freeman p. - polarity management

©2004 Peter D. Freeman, Ed.D., MBA, MSSW, LICSW [email protected]

WRESTLING WITH BOTH/AND:

A Case Study On The Impacts Of Polarity Thinking

For A Corporate Leadership Team

Doctoral thesis

submitted to the faculty of the School of Education

of the University of St. Thomas St. Paul, Minnesota

by

PETER DELANDER FREEMAN

in partial fulfillment of the requirements

for the degree of

Doctor of Education

October 2004


UNIVERSITY OF ST. THOMAS

This is to certify that I have examined a copy of a doctoral thesis by

Peter Delander Freeman

And have found it to be complete and satisfactory in all respects and that any and all revisions required by the final

examining committee have been made.

Barry Johnson, Ph.D. Peter Vaill, Ph.D Committee Members

John P. Conbere Faculty Advisor

SCHOOL OF EDUCATION


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ABSTRACT

Leaders spend millions of dollars each year on books, trainings, and consultants to

help them discover the best ways to identify and solve the problems in their organizations.

When examined closely, many of the problems are unsolvable – unsolvable because they

exist within a polarity. Other words associated with polarity are paradox and dilemma. The

researcher theorized that learning and actively using both/and, polarity thinking approaches,

that intentionally identify polarities in play and use that awareness to understand and plan,

alongside either/or thinking approaches would have a significant, positive impact on leaders

as individuals and their team as a collective. The purpose of this project was to examine what

impacts, if any, based on the leader’s perceptions, occurred following the introduction of

polarity thinking to a corporate leadership team through Johnson’s Polarity Management™

model. It was believed that this study represented a contribution to a relatively undeveloped

stream of research inquiry.

The participants were senior leaders of a leadership team for a division of a major

Midwestern U.S. corporation. The participants were exposed to polarity thinking through

Johnson’s Polarity Management™ model during two training sessions.

Using the positivistic case study methodology of Robert Yin and the theory-building

model of Robert Dubin, the researcher posited the theory that the leadership team members

would be significantly and positively impacted both as individual leaders and as a collective

leadership team in the domains of sense of self; organizing theory of leadership; problem

identification, labeling and analysis; problem solving and taking action; communication;

conflict; and organizational working relationships.

The researcher finds support for the theory in that individual leaders were


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significantly impacted and insufficient support for the theory in that the team as a collective

was marginally impacted. Possible reasons for the discrepancy are discussed. Implications

for organization development practice and further research are outlined.


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TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page

Chapter 1 – Introduction 1

Chapter 2 – Literature Review 6

Psychology: Archetypes, consciousness and the tension of opposites 6 Awareness of polarities – Multi-disciplinary perspectives 20 The researcher’s theory of polarity thinking 37 A tool to facilitate polarity thinking: Johnson’s Polarity Management model 38 A theory-building model for this study – Dubin’s model 43

Chapter 3 – Research Methodology 45

Definitions 45 Domains studied 45 Research design 46 Research questions 49 Units of analysis 50 Initial participant exposure to polarity thinking through Polarity Management™ training 50 Confidentiality and protection of human subjects 51 Data collection methods 51

Interviews 53 Observations 59 Controlled Self-Assessment (CSA) Report 59 Polarity maps and assessments 60 Data collection timeline 62 Data analysis 63 Theory revision 64

Chapter 4 – Findings 65

Acquisition of polarity thinking awareness and skill 67 Previous exposure to polarity or paradoxical thinking 67 The Polarity Management model 68 Training effectiveness in providing the Polarity Management model theory and skills 70 Supports and barriers to learning and using polarity thinking 74

Diffusion 79 Efforts to explain polarity thinking to others 79 Perceived value of polarity thinking to other leaders and teams in the organization 84


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Unit 1: Perceived Impacts on Individual Leaders 92 Sense of self 92

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Sense of self 95 Operating theory of leadership 96

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Operating theory of leadership 98 Problem identification, labeling, and analysis 99

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Problem identification, labeling, and analysis 102

Problem solving and taking action 102 Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Problem solving and taking action 107

Communication 107 Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Communication 111

Conflict 112 Conflict: Understanding 112 Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Understanding conflict 116 Conflict: Personal experience 116 Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Personal experience of conflict 118 Conflict: Conflict Management 118 Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Approaches to conflict management 123 Interpretation for conflict domain 124

Organizational working relationships 124 Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Organizational working relationships 129

Unit 1: Summary and interpretation of findings 129 Unit 2: Perceived impacts on the leadership team 134

Controlled Self-Assessment and other documents 134 Interpretation of the Controlled Self-Assessment and other documents 135

Polarity assessments of the leadership team 136 Interviews with the leaders 146 Supports and barriers to the team’s use of polarity thinking 147 Sense of team self 152

Interpretation of impacts on the team: Sense of team self 157 Problem identification, labeling, and analysis 157

Interpretation of impacts on the team: Problem identification, labeling, and analysis 163

Problem solving and taking action 163 Interpretation of impacts on the team: Problem solving and taking action 168

Communication 168 Interpretation of impacts on the team: Communication 171

Conflict 172 Conflict: Understanding 172 Interpretation of impacts on the team: Understanding Conflict 175 Conflict: Team experience 176 Interpretation of impacts on the team: Experience of conflict 179 Conflict: Conflict Management 179 Interpretation of impacts on the team: Approaches to conflict management 184


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Interpretation for team conflict domain 184 Organizational working relationships 184

Interpretation of impacts on the team: Organizational working relationships 188

Unit 2: Summary and interpretation 189 Comparison of findings from Unit 1 and Unit 2 193

Chapter 5 – Conclusions and Implications 196

Purpose of the study 196 Overview of significant findings and revision of researcher theory 196 Comparison to existing research studies 199 Implications for theory 199 Lack of support for researcher’s theory 199 Limitations of the study 199 Recommendations for further research 201 Implications for organization development practice 201

References 203


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LIST OF TABLES

Table Page

Table 1 Data Collection Methods 52

Table 2 Data Collection Timeline 63

Table 3 Impacts on Leaders: Sense of Self 93

Table 4 Impacts on Leaders: Operating Theory of Leadership 97

Table 5 Impacts on Leaders: Problem Identification, Labeling, and Analysis 99

Table 6 Impacts on Leaders: Problem Solving and Taking Action 103

Table 7 Impacts on Leaders: Communication 108

Table 8 Impacts on Leaders: Conflict: Understanding 113

Table 9 Impacts on Leaders: Conflict: Personal Experience 116

Table 10 Impacts on Leaders: Conflict: Approaches to Conflict Management 118

Table 11 Impacts on Leaders: Organizational Working Relationships 125

Table 12 Impacts on Leaders: Unit 1 Summary 130

Table 13 Green Flags for the Poles of the Candor/Diplomacy Polarity 138

Table 14 Red Flags for the Poles of the Candor/Diplomacy Polarity 139

Table 15 Average Candor/Diplomacy Polarity Quadrant Ratings: 1:1 140

Table 16 Average Candor/Diplomacy Polarity Quadrant Ratings: As a Team 141

Table 17 Average Business Unit/Division Polarity Quadrant Ratings:

Business Unit-Identified Leaders 144


Division-Identified Leaders 145


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Combined Leaders 146

Table 20 Impacts on Team: Sense of Team Self 152

Table 21 Impacts on Team: Problem Identification, Labeling, and Analysis 157

Table 22 Impacts on Team: Problem Solving and Taking Action 164

Table 23 Impacts on Team: Communication 169

Table 24 Impacts on Team: Conflict: Understanding 172

Table 25 Impacts on Team: Conflict: Experience 176

Table 26 Impacts on Team: Conflict: Approaches to Conflict Management 180

Table 27 Impacts on Team: Organizational Working Relationships 185

Table 28 Impacts on Team: Unit 2 Summary 190

Table 29 Side-by-Side Comparison of Units 1 & 2, by Domain

and Response Rating Category 194

Table 30 Side-by Side Comparison of Units 1 & 2, by Domain

and Level of Significance 195


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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Page

Figure 1 Centralized/Decentralized Polarity Map 40

Figure 2 Original Research Design 48

Figure 3 Revised Research Design 49

Figure 4 Computation of Polarity Management Composite Score 61

Figure 5 Candor/Diplomacy Polarity Map 137

Figure 6 Business Unit/Division Polarity 143


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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

In particular, I wish to acknowledge the tremendous debt I feel to Carl Gustav Jung

(1875-1962) whose extensive research and writing on the dynamics of the human psyche

provided confirmation and affirmation of my own experiences in and of the world and

provided an unsurpassed groundwork for my unified personal and professional worldview. I

am proud to carry the descriptor of Jungian.

