Adaptive Leadership and Cultures

Two case studies exploring how Tennis Australia and Aurecon have used adult (vertical) development to support leadership development

Many constructive developmental theorists have argued that resolution of the adaptive challenges now faced by organisations, communities and globally, requires leadership from people who
have reached Loevinger’s post-conventional stages of adult psychological development.

This paper by Nicola Caroline (Niki) Vincent explores three studies that contribute to a more sophisticated understanding of the factors that may facilitate or inhibit consciousness development (particularly to post-conventional stages). Implications for the design of, and selection of participants for, leadership programs to promote such development are discussed, and future research directions are indicated.

This article explores the difference between sense and meaning making. From the article:

Meaning-making and sense-making are often used synonymously, but they are different. Sense-making is about making sense of the external world, while meaning-making is about relating it to our inner world. Asking the question: “What does this situation mean to me?”

A simple way of looking at it is as follows. If sense-making asks, “What is going on?”, meaning-making asks, “What are the implications of what’s going on for me (or my family or my organization)?”

An interesting exploration of Donald Trump through the lens of adult development. 

'Growth is possible only when we can see ourselves not as right or wrong, good or bad, strong or weak, but as all of who we are. We won’t change Trump, and he won’t change himself, but we can grow ourselves. The more we see and acknowledge — our best, our worst and all the shades in between — the less we feel compelled to defend our own value, and the more value we can add in the world'.

Jennifer Garvey Berger describes stages of adult development. I've been exploring this as part of building my own capacity for growth and to support my role as a practitioner. My head explodes when I think about helping build organisational capacity (i.e. evolving from compliant dependence to an achievement culture), but then recognising that 60% of the people I'm working with are socialised....

An interview with Jennifer Garvey Berger exploring the imperative for adaptive leaders and opportunities for personal growth. 

“Who am I being right now and is that the person I want to be?” 

"Our lives are living out answers to questions we don’t notice that we’re asking. Asking different questions helps us lead different lives".

Some practical examples and guidance for learning from the balcony and the dance floor. This skillset is part of helping build capacity (i.e. vertical development) and offers me a new term - Complex Adaptive Leaders (CAL).

CAL capacity 2 - Courage to take sensible risks and to lead others to do so is available here - 

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/cal-capacity-2-courage-take-sensible-risks-lead-do-so-garvey-berger/

Adult development as a form of anti-fragility and potential risks for organisations that focus on providing, stability, 'comfort' and certainty.

Nick Petrie shares the 7 most important things he has learned about vertical development.

1. Leaders find it helpful on many levels

2. It is just a model: it is not ‘the answer’ or the only way of understanding humans.

3. Hold the stages lightly

4. You are too complex for any assessment to capture

5. You are not at a stage

6. Higher stages are not ‘better’

7. There are heroes at all stages

An incredible resource to support vertical leadership development.

Our Real Work, Wendell Berry

It may be that when we no longer know what to do
we have come to our real work,
and that when we no longer know which way to go
we have come to our real journey.
The mind that is not baffled is not employed.
The impeded stream is the one that sings.

A great overview of the Subject/Object Interview process. If you want to read further, I suggest purchasing Jennifer's fantastic book, 'Changing on the Job' or if you want to develop your leadership/coaching practice, consider joining the Growth Edge Coaching program.

This draft chapter explores the intricacies of the Subject-Object Interview, the measure of Robert Kegan’s theory of adult development and thus one of the primary means of assessing self-authorship. The author focuses on using the interview as an intervention to assist adults in moving toward self-authorship and the dilemmas involved in doing so.

In this White paper, Nick Petrie explores the concept of vertical development and some of the insights he has gained from his experiences supporting leaders to build their capacity to lead through complexity.

A key idea for me is the situational approach, with great leaders having range; being able to flex between developmental stages, so they can respond to the needs of the role/task. 

Nick also talks about what can occur if their is misalignment between organisational stage of cultural evolution, role complexity and the individual's stage of development. 

Stages of Adult Development 

A complexity check in is a great way to help teams develop their ability to see the system(s) and each other in new and helpful ways. 

1. Start the meeting by asking a question (i.e. What surprised you this week? Where are we failing that we didn't expect to?)

2. Give everyone time to consider their response (think/write/post-it)

3. Allow everyone to share their answer

4. Ask the group what they noticed in the responses. What patterns did they see? What things were common?

5. Determine the outlier (perspectives/responses). 

6. Ask the group to identify what we're not seeing or what we're not talking about.

Questions 5 and 6 are harder, but as the group gets used to exploring these questions, they will get better at seeing patterns and understanding human systems.