leadership in action webinar
TRANSCRIPT
Leadership in Action
Webinar November 2016
TO BE USED WITH PERMISSION ONLY
What is Leadership?
• Definitions
– Adaptive Leadership
– Relational Leadership
– Collective Leadership
• The NSW Health
Leadership Program
A different framing: Leadership as
a Relational and Adaptive Practice The focus of leadership action can generally be categorised as:
When to use Leadership Action?
• In situations without
a known solution
• Challenges that
also known as
‘wicked problems’
Leadership action is messy!
Observation
Intervention
Engaging in leadership action
• Challenging the status quo
• Challenging deeply held beliefs
• Generating disequilibrium
• Creating uncertainty
• Increasing levels of discomfort
• Bringing to the surface legitimate
but competing commitments
• Acknowledging that people in
positions of power will not provide
answers or solutions.
Change
and
Innovation
Adaptive Leadership (Heifetz/Linsky 2002)
Technical Problems
• Easy to identify
• Often lend themselves to quick and easy
solutions
• Often can be solved by an authority or
expert
• Require change in just one or two places;
often contained within organisational
boundaries
• People are generally receptive to technical
solutions
• Solutions can often be implemented quickly
– even by edict.
Adaptive Challenges
• Difficult to identify (easy to deny)
• Require changes in values, beliefs, roles,
relationships and approaches to the work
• People with the problems do the work of
solving it
• Require change in numerous places; usually
cross-organisational boundaries
• People often resist even acknowledging
adaptive challenges
• ‘Solutions’ require experiments and new
discoveries; they can take a long time to
implement and cannot be implemented by
edict.
Zone of disequilibrium diagram
Reframing the challenge (Heifetz & Linsky 2009)
TECHNICAL ADAPTIVE
BENIGN
INDIVIDUAL SYSTEMIC
CONFLICTUAL
How to reframe
• Notice when people are moving to the left
• Question the default interpretation
• Generate multiple interpretations
• Observe what is going on
• Audition your ideas (Heifetz & Linsky 2009)
Identifying an Adaptive Challenge
Type or Concept Identifying flag
Persistent gap between aspirations
and reality
• The language of complaint is used increasingly to describe
the current situation
Responses within current repertoire
inadequate
• Previously successful outside experts and internal
authorities unable to solve the problem
Difficult learning required
• Frustration and stress manifest
• Failures more frequent than usual
• Traditional problem solving methods used repeatedly
without success
New stakeholders across
boundaries need to be engaged
• Rounding up the usual suspects to address the issue has
not produced progress
Longer time frame necessary • Problem festers or reappears after short term fix is applied
Disequilibrium experienced as
sense of crisis starting to be felt
• Increasing conflict and frustration generate tension and
chaos
• Willingness to try something new begins to build as
urgency becomes widespread
Identifying the technical and
adaptive workplace challenges
Some possible examples:
• Hand washing
• Completion of discharge
summaries
• Email etiquette
• Privacy and confidentiality →
corridor conversations
Leadership action is messy!
Observation
Intervention
Individual Leadership Challenge
A patient presents to their GP with high blood pressure:
Technical solutions Adaptive solutions
• Prescription of anti-hypertensive
medication
• Medication
• Diet
• Exercise
• Stress management
What is
our
current
reality?
What is
our
preferred
future?
What is
our
current
reality?
What is
our
preferred
future?
Personal Mastery
Not enough tension –
little or no
improvement
Too much tension –
stress, burnout
Collective Leadership (The Kings Fund, May 2014)
• Current and future leadership – at all levels – shapes organisational culture
• A collective leadership approach must be endorsed from the top e.g. the board
• Collective leadership means everyone taking responsibility for the success of the
organisation as a whole
• Embed the development of leaders within the context they are working in
• Collective leadership needs focus on continual learning and improvement of patient
care through dialogue to achieve shared understanding about problems and
solutions
• All staff need to adopt leadership roles in their work and take individual and
collective responsibility. There should be a constant focus on nurturing leadership
and culture.
HETI Leadership Unit
(02) 9844 6551
www.heti.nsw.gov.au