Dr. John Conbere, my faculty advisor, has demonstrated on-going enthusiasm,

support, and encouragement. Most notable about John is his gleeful love of facilitating the

learning of students and his deep, consistent spirit of human kindness. My respect for him is

tremendous.

Dr. Barry Johnson’s Polarity Management model, which is referenced throughout this

thesis, provides an elegant and useful tool to facilitate understanding polarities and

operationalizing comprehensive approaches toward managing polarities. I am extremely

grateful to Barry for facilitating my entry into the corporation and the leadership team I

researched. Dr. Peter Vaill has made tremendous contributions to the body of knowledge in

organization development. His wisdom is deep. I was humbled and honored that he found my

research question interesting and volunteered his time and energy.

The president and leaders of the corporate leadership team who participated in this

research project were curious, open and welcoming. I deeply appreciate the gifts of their

time, thoughts, and their various contributions to this research.

Finally, I wish to thank my children. The love of my treasured sons, Andrew Mears

and Alex Freeman, was unwavering and indispensable.


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"Two souls alas! Are dwelling in my breast; And each is fain to leave its brother.

The one, fast clinging, to the world adheres With clutching organs, in love’s sturdy lust; The other strongly lifts itself from the dust

To yonder high, ancestral spheres."

Goethe, W. Faust, Part 1, Scene 2, ll. 1112-17

Leaders spend millions of dollars each year on books, trainings, and consultants to

help them discover the best ways to identify and solve the problems in their organizations. It

seems that there is always a theory or approach du jour, a “flavor of the month,” that is

touted as the final answer or all that a leader truly needs to know. Major efforts are taken to

implement the new approaches, the old ways are discarded as obsolete, and yet, the problems

don’t really go away. There is something not quite right in it all, it seems. When examined

more closely, the problems are unsolvable – unsolvable because they exist within a polarity.

Other words associated with polarity are paradox and dilemma. All three describe the

repeating difficulties encountered by leaders in organizations.

Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary (1984) defines polarity as “the quality or

condition inherent in a body that exhibits opposite properties or powers in opposite parts or

directions or that exhibits contrasted properties or powers in contrasted parts or directions”

(p. 909). It defines paradox as “something (as a person, condition or act) with seemingly

contradictory qualities or phases” (p. 853). Finally, the dictionary defines dilemma as “a

difficult or persistent problem” (p. 355). This dissertation will focus on what Barry Johnson

(1996), author of the Polarity Management1 model, refers to as “managing unsolvable

problems,” which inherently embody what is variously referred to as polarity, paradox, or 1 Polarity Management™ is a registered trademark. For the purposes of this dissertation, the trademark symbol will be omitted from this point forward.


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dilemma.

In his book Polarity Management, Johnson (1996) distinguishes between what he

calls problems to solve and polarities to manage. Problems to solve, according to Johnson,

are those that present clear-cut, either/or choices within a known, limited time horizon. The

choices are mutually exclusive and do not interpenetrate in any way. Polarities to manage

are found in those circumstances where both options, although opposite in character,

contribute to an inseparable whole. Polarities, by their nature, present problems that are not

resolvable simply by researching and analyzing the two presented options and taking the

“correct” action.

An example of a problem to solve is in hiring: whether to hire John Smith or Sarah

West. Although a manager might wrestle with the seemingly equal credentials of the two

candidates, neither is in any way dependent on the other choice for his or her future

effectiveness. Sarah is chosen, the problem at hand is solved, and she begins the job. Sarah’s

employer can easily send John Smith on his way with good wishes. John, it may turn out,

might have been the better candidate. However, Sarah’s performance, strong or weak, is in

no way impacted by John’s presence or absence.

Another example might be a purchasing choice between two rival brands of heavy

machinery. The purchaser weighs the pros and cons of the two machines and makes a one-

time decision of one over the other. Again, the effectiveness and efficiency of the machine

chosen is independent of the existence of the machine not chosen.

Although these choices might be difficult, the decision is finished and is easily moved

past. It is small wonder that people gravitate naturally toward these either/or frames of

decision-making. They often fit the requirements of the situation and, however difficult the


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choice may be, they give us the sense of resolution and clear future orientation.

Polarities to manage are far from being as neat. Polarities are found endlessly in

those on-going circumstances where two interdependent opposites are often at play, neither

of which is independently sufficient. Despite the best efforts to select the “better” of the two

choices or paths, eventually, the benefits of the choice not selected become a pressing need

for the individual or organization that made the choice. The problem simply will not go

away. It might even be said that all either/or decisions exist within both/and polarity contexts.

Terry (2001) makes the case clearly:

Because polarities cannot be resolved, because we cannot dismiss one side or meld

the two sides into something new and comprehensive, they can only be managed. The

contrary pulls and pressures never cease. Leadership lodges in finding ways to affirm

and live both poles fully and simultaneously. This is no small feat because it means

accepting the paradox that results from the polarity. (p. 350)

Some common examples of polarities faced by individuals and organizations are

stability/change, uniqueness/uniformity, quality/cost, part/whole, candor/diplomacy,

centralized/decentralized, privacy/openness, individual/team, employee needs/organization

needs, compassion/accountability, relationships/productivity, and planned/emergent. The

potential list is extensive and people are never free of the need to wrestle with one polarity or

another. And yet, it is a natural, human tendency to act as if that isn’t so.

The researcher theorized that learning and actively using polarity thinking

approaches–that intentionally identify polarities in play and use that awareness to understand

and plan–alongside either/or thinking approaches would have a positive impact on leaders as

individuals and their team as a collective. The purpose of this project was to examine what


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impacts, if any, occurred following the introduction of polarity thinking to a corporate

leadership team through Johnson’s Polarity Management model. The leaders went through

two trainings, an initial one in April 2003 and a second in June 2003. The focus of this

positivistic study is on the perceptions of the leaders. Although a study examining the

potential impacts of polarity thinking approaches on business outcome measures would have

been useful research, that focus was beyond the scope of this research.

The researcher found the focus of the research, polarity thinking, to be of high

importance. In his personal life, the researcher had been aware of polarity and paradox from

an early age and was frequently frustrated when other people seemed oblivious to the

both/and nature of many issues and problems. Working in organizations brought on-going

circumstances where it seemed obvious that there were valuable “missing voices” in the

decisions of superiors or peers and the researcher often found himself naturally verbalizing

the other side of polarities to generate fuller discussion and analysis of issues, facilitate more

effective problem solving and reduce the conflict. Professional training, extensive study of

the theories of Carl Jung, and clinical practice as a psychotherapist further deepened the

awareness and insights related to the presence and dynamics of polarities. In short, the

researcher had been a polarity thinker for years. This was reflected in the choice of the

researcher’s organizational consulting practice: Interface Dynamics. The choice to pursue a

doctorate degree in organization development carried an assumption that the personal

knowledge of polarities and advocacy for the full realities of organizational dilemmas would

necessitate the focus on polarity thinking in the dissertation project.

Finally, the researcher articulated a personal life mission statement in the mid-1980s

that has guided choices since. The mission statement reads: To help people and organizations


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function in more effective and affirming ways as they seek to realize their higher potentials. It

was the hope of the researcher that this dissertation research would contribute to that intent.


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CHAPTER 2

LITERATURE REVIEW

If we want to teach and learn in the power of paradox, we must reeducate our

hearts….In particular, we must teach our hearts a new way to understand the tension

we feel when we are torn between the poles….[I] understand that the tension that

comes when I try to hold a paradox together is not hell-bent on tearing me apart.

Instead, it is a power that wants to pull my heart open to something larger than

myself. (Palmer, 1988, pp. 83-84)

The researcher discovered perspectives from various disciplines that contribute to a

basis for exploring polarity thinking in organizations, Jungian psychology, general semantics,

conflict, creativity, education, and organization and business studies.

Psychology: Archetypes, consciousness and the tension of opposites

The researcher’s interest in polarities and polarity thinking grew from personal life

experience, professional conceptual grounding in the theories of Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung

(1875-1961) and work as a psychotherapist. Jung, a seminal thinker in the field of

psychoanalysis and a protégé of Freud, was interested in the dynamic relationship between

the conscious and the unconscious. Throughout his work is the awareness of polarity, which

he typically referred to as opposites, and the dynamic interactions between the two poles of

pair of opposites. This is reflected, for example, in his basic theories about the dynamics of

energy within the psyche (1973), the compensatory interactions between the conscious and

unconscious (1977), and his personality typology (1976a).

