help you develop your skills as an adaptive leader, able to take people outside their comfort zones and assess and address the toughest challenges.[1]<\/a> Ron Heifetz is a co-founder and Principal of Cambridge Leadership Associates, the author of numerous books on adaptive leadership, and a consultant in adaptive change.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The authors, who have a lot of experience in helping people and organizations create cultures of adaptive leadership, identify two types of organizational problems or challenges. Technical challenges are predictable and generally have known solutions. They can be resolved through the organization’s usual way of doing things. The solutions to these technical challenges can be routinely attended to through standardized operational processes, procedures, and discretion decisions as necessary. On the other hand, adaptive challenges require shifts in the usual way of thinking, doing, communicating, or relating. There are no known solutions. Drawing this distinction helps a leader to step back and be more conscious of his thoughts and attitudes. Tackling the adaptive challenges requires changing the existing order of things. This calls for the leader to be creative in modulating the degree of the challenge to ensure that uncertainty is sustained but can be manageable. Challenges come with inherent risks, and the leader has to work towards minimizing the impact of the risks and ensuring he\/she maximizes the gains.<\/p>\n

A situation like the covid19 was an adaptive challenge with many disruptions. Leaders had to take steps that minimized risks by adopting protocols that minimized the spread of the disease and losses. Still, at the same time, the adaption of technology that supported remote working helped continuity in their organizations. Many organizations benefited from the lessons learned, and some have adapted new ways of transacting business. A good example is the Hybrid model, where some employees work remotely. In contrast, others work in the office, and the leader has to develop ways of managing the face-to-face group in the office and those working remotely. Razette has helped many organizations navigate these changes and create a new organizational culture that helps such organizations thrive.[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

The authors attribute the failure to distinguish between technical and adaptive challenges as a key reason for difficulties in achieving desired outcomes. Treating adaptive challenges as technical challenges does not resolve the challenges but rather leads to stalled or problematic change efforts. In today’s rapidly changing world, The Practice of Adaptive Leadership can be very helpful but requires building an organizational culture that continually encourages flexibility and a readiness to change. your handbook to meeting the demands of leadership in a complex world. It can be dangerous, difficult work when change requires challenging people’s comfort zone in their familiar reality. Many people will feel threatened as you push through major changes regardless of the context, whether in the private or the public sector. As a change leader, you must develop a culture that allows people to embrace the necessary change. Ron Heifetz first defined this problem with his distinctive adaptive leadership theory in Leadership Without Easy Answers.[3]<\/a><\/p>\n

Heifetz, Linsky, and Grashow have written a good tool for any leader to use in learning and applying adaptive leadership. It is a great read that I will add to my library of reference books. In the words of one commentator of the book, \u00a0“If you want to help your organization, your community, and your society to thrive in a changing world; If you want to mobilize greater progress; If you want to strengthen your practice of leadership; if you want to help others strengthen their capacity, this book is about the possibility”[4]<\/a> The book also equips you to challenge the status quo and to build the resilience of the leader to face any kind of challenge. “Adaptive leadership is an approach to progressing on the most important challenges you face\u2026.\u201d[5]<\/a><\/p>\n

Adaptive leadership is also about working with others to achieve your set goals. The authors emphasize involving other people in the change. People will resist change if they are not involved in the process. Other people will just resist and view your efforts as a waste of time and resources because they were not involved; involvement leads to ownership of the process and active participation. The practice of Adaptive leadership adequately addresses these issues and shows how to get people involved. It provides a framework for individuals and organizations to adapt and thrive in challenging situations. Change requires you to challenge people’s status quo or, in some sense, be disruptive, which is not easy work. As you undertake major changes, the political and organizational fallout can be deadly, but managing change is the essence of leadership, finding ways to make it work. Working with adaptive leadership means reminding yourself that it is okay to fail, that people don’t always have to like you, and that you must let go of the past. According to the authors, the adaptive response to the challenges encountered or presented over time to any systematic efforts towards a goal is leadership. This involves two core processes, diagnosis, and action, which must be understood and carried out within the system by the leader.<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> Heifetz, Ronald A., Marty Linsky, and Alexander Grashow.\u00a0The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World.<\/em>\u00a0(Boston, MA, USA. Harvard Business Press, 2009).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Razetti, Gustavo. Remote, not Distant. Design a Company Culture that Will Help you Thrive in a Hybrid Workplace. (West Point, MS. Liberationist, 2022).<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> Heifetz, Ronald A. Leadership Without Easy Answers. (Cambridge, MA. Harvard University press, 1998).<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> Heifetz. A Practice of Adaptive Leadership. Pg. 1.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> Ibid,\u2019\u2019\u2019pg. 3.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The pace of changes has increased significantly since the beginning of the 21st Century, and success in organizations is becoming more about adapting to the environment. \u00a0The challenge of leadership is not just about adapting to the environment but also leading their followers to change and adapt to the environment. People have inertia and resist […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2260,2654,2081,2657],"class_list":["post-31558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-adaptive-leadership","tag-heifetz","tag-lpg11","tag-the-practice-of-adaptive-leadership","cohort-lgp11"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31558"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31558\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31560,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31558\/revisions\/31560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}