A Story
The boardroom was getting increasingly tense. CEO Liz Drum was sure this board meeting was going to end as frustratingly as too many previous ones over the past year. Seventeen board members and three staff. Two hours into the conversation and Liz was convinced the board members were having multiple conversations—simultaneously!
Tex was representative of one of the conversations. “I just don’t understand why we can’t get this problem fixed. We’ve talked about it before, and frankly I was frustrated when I saw it on the agenda again. Three months ago, we hashed this out and I assumed Liz had enough information to put this to bed. Am I missing something?”
Tex’s frustration and tidy solution was too much for Adriana. She looked up from her doodling and faced Tex squarely, took a deep breath, and said: “Look Tex, maybe you think this is a simple problem, but I don’t. And I doubt I’m the only one in the room who feels this way. I don’t love talking about the same ‘problem’ over and over, but I believe we’re making progress. We’re getting a better understanding of the challenge before us. And Liz implemented one aspect of this challenge using the clarity we got at the meeting you mentioned. That’s the best she could do at this point. We are learning our way into the rest of the challenge. Further, I don’t believe this is simply a board problem. We need to engage our stakeholders. There’s a lot of learning that needs to happen before we can take any next steps.” She exhaled as quietly as she could, looked down at her agenda, and began doodling again.
Pat was sitting across from Adriana and Tex. She sighed deeply. Board chair Bill Turner looked at Pat, and aiming for some levity in the room, said: “Wow Pat, that was a deep sigh. Are you willing to share your wisdom?”
“Well,” Pat began, “if you must know, I have yet a third way of viewing our conversation.”
“Do tell,” Bill said, hoping to prod Pat into adding some light to the heat that was being generated in the room.
“Well,” Pat said again, “I certainly sympathize with Tex and his frustrations that we’re having this conversation again—or still. But I also understand some of what Adriana is trying to highlight. I also don’t believe this is as simple as you want it to be Tex; and I wish I was as confident as you are Adriana that we can learn our way into the solutions by more conversation. I guess,” Pat hesitated, “I guess, I was raised to see that life just has some challenges, and that some won’t necessarily ever go away.
“You might call it a polarity,” Pat continued, “or as my coach calls it, a ‘dynamic tension,’” Pat said with air quotes, highlighting that it wasn’t yet a term that felt comfortable. “What I’m saying is, there are some things that are clearly fixable, like a flat tire. And certainly, there are things we can only understand if we learn more about a challenge that currently lies beyond our experience. But I also believe there are just things in life we don’t fix as much as we just manage them.”
Liz took a risk and spoke up. “I’ve been sitting here thinking there are multiple conversations going on simultaneously. And I think we just heard three voices outlining three different perspectives. Tex, and I suspect a few others, believe this is a technical problem with a fixable solution. All we need to do is take action, and as Tex says, put it to bed. I wish I felt more confident that it was that simple.
Adriana, and clearly some others, believe this is less about fixing something at this point and more about finding ways to learn about and better understand our challenge. And that this surely involves expanding the conversation to some key stakeholder groups. That makes sense to me, yet I also grow weary of juggling so many balls in the air. And I hear Pat’s wisdom that some things in life just are the way they are, and that we need to adjust to navigating between what are perhaps two poles. Bill, I’m wondering if we could break up into small groups and discuss what to do about these three perspectives in the room.”
Different Fruit?
Liz was right to suspect there were multiple conversations happening simultaneously. And this is not uncommon. Many boards, leadership teams, and other groups struggle with the reality that we see life through different lenses. Some of us tend to view things more technically, and that most things are in fact fixable with the knowledge we have at this time. Others of us tend to see things as more complex, and that often the best we can do at the moment is to gain a better understanding of the situation—with a focus on learning. Still others of us tend to see the world through a lens focused on understanding how to navigate and adapt to the realities that are simply part of life. If you recognize this multi-perspective dynamic in your group, don’t stress. It is normal. But what to do about it? If we’re not comparing apples with apples, then how do we determine which is the right fruit?
Well, it depends. All three of the views outlined in the story above, and shown in the table below, are valid. As Pat noted, some things are clearly fixable, like a flat tire. There is a known solution, and the action required is fixing. But what if I got five flat tires in less than a month? The action of learning how to fix the flat tires more quickly isn’t really addressing the larger challenge of why I’m getting all the flat tires. That challenge requires learning more than just fixing. Finally, if I keep my set of tires long enough, the likelihood of getting a flat tire increases. It’s a polarity between saving money by continuing to use my existing tires and spending the time and energy to regularly have them fixed, and replacing the tires so I am not as likely to get a flat tire. It’s a risk I manage depending on my perspective or priority.
Resources that inform my work as reflected in the story above include the work of Ronald Heifetz at Harvard and author Barry Johnson of Polarity Partnerships. To learn more about ways of framing challenges, group decision-making, and leading through change, let’s talk.