The researcher will explore polarity thinking beginning with some theory of what


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occurs in the human psyche as the basis for what occurs within an individual, between

individuals, and among the members of a collective. Jung described that the individual Ego

in its differentiation from the unity of identification with wholeness and the mother, both

through the individuation process (Jung’s term for the emergence of the potential of the

individual toward conscious wholeness from the unconscious into consciousness over the

lifespan) and through the influence of the socio-cultural environment, naturally splits the

consciousness of polarities and consciously identifies with one pole over the other. At root,

as Jung described, this is grounded in the nature of the human experience of archetypes,

which are the universal, psychological propensities of human beings (Van Eenwyk, 1997).

Certainly we humans resemble one another in our thoughts and feelings more than we

resemble other species. Just as dogs differ from cats, humans differ from other

animals….So how is it that we think so much alike? For Jung it was fairly simple. It

is due to the way our minds are constructed. We all share similar genetic material, so

we all have similar minds. Our minds think the same way because they are set up to

do so. These capacities to think in certain ways–decidedly human ways–are the result,

said Jung, of the activity of the archetypes. (Van Eenwyk, 1997, p. 22)

Stevens (1982) emphasized the strength of Jung’s perception in stronger language:

The archetype, as Jung conceived it, is a precondition and coexistent of life itself; its

manifestations not only reach upwards to the spiritual heights of religion, art and

metaphysics, but also down into the dark realms of organic and inorganic matter.

(Stevens, p. 29)

Again, Van Eenwyk,

Jung grounds his analysis of the psyche in some assumptions. The major ones are that


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there are such things as instincts, that are present in the organism at birth, and that

they have the power to command the attention and behavior of the organism. But if

instincts provide the impulses to action, archetypes portray the objects of those

actions. They give instincts something toward which to direct the organism’s

attention, generally in the form of mental representations (images) of that which can

gratify the instinct. It’s one thing for me to have a vague feeling that my life needs to

head in a new direction. It’s quite another to have a sense of what that direction is. It

is the archetypes that draw my attention to those things in my life that can help me to

develop in new ways….

Archetypes play a role both in the gratification of basic instincts and in the

more highly developed areas of functioning. By investing everyday perceptions and

experiences with a value, they lead certain things to stand out from others. When

perceptions and experiences become invested with the power of an archetype, they

command our attention and influence how we orient ourselves. If all goes well,

archetypes lead us into encounters (situations and relationships) that increase our

adaptive capacities. (p. 23)

Archetypes are universal, although their particular manifestation may look different

from individual to individual, culture to culture. It could be said that archetypes act as the

basic “software” that all humans share. The archetypes, as such, exist a priori to particular

manifestations and are not learned or socially constructed. They are, rather, the biologically

based, psychological substrate common to all human beings (Stevens, 1982). Stevens (1982)

commented of archetypes that “they are common to all mankind, yet each person experiences

them in his own particular way” and they “have the capacity to initiate, control and mediate


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the common behavioral characteristics and typical experiences of our kind, even though we

are, for the most part, unaware of them” (p. 39).

The archetypal endowment with which each of us is born presupposes the natural life-

cycle of our species – being mothered, exploring the environment, playing in the peer

group, adolescence, being initiated, establishing a place in the social hierarchy,

courting, marrying, childrearing, hunting, gathering, fighting, participating in

religious rituals, assuming the social responsibilities of advanced maturity, and

preparation for death. (Stevens, 1982, p.40)

These archetypes are universal, present and operative in all individuals and cultures,

bar none. What varies from individual to individual, culture to culture, and the like, is the

particular form the archetype takes. For instance, a study of the feminine ideal would yield

very different attributes cross-culturally in the current world and demonstrate changes within

individual cultures over time that would represent the diverse manifestations of the enduring,

eternal archetype of the Feminine. The manifestations are socially constructed, over time, in

the interactions between the innate, idiosyncratic realities of individuals and their cultures.

However, the driving archetype preexists all manifestations and is unalterable and in itself

formless and unknowable directly (Jung, 1960; Stevens, 1982; Stein, 1998). Conflicts that

exist in the world often relate to disputes over which surface manifestation is the true ideal,

and the potential for connectedness through the underlying, shared archetype is missed

altogether.

The archetypes, according to Jungian theorists, reflect the laws of nature, especially

related to energy (Jung, 1973; Van Eenwyk, 1997; Stein, 1998).

The concept of energy implies that of polarity, since a current of energy presupposes


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two different states, or poles, without which there can be no current. Every energic

phenomenon (and there is no phenomenon that is not energic) consists of pairs of

opposites: beginning and end, above and below, hot and cold, earlier and later, cause

and effect, etc. The inseparability of the energy concept from that of polarity also

applies to the concept of libido [For Jung, this was psychic or life energy and not

sexual energy as conceived by Freud]. Hence libido symbols, whether mythological

or speculative in origin, either present themselves directly as opposites or can be

broken down into opposites [Examples: heaven/hell, God/Devil, Cain/Abel, or the

relative perceptions of some about for-profit and non-profit organizations]. (Jung,

1976a, p. 203)

A key point is that the opposites within these polarities are naturally occurring,

inseparable, and interdependent. The Taoist Tai Chi symbol, , visually represents the

structure of polarities as opposites forever linked and mutually impacting.

Examples of what the researcher might identify as some organizational archetypes are

structure, the leader, and sustainability; all are universals and although handled differently

across organizations, they are all addressed in some way or another. Within these archetypes

might also be envisioned some operating polarities including, but not necessarily limited to,

structure: centralized/decentralized; the leader: directive/facilitative; sustainability:

stability/change. Nonetheless, few people will, without concerted effort, hold both sides of a

polarity simultaneously, as aptly pointed out in Fitzgerald’s quote above, and not everyone

will gravitate toward the same poles of a polarity.

Jungian theorists posit that the human infant is psychologically united with the all-

inclusive mother archetype (wholeness) as experienced through contact with its real-life


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mother (Jung, 1947/1954/1960; Neumann, 1954/1995; Stevens, 1982). An important

developmental task of the child is the separation from this identification with wholeness and

the solidifying of the Ego and the resulting split of the original wholeness into self and other

(Neumann, 1954/1995; Stevens, 1982). Through interaction of the inborn personality

preferences of the individual and the surrounding environment, the person develops a sense

of what is to be considered I, the Ego, and what is considered Not-I. The individual in this

nature and nurture process of interaction with family and cultural beliefs and expectations

develops a psychological aspect that Jung labeled Persona, or mask, which facilitates the

individual’s ability to connect to the collective and sustain that relationship over time. In this

developmental process, polarities are sorted through socialization and the poles within the

polarities given a positively-toned emotional value by the collective environment of family

and society are retained and consolidated in the conscious as ego-congruent elements of Ego-

self, the I, and, by extension, We. The rejected poles of the polarities are naturally identified

as other, become unacceptable, and are naturally repressed by the individual, or the

collective, into the unconscious (unawareness). It must be noted that although the

Ego/Persona might perceive manifestations of these repressed aspects or poles as negative

and threatening, they are not inherently so. Disregard generally leaves these aspects

underdeveloped, primitive and crude, yet full of positive potential to round out and enrich the

dominant mindset. The emotional valuation becomes negatively-toned, in part, because they

are persistently repressed as antithetical to the dominant, conscious pole (noise in the system)

and because of the continued development and over-valuation of the privileged mindset. Jung

referred to these repressed aspects as Shadow not because they are inherently dark and

threatening, but because they reside “in the shadows” outside of the “light” of conscious


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awareness (Jung, 1977).

Neumann stated that,

The learning period that ends with puberty is devoted to cultural education, consisting

in the adoption of collective values and differentiation of consciousness [from the

unconscious/identification with the mother archetype/wholeness], which facilitates

the individual’s adaptation to the world and the collective….

Education and increasing experience of life strengthen the adaptation to

reality, which is more or less identical with adaptation to the collective and its

demands. Meanwhile the collective compels the individual, however different his

orientation may be at different periods, to develop a one-sidedness which is at all

times acceptable to itself [the collective].

Various factors collaborate in this adaptation. Their common denominator is

the strengthening of consciousness and of its capacity for action, and the

simultaneous exclusion of the disruptive forces of the unconscious [italics added].

(Neumann, 1954/1995, p. 398-399)

Germane to the present study, Jung wrote:

The persona ... is the individual’s system of adaptation to, or the manner he assumes

in dealing with, the world. Every calling or profession [or organizational discipline],

for example, has its own characteristic persona....Only, the danger is that [people]

become identical with their personas-the professor with his text-book, the tenor with

his voice….One could say, with a little exaggeration, that the persona is that which in

reality one is not, but which oneself as well as others think one is. (Jung, 1990, p.

