Adaptive Leadership – finding new ways!
Krishnakumar Ramanathan
Managing Director and Group CEO S & S Power | Acrastyle | Hamilton Research and Technology | At the intersection of Engineering and Management lie infinite possibilities!
Adaptive Leadership – finding new ways! 132, 21 Sep 2024
These articles explore Management and Leadership. They’re based on experiences, reading, & reflections. Views are personal. Sources are cited. Feedback is welcome!
In an old tale, Nasiruddin Hodja is searching for a key outside his house. A friend offers to help. After a while, the friend asks Hodja if he remembers where exactly he lost the key. Hodja promptly replies that he lost the key inside his house. The confused friend asks him the obvious question; why are they searching for it somewhere else; Hodja replies it is because there is light outside his house, making the search easier!
As the world is rapidly evolving around us, the nature of problems has changed. Consequently, their solutions have also changed. But many of us – like Hodja – prefer to search in familiar territory, or believe in ‘tried and tested’ solutions, for the answers. The problems of today call for customised, and iterative new approaches, called Adaptive Leadership, by Prof. Ronald Heifetz of HBS. This is our theme for this week! Do read on!
As per Prof. Heifetz, problems are of two types – Technical and Adaptive. Technical problems can be solved through directive leadership, based on experience and expertise, by proper implementation of SOPs and systemic review. But Adaptive problems cannot be solved similarly because the expertise doesn’t exist, or because they need work at multiple levels, through an iterative approach (try, review, modify, and implement). Let’s explore typical examples of Technical (TP) and Adaptive (AP) problems and solutions:
As we can see, while Technical problems can be solved by experienced leaders (Top Down), Adaptive problems need to be handed over to multiple teams across the organisation to find a solution through collective intelligence and fine-tuning (Bottom Up). We will also realise that large problems are a combination of Technical and Adaptive, and we will need to work on both directive and collaborative solutions for different aspects of it.
I hope you enjoyed reading this one and look forward to your feedback and thoughts as we build a conversation around this topic.
Warmest regards, Krishnakumar.
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Sr. Operations Leader- GE Vernova SERVICES | Plant Operation| Transformer Expert | Business Dev| Lean Six Sigma Cert| CIGRE WG Member| Lean Manufacturing & Repair Services| EHV Products & Services
1 个月Thanks sharing. It was insightful and agree that most of the complex problems those are key to performance & growth are mix of TP and AP and often we miss to search the solution inside the room where we lost the key and keep pushing energy outside where things are more or less clear. Pure technical or adaptive problems can be solved more easily which are either related to real process or human behavioural topics and mix of both are key to growth but tough to reach on solutions with common approach.
Global Intrapreneur & A Learner!
2 个月Dear Sir, reading your article and thoughts always inspired and challenges me to think differently, the way of explanation of the adoptive leadership with examples is Great, Thank you for sharing!
Global Industrialization leader - Power Transformer Business @ GE Grid Solution | Former Senior Plant leader Grid Automation Business in GE
2 个月Hi KK, Good insights on leadership! Well said !!Complementing to what you said whille we need expertise to solve technical problems we need more of human experiences to resolve adaptive problems .That is why as a leader we need to foster a positive work environment which encourages open communication and cross functional collaboration. The employees need to feel safe about expressing diversed perspectives and opinions.This culture will encourage employees to suggest innovative solutions in a proactive manner for some of the adaptive problems we encounter!!
Motor Design | Engineering | EPC Projects | Commissioning | Installation | Leadership | Siemens | Ex-Thyssenkrupp Industries |
2 个月It is important to differentiate between technical and adaptive challenges which need change in values, beliefs and roles.. Thank you very much Sir for this insightful article!! Adaptive leadership is about being flexible, collaborative and responsive to changes.. Also Leaders need dynamic approach that can help themselves and organisations to navigate through complex challenges and continuously changing world.
Regional Service Lead-South India at Siemens
2 个月Very helpful