Welcome to the New Year, everyone.
I’ve had the great fortune to work over the past few years with an extraordinarily useful yet simple system called Polarity Management, created by one of the most beautiful souls I know – Barry Johnson. Barry has made his life work dedicated to helping us learn to shift from either/or to both/and thinking through this powerful tool that has us identify where a problem we are stuck with might actually be a polarity to manage, and then gives us a clear process for managing it.
In brief, a polarity is a pair of inter-dependent opposites. Each pole in the polarity is value neutral and persistent over time. Neither side is going a way and both have importance. While the poles are value neutral, there is an upside and a downside to each side. When we get out of balance and emphasize one side too much, for example, we can begin to see it’s downside.
So, what we think of as “problems” so often are simply efforts to go from the downside of one pole to the upside of another. Perhaps, you are on a team that is mired in process and discussion and want to scream, “can’t somebody just make a decision!” What you are experiencing may be the downside of an excessively participative leadership – one side of the participative / directive polarity. Start to move away from this unconsciously and the resistance is fear of the downside of the directive pole – too much autocratic decision-making, not getting your voice heard, etc.
There are many benefits from looking through this lens of polarities. It is simple yet powerful, and in my experience working with it in organizations, catches on very quickly and easily. It readily reveals the resistance in any situation as wisdom that needs attention. We turn 90 degrees from conflict and start moving together. It’s affirming and inclusive, yet gets the energy flowing. It shifts us to a move balanced, integrative, systemic orientation.
There’s another benefit, however, which often overlooked. Polarities are a developmental lever. As we grow in our complexity of thinking and vision, one of the things that shifts is how we work with polar opposites. The shift from either/or to both/and thinking is one such step, but it goes beyond that. Through our developmental research we know that our relationship polarities change as our consciousness develops and working with polarities is like a workout of your leadership perspective that can expand your thinking and identity. In our leadership development programs, we use polarities as one of a set of tools to powerfully stimulate development of greater leadership agility.
This week, look at some place in your work where you see conflict or problem. After asking yourself what the problem and desired state is, ask two more important questions. Regarding the problem, ask, What do I value, to much of which can lead to this current situation? Regarding the solution, ask, What do I fear, if I do too much of the solution? Finalize, what polarity might be present here? What wisdom do you retain and maximize from the current situation? What needs to be balanced? Going back to the example, rather than “can’t anyone make a decision around here?”, try “how can we balance participation and taking action to move forward?”
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