122)


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Perhaps Jung’s assessment of Persona being nothing more than that “which oneself as

well as others think one is” is too strong a statement. An important point is that people are

shaped significantly, although perhaps not entirely, by the powerful influences of the

surrounding environment. The Persona does reflect a given culture’s assumptions about the

nature of the world; what connects people and what separates them; what is acceptable

behavior and what isn’t; which physical looks and personal presentation are favored and

which are not; and so on. The formation of Persona is essential if the individual is to connect

to the world of people and adapt successfully in whatever culture he or she operates. As a

natural occurrence and to a significant degree in all persons, the Ego will often over-identify

with the Persona as a quality that is essentially personal and not collective, even to the

extreme point where the individual dissolves into the collective and any expression of

individual difference can feel internally disorienting for a person or threatening to that

person’s collective social context. This certainly makes sense if the issues are connection,

security, and adaptation (Jung, 1976a, 1977). Even the run-of-the-mill independent spirits–

individualists–don’t tend to wander too far from the cultural mainstream. The archetype of

wholeness in Jung’s theory, that Jung labeled the Self, continues to push the individual

toward greater conscious awareness of the entirety of the individual psyche, despite the Ego’s

best efforts to block it. This on-going process Jung called individuation (Edinger, 1972; Jung,

1977, 1990; Stein, 1998; Stevens, 1982). For this reason, the Persona tends to become more

flexible over time–and needs to for psychological health– and the conscious of the person

comes to experience aspects of the broader personality that seemed alien or threatening and

move toward what Jung would describe as a truer, more complete individual personality. As

Jung (1966) pointed out,


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When we analyze the persona we strip off the mask, and discover that what seemed to

be individual is at bottom collective; in other words, that the persona was only a mask

of collective psyche. Fundamentally the persona is nothing real; it is a compromise

between individual and society as to what a man should appear to be. He takes a

name, earns a title, exercises a function, he is this or that. In a certain sense all this is

real, yet in relation to the essential individuality of the person concerned it is only a

secondary reality, a compromise formation in making which others often have a

greater share than he. The persona is a semblance, a two-dimensional reality, to give

it a nickname. (p. 158)

From the leadership literature, Cashman (2000) illustrated the realities of Persona in

slightly different language:

The purpose of the persona is to “protect” us and help us cope. Qualities of the

persona include image, safety, security, comfort, control, fear, and winning at all

costs….

Persona is the personality or “mask” we wear to cope with our life

experiences. Persona is built to “protect us” from external stressors, as well as

internal fears, limitations, and inadequacies. Our external shell can be either rigid and

thick, preventing new possibilities to enter or to arise, or it can be permeable, thin and

flexible, allowing learning and expression of potentialities. (p. 44)

From a different, but related, tack, Argyris (1990) described the generation and

perpetuation of a mindset as the Ladder of Inference. The first rung of the ladder, Argyris

describes as “relatively directly observable data, such as conversations” (p. 88) or other

direct experience from birth on. The second rung is the “culturally imposed meanings” (p.


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88). These, together, are the basis for generation of the persona in the first place, as described

above. The third rung, according to Argyris, is the “meanings imposed by us” (p. 88) on a

particular circumstance that are born of rungs one and two. The final rung consists of the

“theories we use to create meanings on rung [three]” (p. 88). Although in the activity of

rungs one and two, the generation of a persona, people are relatively passive, they actively

reinforce and solidify the one-sidedness of the persona in rungs three and four. Whatever

does not fit is cast out as incompatible

The aspects of the personality, culture, or discipline that are rejected as incompatible

with the ideal are not lost, merely repressed into the unconscious where they continue to

operate and push into conscious awareness of the individual or group. These aspects are

Shadow (Edinger, 1972; Jung, 1977, 1990; Stein, 1998; Stevens, 1982). Here is the split

within the personality with the Ego/Persona instinctively seeking to defend its dominant

position, often feeling the struggle with the Shadow to be one of survival itself. The

personification of aspects of the psyche might seem inappropriate at first, except that these

aspects are experienced in dreams, internal dialogues and interactions with others with

human character. The Ego will perceive the Shadow as inferior and contaminating, the

enemy threatening to bring down everything that the Ego has striven to develop. The Shadow

compensates keeping pace with the Ego in its continuing attempts to reach conscious

integration. The struggle escalates proportionate to the level of repression or suppression of

Shadow by the Ego. The Self, pushing for the integration of the whole person, will often act

through the Shadow (e.g., the neglected pole of any given polarity) and will be experienced

even if the consciousness of the individual needs to be thrown into chaos or possessed

outright by the Shadow quality.


16

There is, after all, something individual in the peculiar choice and delineation of the

persona, and that despite the exclusive identity of the ego-consciousness, with the

persona and the unconscious self, one’s real individuality, is always present and

makes itself felt indirectly if not directly. Although ego-consciousness is at first

identical with the persona–that compromise role in which we parade before the

community–yet the unconscious self can never be repressed to the point of extinction.

(Jung, 1928/1966, p. 158)

There is this natural human tendency of consciousness to “lean” in one direction over

the other and as the people repeatedly lean toward a particular pole, they tend to develop and

strengthen their appreciation for its benefits and the skills connected to that pole’s most

effective use (Jung, 1976a, 1977; Myers, 1993; Shapiro & Alexander, 1975; Stein, 1998). We

develop a set of values connected to a particular pole within that pair of opposites. At the

same time, again quite naturally, we develop a sense of the downsides and “dangers” of the

opposite pole, the Shadow, because its opposite-ness seems to pose a threat to our dominant

view. The stronger our embedding in our preferred, dominant mode, the greater the potential

for disturbance from the other side. Shapiro and Alexander (1975) stated this dynamic as the

principle of opposites where,

The relation between the two poles, it is postulated, in [sic] a function of the degree of

“dominance” of the conscious pole. Dominance means a one-sided employment of the

conscious attitude, which prevents the expression of the opposite unconscious attitude

in consciousness. With minimal dominance, when the unconscious attitude

occasionally expresses itself, it does so in a compensatory or complementary way. It

adds to or rounds out the conscious attitude in the latter’s service. With increasing one-


17

sidedness of the conscious attitude, however, the suppressed unconscious pole has a

more opposing and destructive relation to its conscious opposite. (Shapiro and

Alexander, 1975, p. 38)

Action is taken to prevent the deleterious effects of the opposite pole and efforts to

strengthen the preferred pole are redoubled. All seems well, except the needs of the opposite

pole intrude over time in the wake of overuse of the preferred pole, perhaps seen in negative

manifestations, e.g., overvaluing of stability manifests as rigidity and what becomes needed

is the change that represented the opposite, “threatening,” pole related to stability, change.

The more entrenched and defended the dominant pole is, the greater the likelihood that the

disturbance or push back by persons or forces characterizing the other pole will be intense,

perhaps overthrowing the previously dominant pole altogether. This is often at the core of

difficulties presented to the clinician in the psychotherapy milieu. In the organizational

setting, the signs are often apparent, from discontent in some sectors of the organization or

disruptive factors related to untended aspects of the organizations culture. The situation does

not need to be so troublesome.

The tendency toward one-sidedness is inherent in consciousness (Jung, 1976a. 1977,

1978) and is actually an important element in individual differentiation and Ego

development. However, given the reality of polarity the excesses of this one-sidedness leads

to a disturbance from the neglected pole and eventual loss of the strengths of the preferred

pole (Johnson, 1996).

This dynamic is quite natural and predictable and will play out back and forth over

time. The entrenched values of the old regime are swept away by those of the new regime,

which are swept away by a later regime (the original regime returns in new guise). Since few


18

people in organizations have been trained to think and act with polarities in mind, the

dynamic will easily continue endlessly because no one is conscious enough to do things

differently. Ironically, it is likely that the very nature of the pressure to change to an opposite

pole because of the overuse of a dominant pole contributes to the sense that there is an

either/or choice to be made.

Edinger’s (1995) writing on the individual psyche can be illustrative in thinking about

the experience of leaders and organizations:

It is by no means easy to accept the Shadow. It usually involves facing one's most

serious weaknesses and inferiorities. It is commonly thought that the acceptance of a

weakness gives it a reality it will not have otherwise. The Ego operates on the false

assumption that it can decide what aspects of the psyche may be permitted existence.

