Adaptive Leadership: An Overview

Author: Team xMonks | Published on: Sat, 17 Sep 2022 05:57:06 +0000

Work conditions and circumstances are constantly changing. The workload, team members, clients, and available resources are always in flux. This means your leadership and management style must be adaptable.

Leadership and management are distinct. Management focuses on coping with complexity and managing people and tasks, while leadership focuses on coping with change and ensuring the team works collaboratively to achieve common goals.

The most successful leaders are adept at adapting to changing environments and using the appropriate techniques for each circumstance. Poor leaders fail to make necessary adjustments in dynamic settings, leading to chaos and confusion.

The emerging model of Adaptive Leadership embraces change, experimentation, and innovation. The goal is for organizations to empower individuals to face challenges and adapt to a dynamic environment.

This blog will provide an overview of the genesis, model and practice, and supporting research for this theory.

The Birth of Adaptive Leadership

Dr. Ron Heifetz and Marty Linsky developed Adaptive Leadership after over thirty years of research at Harvard University, defining the frontier of leadership training and development.

They both acknowledged that the top-down or hierarchical model of leadership was outdated and unrealistic, with no single individual capable of solving every problem.

Modern corporate leadership is essentially a team sport. Management must collaborate with other leaders and employees to navigate change, achieve goals, and emerge victorious.

Adaptive leadership does not rely on conventional problem-solving techniques that prioritize rules, regulations, and protocol. Instead, it employs innovative, people-centric solutions. While this leadership style has been popular for years, its popularity has increased as organizations face the ongoing challenges of navigating the coronavirus pandemic.

The Adaptive Leadership Model

Adaptive leadership is defined by a framework of three key components:

• Precious or expendable - When change occurs, it's normal for companies to examine which components are still beneficial. Which parts should be preserved, and which should be discarded? An organization's growth depends on its leaders moving on from the past and creating new economic opportunities or ways of operating.
• Experimentation and smart risks - Adaptive leaders recognize that growth is hindered by obstacles. However, they build and test ideas, then learn from any mistakes.
• Disciplined assessment - After identifying new development opportunities, adaptive leaders implement and assess the impact of new systems or procedures. They actively engage with affected teams and make necessary adjustments.

The Five Adaptive Leadership Principles

Like all leadership styles, there are no predetermined qualities an adaptive leader must display.

Here are some principles that may be useful:

• Organizational justice - otherwise known as fairness. Adaptive leaders must be transparent, trustworthy, and willing to engage in challenging conversations. They must also explain facts truthfully to ensure change is accepted by subordinates.
• Character - Adaptive leaders must earn the respect of those they lead. Transparency is crucial here. They must not be afraid to make or admit mistakes, or to abandon a failing project. Additionally, they value diverse perspectives within the organization.
• Emotional intelligence - The ability to recognize the feelings or emotions of others while maintaining control over one's own emotions. Emotionally intelligent leaders respond empathetically to the concerns of others because they separate the individual from the issue they face.
• Development - Adaptive leaders welcome ongoing growth and learning and are not hesitant to explore new problem-solving techniques. The most adaptable leaders also instill comparable creative and innovation principles in their employees.
• Win-win problem solving - Adaptive leaders view dispute resolution as an opportunity to reach a mutually beneficial outcome. For instance, a company may benefit from merging with a competitor rather than investing significant resources to defeat it.

The Practice of Adaptive Leadership

Due to its emphasis on overcoming obstacles to achieve success, adaptive leadership can have a significant impact on a business. For example, an aspiring corporate leader tasked with setting ambitious goals and motivating team members to achieve them embodies this problem-solution dynamic. The potential for significant rewards for the organization and its people would inspire an adaptive leader to accept this challenge. Even if there are failures along the way, the leader remains undeterred and will continue to propel the organization towards its goal.

Adaptive leadership applies to various professions, including healthcare administration.

