You can’t fix systemic issues...

...with linear thinking

A core topic in many of our business and leadership coaching sessions has been the challenge of solving many of the systemic issues 21st Century leaders face. Whether it be in the non-profit space, the small business space or the large corporate space, leaders are challenged to fully understand the root causes of the issues impacting their organizations. From a leadership perspective, one of the key challenges is how the leaders themselves think about the issues. Hence, it was in one such coaching session that the title of this discussion was born.

From the very beginning of our own leadership journey, we’ve embraced and supported the value of systems thinking. Our Business Alignment Maturity Model? is based on the concept as are the five Missing Piece books we’ve published highlighting the application of systems thinking at an organizational level. From Chapter One of our book, Finding the Missing Piece: The Impact of Effective Communications on Sustainable Success, we define systems thinking as a holistic approach focusing on how a system’s components work together, how a system operates over time as well as how it operates in the context of other larger systems.

When we look at linear thinking, then, in the context of the above definition, we can start to understand why linear thinking alone cannot solve systemic issues. Linear thinking is a way of thinking logically based on rationality, logic, and rules and typically follows a sequential pattern and progression. The implication is that one completes a step in problem-solving an issue before moving to the next step. When we consider the most common approaches to solving organizational issues, we think of solving for effectiveness and efficiency in a manner not unlike what is taught in most process improvement training. However, when applied to systemic issues, we can quickly see that a step-by-step process has limited value as each step in the linear thinking methodology has multiple impacts within the system.

Since the late 1960s, the idea of lateral thinking came into play as another way to look at how to address systemic issues. Lateral thinking is a holistic, non-linear thinking style that relies on flexibility in searching for creative ideas and original solutions. It is associated with creativity and innovation, generating and exploring many different ideas to restructure existing ideas and knowledge to develop original models and approaches. In the example above where leaders lean heavily on driving effectiveness and efficiency, we introduce a third complementary measured variable into the discussion. We ask leaders how they are measuring adaptability alongside effectiveness and efficiency. More often than not, we are met with silence suggesting a natural comfort with linear thinking and a lack of understanding in the importance of lateral thinking.

This discussion is not to say that linear thinking is bad. Quite the opposite is true. However, the limitations of linear thinking, when applied to the systemic issues organizational leaders face every day, must be recognized and augmented with developing strong lateral thinking, especially within the senior leadership ranks. In Chapter 10 of their book, Ignition, Gordy Curphy, Dianne Nilsen and Robert Hogan speak to the concept of first loyalty on the senior leadership team. It means that the senior leadership team’s first loyalty is to each other over the teams they lead. The implication of not having first team loyalty is that each leader naturally focuses on linear thinking within their own team to optimize their function while the CEO/Executive Director/Business Owner hopes that it all adds up to a systemic solution for the organization. Two hard truths to embrace; Hope is never a viable strategy and cumulative linear thinking rarely, if ever, solves systemic issues!

How well are you thinking systemically to achieve desired results? If you are not sure, we can help!

Lead Well!