Acceptance of a weakness is equated with the condoning of it; that is, the Ego acts as

a judge which approves or condemns various aspects of personality. This is the

repressive attitude which split the original wholeness of the psyche and created the

Shadow in the first place. However, for the adult, the psyche in all its aspects is a

given, a priori fact. Since it exists and has its effects, whether consciously accepted or

not, it is greatly to the individual’s advantage to be conscious rather than unconscious

of his own reality. (p. 29)

People will block off aspects of themselves that they see as antithetical or of no use to

their preferred conscious mode, oblivious both to the consequences and the lost potentials for

achieving their highest aspirations by including those aspects (Jung, 1997). Whichever pole

goes unacknowledged will somehow be manifested through other people advocating for

change in that direction or through physical realities forcing the change. This occurs


19

regularly in organizations as well, with the conflicting voices of the polarity being expressed

variously by separate people, by factions within teams (or within the organization as a

whole), between functional groups within the organization, between subcultures of the

organization, between hierarchical levels, between the organization and its client/customers

or the marketplace, and between organizations. Similar to people, Bridges (1992) provided

an example of how:

…organizations do the same thing. The no-nonsense, by-the-numbers operations

division of a large corporation sees its own denied and undeveloped concern for

people as “the problem with the Human Resources Department.” They describe HR

as touchy-feely and full of bleeding hearts, and who think the production objectives

operations has set for itself are less important than “hand-holding” the people.

(Needless to say, the HR department does its own reverse projections, in which its

denied and developed objectivity and concern for results are discovered in the

“harsh,” “impersonal” “widget makers” over in operations.) That kind of projection

goes on throughout large corporations, as one division or department discovers its

shadow in some other entity that it has to work with: R&D and manufacturing, the

home office and the field operation, finance and marketing. (p. 80)

Bridges went on to state quite aptly that “the surest sign that you have stumbled over

your own shadow is that you find that you are always frustrated by or antagonistic toward

some other area of the organization” (p. 80).

People and teams manifest the same qualities as the individual psyche and quite

naturally favor one pole within a polarity (Persona/Ego), especially if they zealously espouse

values related to the favored pole. A result is that they also naturally tend to be blind to the


20

positive potentials and try to limit the influence of the opposite pole. The opposite pole, as

Shapiro and Alexander illustrated above, acts as the disturbing Shadow to their preferred

perspective that is understandably avoided or repressed. This is the significance of Heraclitus

statement that “Character is destiny.” This researcher believes this to be true generally.

However, conscious and intentional discovery and integration of the non-preferred poles of

any polarity enable the leaders and organization to operate in that realm where “when the

unconscious attitude occasionally expresses itself, it does so in a compensatory or

complementary way. It adds to or rounds out the conscious attitude in the latter’s service”

(Shapiro & Alexander, 1975, p. 38). This is far more challenging than it might seem. To

break from the collective Persona that includes assumptions and beliefs, and well-established

interpersonal and operational structures, puts an individual or minority of group members at

risk for being marginalized by the majority or for missing out on the rewards based on the

existing organization/functional area/team culture. Individual confrontation with and

integration of the Shadow, while very challenging, may pale in comparison to the courage

needed for an individual pushing for fundamental changes in a organization or team culture’s

assumptions, protocols, and reward structures.

Awareness of polarities: Multi-disciplinary perspectives

Vaill (1990) wrote of the reality of organizational management:

There has been more of this rationalistic analysis, design, and control of human

systems in the last fifty years in America than possibly anywhere else in possibly all

of the rest of human history. So here is a research question for someone to take a

crack at: Why in the face of all this do those living in the midst of these systems,

including managers, continue to find them mysterious, recalcitrant, intractable,


21

unpredictable, paradoxical, absurd, and–unless it’s your own ox getting gored–funny?

This is the “grand paradox of management.” (p. 77)

Vaill continued,

Paradoxes are conflicts and collisions among apparent truths. Paradoxes refuse to

dissolve or be reconciled by such normal methods as getting more facts or being more

careful with logic. (p. 80)

Perhaps the clues may be found in the reality of polarities at the root of all of the

unsolvable problems facing managers and organizations. In circumstances where cause and

effect, either/or thinking predominates, the natural expectation is that finding the one-best

solution will eliminate the problem. If the one best solution didn’t suffice then it clearly

wasn’t the one best solution. In fact, attention to a particular cause and supposed best

solution often eliminates a counter balancing factor which is effectively opposite in character

that will become the “ruin” of the single answer approach. It’s predicable, albeit frustrating

and maddening. It’s probably a polarity at work.

The awareness of the fullness of polarity coming to the fore in a natural cyclical

pattern has been expressed in numerous ways throughout time. Death and rebirth images and

rites have been part of religious practice universally from earliest human social history.

Heraclitus said “Eventually everything will run into its opposite” in a naturally occurring

self-correcting phenomenon called enantiodromia. Like it or not if significantly ignored,

attributes of the non-preferred pole of any polarity will forcefully emerge to balance the

situation. An uncomfortable thought, when people are trying to discover certainty and

predictability, unless the predictability of the in pressing dynamic of the “missing voice” of a

polarity is made conscious, with a resulting search for the full polarity factors and action with


22

conscious intent to realize both poles’ potentials. Again, not simple, as Firth and Leigh

(1998) pointed out:

Perhaps if we felt we had the time to take a step back and reflect on a larger view that

encompasses both sides of such paradoxes [polarities], we might see creative

solutions that are invisible at the moment. As it is, the speed at which things are

moving only adds to the pressure we are under to make quick decisions. The

paradoxes become unbearable and we hasten to act decisively, choosing one side or

the other. The problem is that consistently selecting one aspect over the other the

other in the end creates more tension, not less. The impulse we have to deal with

paradox by taking ‘easy,’ pressurized, either/or decisions is understandable. It appears

to resolve dilemma. It keeps moving things along. It means that we appear

unequivocal and in control. The other option, embracing the paradox, would leave us

open to complexity, ambiguity and not-knowing. We’d be mad to try it. (p. xv)

Mad perhaps, and far wiser. The factors that support either/or thinking then are

twofold, the natural tendency of human consciousness to split polarities and identify

primarily with a dominant pole (ego/persona: good/right/safe/effective) and unconsciously

ignore or actively repress the opposite pole (shadow: bad/wrong/dangerous/ineffective), and

the pressures to produce quick, direct and simple decisions and actions. Ironically, both

tendencies put people at odds with the realities they need to adapt to daily.

From the field of general semantics, Hayakawa (1949) described how,

…in such an expression as “We must listen to both sides of every question,” there is

an assumption, frequently unexamined, that every question has, fundamentally, only

two sides. We tend to think in opposites, to feel that what is not “good” must be


23

”bad” and what is not “bad” must be “good”….This tendency to see things in terms of

two values only, affirmative and negative, good and bad, hot and cold, love and hate,

may be termed the two-valued orientation. (p. 222)

Conflict around polarities is ubiquitous and natural. People are not easily able to

maintain their grip on the exclusive, positive valuation of one side of an issue because as

Cloke and Goldsmith (2000), writers in the field of conflict resolution, pointed out that,

Paradoxes and polarities are part of nature and human thinking. It is impossible to

resolve the “conflict” between up and down, light and dark, plus and minus, inner and

outer, without at the same time abolishing both. The same can be said about life and

death, pleasure and pain, good and evil, right and wrong, truth and falsehood. It is

impossible to eliminate the one without eliminating the other….By accepting our

problems, learning from them, wrestling with them and at the same time not

immediately solving them, we are able to discover the paradoxes they express. If we

become aware of these paradoxes and do not try to reduce them to a single solution, if

we are open to learning and allowing the interplay of diverse and contradictory

processes, we can enrich our lives immeasurably–and come to resolution and

transformation. (Cloke & Goldsmith, p. 207)

Not an easy shift for most people socialized in a culture that emphasizes “right”

answers based on scientific inquiry. Charles Handy (1995) said of his own mind shift:

I no longer believe in A Theory of Everything, or in the possibility of perfection.

Paradox I now see to be inevitable, endemic, and perpetual. The more turbulent the

times, the more complex the world, the more paradoxes there are. We can, and

should, reduce the starkness of some of the contradictions, minimize the


24

inconsistencies, understand the puzzles in paradoxes, but we cannot make them

disappear, or solve them completely, or escape from them. Paradoxes are like the

weather, something to be lived with, not solved, the worst aspects mitigated, the best

enjoyed and used as clues to the way forward. Paradox has to be accepted, coped

with, and made sense of, in life, in work, in the community, and among nations. (p.

12)

Hampden-Turner (1990) in writing about dilemmas stated that,

Just as “choice” hides within it two contrasting ideas, that of separating and that of

combining values, so all values are really contrasts among which there are necessary

dilemmas. Dilemma is from Greek meaning “two propositions.” When we try to

create wealth there are always contrasting and, hence, dual propositions laying claim

to our allegiance. These seemingly “opposed” propositions are converging upon us

simultaneously. If we give exclusive attention to either one in the pair, the other is

likely to impale us….

Value creation lies in the capacity of acknowledging those dilemmas which

arise from competing and competing claims, and of combining both “horns” of these

dilemmas in a resolution which enhances all values in contention. (p. 3)

From the field of creativity studies, Rothenberg (1979) added that the reality of

polarities and the conflicts generated is natural, albeit discomfiting.