Adaptive Leadership Action Steps

By adhering to adaptive leadership principles and essential behaviors, your leadership will gain renewed focus and energy. Here are three action steps for practicing adaptive leadership to get you started:

1. Create a list of tasks that can be delegated and encourage leadership in others. Don't worry about being left without a role. In fact, you will increase your significance and influence by fostering junior leadership qualities. What steps can you take today to begin? Examples include the decision to transfer specific, focused responsibilities for a significant project to a junior leader. If you've attempted this in the past with limited success, ensure the outcome and objectives are clear, the junior leader has mapped milestones, the milestones are on a dashboard with weekly reporting and discussions, and you are there to provide support and encouragement.
2. How can team members be engaged to generate solutions for growth and success? If it takes a village to raise a child, then it requires the entire team to overcome certain obstacles. How can you involve people in your creative process? It's too late to become an adaptive leader and include the team when your company or division is in trouble. This is like trying to train for a marathon the day before the event. Practice adaptive leadership today to build your team's strength and stamina - what we refer to as discipline and rhythm - so your team has a better chance of succeeding when action is urgently needed.
3. Re-evaluate how you and your team adhere to processes and maintain relationships. Which responsibilities could be revisited? What processes are no longer used? How about your company's legacy relationships? Be uncompromising in your analysis. Now is the time to examine how you and your organization accomplish tasks and with whom.

Adaptive Leadership: Leadership Theory or Theoretical Derivative

A recent study titled "Adaptive Leadership: Leadership Theory or Theoretical Derivative" analyzed, synthesized, and evaluated the legitimacy of adaptive leadership as a leadership theory. It provided conclusive results determining whether adaptive leadership is a leadership theory or merely a theoretical derivative of other leadership theories such as situational, transactional, transformational, contingency, or complexity theories.

The theory was exhaustively researched, focusing on three categories of study:

• Category 1 (Academic, Theoretician, Experts on Leadership)
• Category 2 (Business/Consultant Leadership Experts)
• Category 3 (Military Service Components and Leadership Experts)

Based on the findings of the aforementioned study, adaptive leadership is currently an accepted leadership strategy that some view as an emerging leadership theory. Results also indicate that adaptive leadership is widely acknowledged as an offshoot of other leadership theories, such as situational, transformational, and complexity leadership theories, which are essential attributes or skills for contemporary leaders.

Additional research by Drs. Glover, Jones, and Friedman (2002) in "Adaptive Leadership: When Change Is Not Enough" developed a framework they refer to as the "Adaptive Leadership Theory."

This framework describes the relationships between leaders and the contexts in which they operate, and provides a concise explanation of adaptive leadership theory that describes adaptive leaders. This paradigm supports Bass (1990), Hawkins (2004), and Schriver's concepts of leadership theory and theory.

According to the results of this research, this category of respondents believes that adaptive leadership is a modern leadership style that has the potential to become a leadership theory in the future. This suggests that, based on the sampling completed in this category, significant research and study must be conducted for this category to fully embrace adaptive leadership as a leadership theory and as a grounded theory.

Adaptive leadership is commonly considered an offshoot of various leadership theories, such as situational, transformational, and complexity leadership theories, which are essential attributes or competencies for contemporary leaders.

Adaptive leadership is evolving from situational, transformational, and complexity theories, as outlined by Nastanski, and is being developed by leadership theorists like Heifetz, Yukl, and Bennis, who are pioneering adaptive leadership techniques in today's modern workplace.

These studies examine the experiences of leaders in challenging circumstances, such as leading in highly complex and hostile environments against asymmetrical and adaptable adversaries.

Today's public and private industry leaders are challenged with problems requiring leadership capable of addressing and resolving complex contemporary issues through collective, collaborative, timely, and inventive solutions. Adaptive leadership provides a method by which leaders can effectively meet the demanding requirements placed upon them to achieve success in endeavors requiring highly effective leadership.

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