Exercising Leadership When Preservation is Progress
This isn’t the first time in recent memory that we have faced a moment of extreme volatility. In the COVID-19 pandemic, the global community was shaken to its core by a devastating loss of life, a deeply destabilizing fear of an unknown virus, and the heartache of sacrificing countless cultural fixtures of community and connection. As a result, many of us felt powerless, scared, and alone – imagining a post-COVID future was difficult, and understanding our individual roles in shaping that future was murkier still.
Yet as dire as that moment was, many were able to find hope, resilience and even creativity in the belief that the moment was a crisis—an explosive, temporary threat that could be addressed through collective effort.
In our conversations with KONU clients, we find that the present moment is challenging in a different way; as we reckon with the uncertainty brought on by an inflamed global political landscape, the escalating symptoms of climate change, and a technological revolution whose greater societal implications are still unclear, many organizations and communities do not see a path for conditions to improve:
“The organizations I support are facing layoffs, funding cuts, and immense pressure. While money is a top concern, I wonder what else we can do to support executives navigating these challenges together.”
“Our faculty group includes opposing political views, and the two most divided members are creating a toxic culture where we can’t get anything done.”
“I built impactful coaching programs with a strong alumni base, but with my bosses getting fired, and funding being pulled, I fear our work won’t survive.”
Do any of these challenges feel familiar or resonate with you? We think that many of us are facing a particular type of adaptive challenge at this moment: the maintenance challenge.
In his book Real Leadership, Dean Williams describes the maintenance challenge as an adaptive challenge in which a given system such as a group, community, or organization...
...is facing a threat that can’t be ignored or avoided and prevents the group from achieving its mission
...does not have the capacity (or power) to address the threat in the immediate future
...experiences a high degree of despair, with people giving up or abandoning the system
In a maintenance challenge, the survival of the organization, community, or project is at stake, and the group must preserve what is most important in the face of circumstances that may not improve in the near term. The adaptive questions facing the organization include:
How to avoid further jeopardizing the values and capabilities the group has accumulated?
How to preserve hope and sense of purpose?
How to stay collaborative and work together?
How to share the sacrifices that come with constrained circumstances?
How to find inner strength and resilience in connection to the mission?
To help a group navigate a maintenance challenge, here are five leadership strategies you can deploy:
To protect morale... Keep hope alive
Offer words of encouragement and reassurance in times of despair to acknowledge the painful difficulties the group is experiencing. Provide anchor points that remind your stakeholders, colleagues and clients alike, that their values, ideals, traditions, and aspirations are worth preserving, especially when conditions feel hostile. Here is an example from Eli Malinsky from the Aspen Institute.
To center on purpose... Uphold the mission and core values
Reflect on your own ideals and aspirations to strengthen your resolve and presence. Provide strong symbolic presence that embodies the values essential to the group’s survival. Chastise people (gently or not) when the group is violating its cherished ideals and aspirations under the pressure of difficult circumstances. In the face of fear and uncertainty, your system is more susceptible to distraction and negligence, which can erode purpose and distance the group from their core values. Guide people back by embodying and modeling clarity of purpose in yourself.
A recent example is the hundreds of thousands of Germans protesting in Berlin and Munich against the far-right AfD, reflecting opposition to extremism and reaffirming Germany’s post-Nazi memorial culture
To preserve trust and community... Mind the small but important details
Create spaces for candid, compassionate conversations where people can support each other through the fears and losses they are navigating and strengthen their sense of community through shared processing. Better yet, soften the lines of authority that might otherwise distance you from your group by joining these conversations. A little goes a long way. The Wexner Foundation’s Alumni Summit in Princeton earlier this month was a beautiful opportunity to do just that.
To hold collective accountability... Reorient people when they give in to distraction
At times, effective leadership requires challenge rather than support. When the group is in denial about the reality and severity of the threat, remind them what is at stake. When the group succumbs to distraction, avoidance, or counterproductive behaviors, refocus them on the work that survival through hard times requires. Help people anchor in what’s essential to preserve and how they can best be effective, even if that requires also sacrificing the purity of some of their ideals for the time being.
To protect resources... Keep destructive forces at bay
Determine what needs to be protected and preserved, identify the plans needed to do so and mobilize the players responsible for carrying them out. Destructive forces can come from external sources such as volatile markets or from internal sources such as interpersonal conflict within the organization. Prepare and enroll your group to build systemic defenses that minimize loss of resources and facilitate the necessary confrontation of internal conflict that centers the group back to their shared values and mission.
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One of the trickiest things about a maintenance challenge is realizing that’s the true challenge in the first place. In the practice of leadership, we often ask “What needs to change in order to make progress?” In times of threat, though, we must ask “What needs to be kept and preserved when progress is simply surviving?” This enables us to identify what needs preserving to keep the life force of our organizations healthy enough to weather the storms of rapid change and uncertainty.