Psychological conflict is universal and ubiquitous in human experience. To say that

psychological conflict is necessary for janusian thinking and for both the artistic and

scientific processes is not to connect psychopathology with creativity. Psychological

conflict is not intrinsically pathological or inevitably connected to illness. Indeed,


25

such conflict is so ubiquitous and, in some ways, such an appropriate response to the

complexity and flux of human experience that it is objectively best described only as

a state of being. This state of being is not much different for the creative person than

it is for the rest of us: it is experienced both consciously and unconsciously as a sense

of particular inner forces in opposition with each other, an opposition that sometimes

abates, or is shunted away, or is resolved, or is replaced, or continues throughout the

course of life. (Rothenberg, p. 261)

The author discussed his conceptualization of janusian thinking as,

…a term based on the qualities of the ancient Roman deity Janus, the god whose

many faces looked in several opposite directions at the same time. Janusian thinking

consists of actively conceiving two or more opposite or antithetical ideas, images, or

concepts simultaneously. Opposite or antitheses are conceived as existing side by side

or as equally operative and equally true. Such thinking is highly complex. It is

intrinsic to creativity and it operates widely in all types of creative processes,

intellectual and pragmatic as well as artistic. It is different from dialectical thinking,

ambivalence, and the thought processes of children or schizophrenics. (Rothenberg,

1979, p. 55)

Again, this is not simple. It might even be ventured to say that it is impossible to

embrace polarities without experiencing in some way, what Jung would call, a symbolic

death of the Ego (Jung, 1977, 1978, 1990): some measure of sacrifice and suffering comes

with the paradigm shift. Parker Palmer (1998), a writer in the field of education, wrote:

We will not be able to teach in the power of paradox until we are willing to suffer the

tension of opposites, until we understand that such suffering is neither to be avoided


26

nor merely to be survived but must be actively embraced [italics added] for the way it

expands our own hearts.

Without this acceptance, the pain of suffering will always lead us to resolve

the tension prematurely, because we have no reason to stand the gaff. We will ask and

answer our own questions in the silence of the classroom (thus creating more silence);

we will ride roughshod over the dissenting voice that confounds our learning plan

(even though we said we welcomed questions); we will punish the student who writes

outside the assignment (no matter how creatively) to bring him or her back in line. (p.

85)

The shift according to Schumacher, (1973, as quoted in Palmer, 1998) requires that

people (leaders) draw on a resource, perhaps not previously considered:

Through all our lives we are faced with the task of reconciling opposites which, in

logical thought, cannot be reconciled….How can one reconcile the demands of

freedom and discipline in education? Countless mothers and teachers, in fact, do it,

but no one can write down a solution. They do it by bringing into the situation a force

that belongs to a higher level where opposites are transcended–the power of

love….Divergent problems, as it were, force us to strain ourselves to a level above

ourselves; they demand, and thus provoke the supply of, forces from a higher level,

thus bringing love, beauty, goodness and truth into our lives. It is only with the help

of these higher forces that the opposites can be reconciled in the living situation. (p.

84)

A few organizational scholars have explored the realities of organizational life and

the impacts of polarities.


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Morgan (1986) in his book, Image of Organization, observed, without a Jungian

orientation, that,

Human beings have a knack of getting trapped in webs of their own creation….The

idea of organizations as psychic prisons … joins the idea that organizations are

psychic phenomena, in the sense that they are ultimately created and sustained by

conscious and unconscious processes, with the notion that people can actually

become imprisoned or confined by the images, ideas, thoughts, and actions to which

these processes give rise. (p. 199)

With good reason, managers have with in their conceptual knapsack a way in which

to understand paradoxes and polarities and their manifestations through systems theory that

inherently focuses on the interactions of all factors internal and external that exist in the

complexity of organizational contexts. Vaill (1990) pointed out that,

“Systems thinking” is about the nearest thing we have in the management field to a

direct embrace of and confrontation with paradox. Systems thinking does not flinch

from complexity and is willing to be surprised by the “counterintuitive” character of

many organizational events and processes. [However,] systems models aren’t much

better defended than any other models against two kinds of chronic and intense

potentiality for paradox…permanent whitewater…[and] the action taker’s own

presence in the model. (pp. 78-79)

Quinn (1988) described the challenges facing managers and the need to develop a

new form of managerial mastery:

One of the most difficult things for most of us to understand is that organizations are

dynamic. Particularly as one moves up the organizational ladder, matters become less


28

tangible and less predictable. A primary characteristic of managing, particularly at

higher levels, is the confrontation of change, ambiguity, and contradiction. Managers

spend much of their time living in fields of perceived tensions. They are constantly

forced to make trade-offs, and they find that there are no right answers. The higher

one goes in an organization, the more exaggerated this phenomenon becomes. One-

dimensional bromides (care for people, work harder, get control, be innovative) are

simply half-truths representing single domains of action. What exists in reality are

contradictory pressures, emanating from a variety of domains. The fact is important

because much of the time the choice is not between good and bad, but between one

good and another or between two unpleasant alternatives. In such cases the need is for

complex, intuitive decisions, and many people fail to cope successfully with the

resulting tension, stress, and uncertainty. (p. 3)

Burns (1999) identified nine polarities in six integrated health systems in Illinois and

commented that,

…the essence of leadership-from the perspective of polarity management-thus

becomes managing ambiguities and multiple directions. Confronting these seemingly

contradictory ideas provides a fruitful method to sort out confusions regarding the

organization’s direction and create meaning for the organization’s participants. (p. 27)

Hirschhorn (2001) stated that,

to succeed, the project manager [in high-tech companies] should be aware of these

polarities, learn skills for creating “win-win” solutions when faced with them, and

learn to identify the moment when one or another polarity has created unexpected

tension in the flow of the work. (p. 16)


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Collins and Porras (2002), in their already classic study of enduring visionary

companies described those companies as,

…premier institutions–the crown jewels–in their industries, widely admired by their

peers and having a long track record of making a significant impact on the world

around them….Visionary companies prosper over long periods of time, through

multiple product life cycles and multiple generations of active leaders. (p. 1-2)

The authors identified a number of common attributes of these companies. One such

characteristic is the ability to engage in polarity thinking (author’s term). They addressed key

myths in organizational thinking. Among the 12 myths that the authors discussed is that “you

can’t have your cake and eat it too.” They contended that the reality is that:

Visionary companies do not brutalize themselves with the “Tyranny of the OR”–the

purely rational view that says you can have either A OR B, but not both. They reject

having to make a choice between stability OR progress; cult-like cultures OR

individual autonomy; home-grown managers OR fundamental change; conservative

practices OR Big Hairy Audacious Goals; making money OR living according to

values and purpose. Instead, they embrace the “Genius of the AND”–the paradoxical

view that allows them to pursue both A AND B at the same time. (p. 10)

They went on to say that, “one of the most important steps you can take in building a

visionary company is not an action, but a shift in perspective” (p. 40). The shift in

perspective is one of polarity thinking, what the authors referred to above as the “Genius of

the AND.” As emphasized earlier, this is no simple accomplishment.

We’re not talking about mere balance here. ”Balance” implies going to the midpoint,

fifty-fifty, half and half. A visionary company doesn’t seek balance between short-


30

term and long-term, for example. It seeks to do very well in the short-term and very

well in the long-term. A visionary company doesn’t simply balance between idealism

and profitability; it seeks to be highly idealistic and highly profitable. A visionary

company doesn’t simply balance between preserving a tightly held core ideology and

stimulating vigorous change and movement; it does both to an extreme. In short, a

highly visionary company doesn’t want to blend yin and yang into a gray,

indistinguishable circle that is neither highly yin or highly yang; it aims to be

distinctly yin and yang–both at the same time, all the time.

Irrational? Perhaps. Rare? Yes. Difficult? Absolutely….This is exactly what

the visionary companies are able to do. (Collins & Porras, 2002, p. 44-45)

Drawing on a perspective of Oscar Wilde that the “way of paradoxes is the way of

truth,” the Price Waterhouse Change Integration Team (1996) wrote of some key principles

for managing paradox:

• Positive change requires significant stability

• To build an enterprise, focus on the individual

• Focus directly on culture, indirectly

• True empowerment requires forceful leadership

• In order to build, you must tear down (pp. 38-54)

Farson (1997) also wrote at length about inherent paradoxes in leadership and

necessity for the capacity for dealing with endless, seeming absurdities:

Every management choice, job offer, or new applicant can appear both appealing and

unappealing. Every deal is both good and bad. That is why leadership is essentially

the management of dilemmas, why tolerance for ambiguities–coping with


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contradictions–is essential for leaders, and why appreciating the coexistence of

opposites is crucial to the development of a different way of thinking….

Opposites not only can exist, but can even enhance each other. (p. 23)

Covey (1996) in writing about emotional intelligence stated that,

Understanding and managing paradox, the dynamic tension between opposites, is the

key to business management and personal leadership. To have enough freedom,

flexibility, range, and reason to deal effectively with the dynamic tension between

opposites, a person needs both IQ (traditional intellectual quotient) and EI (emotional

intelligence) (p. 3).

In this article, Covey identified three paradoxes managers must contend with in order

to lead effectively, “Paradox 1: You must cooperate in order to compete. Paradox 2: You

must be changeless at the core in order to change. Paradox 3: You must celebrate diversity to

achieve unity” (p.3).

Houston (2000) wrote of the need to develop the skills to find balance in the

paradoxes. Included in his descriptions of paradoxes were interdependent autonomy, flexible

integrity, confident humility, cautious risk-taking, bifocal vision, wobbly steadiness,

skeptical benefits, thick-skinned empathy, lowly aloofness, and childlike maturity (pp. 62-

66).

Pascale has written extensively about paradox and polarity in organizations and the

significant contribution of polarity thinking. He described the typical response to paradox

and a potentially more effective mindset:

When disruption occurs, our managerial response is to impose order as quickly as

possible [i.e., secure the dominant, favored mindset]. The old mindset is predicated


32

on the virtues of stability. Organizations are structured to reduce ambiguity;

systematic procedures and a variety of other formal and informal mechanisms are

employed to provide focus and coherence. But does an organization’s short- and

long-term health benefit from these measures?....

Far better than stability is the attribute of resilience. Stability can be defined as

the capacity of a system to return to equilibrium after it has been disturbed; the more

rapidly it returns, the less it fluctuates and the more stable it is. Resilience may be

viewed as the “measure of the persistence of a system and its ability to absorb change

and disturbance.” Resilience entails the ability to continue to function, to survive, and

to absorb disturbances. Resilience entails and adaptive strategy, not a stabilizing one.

Under this scenario, breakdowns produce breakthroughs–an idea with wide relevance

for organizations as well as organisms….

Since the stability view emphasizes equilibrium, within this framework it

becomes all important to pour resources into maintaining a predictable world (a fail-

safe world). On the other hand, a resilience view suggests the energy be focused on

resilience, with the emphasis upon keeping one’s options open (a safe-fail world).

(Pascale, 1990, p. 108-109)

Kenwyn Smith (1984, as quoted in Pascale) commented on the essential role of

paradoxical (polarity) thinking:

For a social entity such as an organization to reflect on itself, it must have a system

representing both itself and the context in which it is imbedded. That’s where

nonequilibrium comes in. A social system that promotes paradox and fosters

disequilibrium (i.e., encourages variation and embraces contrary points of view) has a


33

greater chance of knowing itself (as the by-product of continually reexamining its

assumptions and juggling its internal tensions). This in turn generates a reasonable

likelihood of being aware of the context in which it operates. (1990, p. 109)

Pascale (1990) identified significant paradoxical forces that shape organizational life,

fit and split, a developmental process contend, and transcend:

Fit pertains to an organization’s internal consistency (unity)….Split describes a

variety of techniques for breaking a bigger organization into smaller units and

providing them with a stronger sense of ownership and identity (plurality)….Contend

refers to a management process that harnesses (rather than suppresses) the

contradictions that are inevitable by-products of organizations (duality)….Transcend

alerts us to the higher order of complexity that successfully managing the renewal

process entails (vitality). (pp. 23, 25)

With further application of paradoxical thinking, Pascale’s Seven S Framework

described the seven important categories of manager attention: strategy, structure, systems,

staff, style, shared values, and skills. Within those seven categories, Pascale identified

“contending opposites” that come into play:

Strategy: Planned and Opportunistic

Structure: Elitist and Pluralist

Systems: Mandatory and Discretionary

Style: Managerial and Transformational

Staff: Collegiality and Individuality

Shared Values: Hard Minds and Soft Hearts

Skills: Maximize and Meta-mize (p. 53)


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[Metamize: Pascale stated that in addition to developing greater skill at what we are

already good at (maximize), we can move toward a “higher-order capability” that goes

beyond what is currently known (p. 81)]

Further, as to the issue of balancing the poles of a polarity, and similar to Collins and

Porras (2002), Pascale stated that,

The term balance creates a great deal of confusion. For Westerners, balance means

equilibrium. Of course, from a purely rational standpoint, one can have dynamic

forms of balance (such as unstable equilibrium), but our associations with the term

balance evokes images of rest and stability, not tension and instability.

The problem, from a managerial point of view, is that if you want to stay in

balance, you need to live out of balance. McGregor’s’ Theory Z isn’t a static

compromise between Theory X and Y. Rather, it entails being both X and Y over

time. (1990, pp. 33-34)

Additionally, Pascale wrote:

Paradoxical qualities within an organization have value because they force people to

think outside the box, and to break away from convenient categories and patterns. The

puzzle in a paradox serves as an impulse; it energizes our minds to “jump the rails” in

search of a reconciling insight. (p. 110)

Hampden-Turner (1990) highlighted the challenge for the usual organizational

mindset in that “formal rationality cannot deal with the conflicts between different values”

and that “excellent companies ‘manage values’” (p. x). What did he mean by that? He was

speaking of managing dilemmas (polarities). Hampden-Turner suggested that the typical

mindset of organizational thinking is primarily to find and implement the most efficient and


35

logical approach to manage any given situation. However, the realities facing leaders often

make this difficult or fruitless. He called for a different form of reasoning that embraces

different values:

Let me describe an alternative reasoning process, which we can call encompassing

reason because it is circular, or substantive, reason, because it deals with issues of

substance and meaning to people. This is a binary logic because values are really

differences or contrasts. If a CEO engages in risking, we immediately understand,

without having to be told, that this contrasts with securing behavior or security. Now

companies do not take risks for the hell of it. The purpose of risking is to secure for

that company a better future. We can, therefore, inquire as to how effectively a leader

is managing the two values on the continuum of risking and securing. Over time, if he

manages these values well, the company should be more secure, enabling it to take

higher risks which feedback to enhance security still further. The two values develop

together. There may be tension between those who enjoy hazards and those who seek

more safety, but, in the end, both may achieve more of what they seek. (p. xi)

A leader’s power, the orientation of a professional discipline or the culture of an

organization will naturally focus attention of a group toward a privileged pole in a polarity,

akin to Persona/Ego dominance in an individual. The possibilities represented by the other

pole may go unexamined, ignored, even repressed, until the necessary qualities of that

neglected pole are actively sought to remedy a crisis or, more seriously, erupt into the

leader’s/organization’s consciousness, much like Shadow qualities in the individual will

intrude forcefully if disregarded.

The nature of the archetype of structure as described through the


36

centralized/decentralized polarity is to manifest both poles, complete with the “tension of

opposites” described above. Attempts to privilege one pole to the detriment of the other will

predictably bring about, in time, the dramatic, perhaps chaotic, intrusion of the other pole.

The archetype is nature itself and as such has no concern other than to fulfill its purpose

despite the meager efforts of human consciousness to choose what to favor and what to

reject.

Further support for this awareness, came from Jung, himself, who in writing about the

individual psyche is expressing truths about leaders experiences and organizational life:

The psyche is a self-regulating system that maintains its equilibrium just as the body

does. Every process that goes too far immediately and inevitably calls forth

compensations, and without these there would be neither a normal metabolism nor a

normal psyche. In this sense we can take the theory of compensation as a basic law of

psychic [organizational] behavior. Too little on one side results in too much on the

other. (1985, p. 153)

Hampden-Turner (1990) developed a practical methodology for identifying the

dilemmas facing organizations and determining how to practically steer a course between the

“Scylla and Charybdis” hazards that both/and situations required. He outlined a seven-step

process for reconciling dilemmas:

1. Eliciting dilemmas through humor

2. Mapping the dilemmas

3. Processing the dilemmas

4. Framing and contextualizing the dilemmas

5. Sequencing dilemmas

6. Waving/cycling dilemmas

7. Synergizing dilemmas (pp. 107-134)


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Johnson (1996) developed another practical model for identifying and utilizing

polarities. It is discussed below.

The researcher’s theory of polarity thinking

Through the literature review to this point, the researcher attempted to illuminate the

existence of polarities and the natural tendency of the conscious psyche to ignore or

minimize the conflicts inherent in perceiving and reconciling the opposing values within

polarities. The researcher took the existence of polarities as given and understood the

difficulties people experience in reconciling those opposites from a Jungian perspective of

the natural splitting of polarities with one pole privileged in the consciousness of Ego and

Persona and the opposite pole devalued and repressed into the unconscious and Shadow. The

lack of conscious integration of the value represented by the other pole of a polarity leads to

a one-sided hypertrophy, defense against the repressed value, and the predictable negative

consequences of overuse of the privileged value and a negative intrusion of the neglected

value. Surfacing and integration of the repressed material into consciousness leads to greater

and greater manifestation of the holistic potential of the person/group/organization than was

possible without that process. Jung’s term (1977, 1978) for this phenomenon was

individuation: both process and goal. Process in that the phenomenology exists with or

without conscious recognition and active participation, and goal in the full realization, albeit

never achieved, of the highest potential of the individual, group, or organization. Polarity

thinking, from the researcher’s perspective, was first and foremost the conscious awareness

of the existence of the inextricable, contrary values within polarities and then the active

mindset of accounting for, at times advocating for, the non-preferred value as an essential

element in developing a complete perspective. The researcher’s theory was primarily


38

psychological and most closely aligned with Jung’s theory of the adaptive potential found in

consciously maintaining and operating within the “tension of opposites” (1977, 1978).

Hamden Turner (1990) captured well the researcher’s theory of polarity thinking as follows:

“Value creation lies in the capacity of acknowledging those dilemmas which arise from

competing and competing claims, and of combining both “horns” of these dilemmas in a

resolution which enhances all values in contention.” (p. 3)

A tool to facilitate polarity thinking: Johnson’s Polarity Management model

Leaders and organizations are constantly making decisions to address problems.

Many of those problems reside within polarities. Johnson (1993, 1996), as part of his Polarity

Management model, offered a mental tool to differentiate between problems to solve and

polarities to manage. A problem to solve is an either/or situation where the choice of one

option does not impact the other. A polarity to manage, the focus of this dissertation, is a

situation where the two poles are inseparable and interdependent. Johnson identified two

criteria questions to determine whether a situation represents a problem to solve or polarity to

manage:

1. Is the difficulty on-going?

Problems to solve have a solution, which can be considered an end point in a

process.

Polarities to manage do not get “solved.” They are on-going.

2. Are there two poles which are interdependent?

The solution in a problem to solve can stand alone.

Polarities to manage involve opposites that are inseparable over time

(Johnson, 1996, p. 82).


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Johnson observed that many decisions made in organizations are problems to solve:

they have a bounded time-horizon that ends with the decision and the “rightness” of either

option stands independent of the choice not taken. The either/or perspective is the primary,

privileged approach taught throughout schooling and reinforced by organizations especially

operating in a rapidly changing world context. However, many circumstances truly are

polarities that require a different approach.

Johnson’s model focused on working with and managing polarities in general and in

organizational settings in particular. It provides a tool for conceptualizing polarities and for

creating action steps to facilitate the ability to operate with the fullness of a polarity in mind.

Johnson’s model includes constructing a polarity map comprised of a four-quadrant

grid; the two left-hand quadrants provide information about one pole within a polarity; the

two right-hand quadrants provide information about the opposite pole within the polarity.

The poles within the polarity are expressed in neutral terms; e.g., in a structure polarity the

poles might be labeled centralized–decentralized, as opposed to value-laden terms such as

controlled–decentralized; or in a leadership polarity the poles might be labeled directive–

facilitative, as opposed to dictatorial–facilitative. The rationale for this is that the two poles

in any polarity are equally valid, although one might be more useful for a focused, time-

limited situation.

An important element in Johnson’s model is what the researcher refers to as the

inherent horizontal polarity and vertical bi-polar quality of each pole at play. The horizontal

polarity is the actual polarity of interest, e.g., centralized–decentralized. A vertical bi-polar

quality, not explicitly described in other writing on polarity or paradox, can also be said to

exist within each pole, i.e., the positive potential and consequences of the pole and the


40

negative potential and consequences of the pole. In effect, the vertical bi-polar qualities are

the upside and the downside of each pole.

The model would visually depict the centralized–decentralized polarity, in succinct

terms, as seen in Figure 1. Centralized can be both empowering to the group (or whole) (+)

and disempowering to the individual (or part) (-); decentralized can be both empowering to

the individual (or part) (+) and disempowering to the group (or whole) (-) (Johnson, 1996,

p.194). Part of the process for using the Polarity Management tool is to identify the polarity

and then flesh out the numerous aspects within the four quadrants.

Figure 1 Centralized/Decentralized Polarity Map

(+)

Positive potentials and consequences of

Centralized

(+)

Positive potentials and consequences of Decentralized

Centralized

Decentralized

Negative potentials and consequences of

Centralized (-)

Negative potentials and consequences of Decentralized

(-)

(Johnson, 1996, p. 194)

In Johnson’s process, the potential and consequences of all four quadrants would be

explored (by a person and especially by a team) and listed to create a map as close to the


41

whole picture as possible. From there a team could come to agreement on a higher purpose

and worst fear to which adherents for both poles could subscribe. To do this is to push the

goal from the pole to a higher shared purpose. This is akin to moving to the level of

archetype as discussed previously.

Johnson’s model then leads participants to identify “green flag” steps to ensure that

the best potentials of both poles are translated into measurable actions, and, at the same time

“red flag” indicators are identified to enable the recognition of negative potential of both

poles.

Applying Jung’s theories of the dynamics of the psyche (Jung, 1976a, 1977, 1978,

1990; Neumann, 1993; Stein, 1996; Stevens, 1992) to Johnson’s model, the researcher

observed how the model captures Jung’s observations that individuals and groups will most

naturally identify and value the positive potentials and consequences of their preferred,

privileged pole and perceive the other pole primarily through the negatively-toned lens of the

negative potentials and consequences of the opposite pole. Unless experience or mindset

steers otherwise, individuals will be relatively oblivious to the positive potentials and

consequences of the other pole, and, in particular, to the negative potentials and

consequences of the preferred, privileged pole (Jung, 1977. 1978; Johnson, 1996).

The researcher did not see polarity thinking and Polarity Management as

synonymous. Polarity thinking is not the same as the Jungian descriptions of the dynamics of

the psyche. Jung sought to describe the phenomenology of the psyche. Polarity thinking is an

overarching concept and embodies the awareness and attention to the dynamic realities of

polarity in life. Polarity thinking is an intellectual mode of perception and judgment that has

existed and developed over the length of human history that operates from a both/and frame


42

of reference. Polarity thinking, as centuries old, is evidenced in the ancient wisdom of Lao

Tzu or the I Ching, The Polarity Management model of Barry Johnson is a particularly

elegant tool to name and train about polarities in general and for organizations in particular.

Johnson has captured the complexities and dynamics of polarities in a useful conceptual and

practical model for applied polarity thinking. Many people might be considered polarity

thinkers without ever being exposed to Johnson’s Polarity Management model. Hampden-

Turner’s (1990) approach to “manage dilemmas” described above is another practical model

to promote and facilitate polarity thinking.

Support for the entire endeavor of learning and using polarity thinking for the

researcher personally was found in the writing of Bohm (2000), which serves as an apt

summary for this review:

It is clear that if we are to live in harmony with ourselves and with nature, we need to

be able to communicate freely in a creative movement in which no one permanently

holds to or otherwise defends his own ideas….

It is easy for each one of us to see that other people are “blocked” about

certain questions, so that without being aware of it, they are avoiding the

confrontation of contradictions in certain ideas that may be extremely dear to them….

The very nature of such a “block” is, however, that it is a kind of insensitivity

or “anesthesia” about one’s own contradictions. Evidently then, what is crucial is to

be aware of the nature of one’s own blocks….

If each one of us can give full attention to what is actually “blocking”

communication while he [or she] is also attending properly to the content of what is

communicated, then we may be able to create something new between us, something


43

of great significance for bringing to an end [or managing] the at present insoluble

problems of the individual and of society. (pp. 4-5)

Limited research was found in the literature that specifically sought to determine

whether organization leaders or others were impacted by learning and using polarity

thinking. Pascale (1990) and Collins and Porras (2002) identified how the examined

organizations, studied in retrospect, exhibited what the authors identified as sensitivity to

polarities or paradoxes. There was no prior introduction of polarity awareness or model for

application utilized. Hampden-Turner (1990), as described above, identified an approach

with organizations of identifying and analyzing their specific dilemmas and charting courses

to maximize both/and awareness and action. His description of that process with client

companies showed significant results on bottom-line outcomes.

This current study sought to examine the impacts of learning and using polarity

thinking in various domains not specifically targeted ahead of time. As an organization

development consultant and psychotherapist, this researcher believed that conscious,

intentional surfacing and acting on polarities would yield improved interactions and

increased performance for leaders and the organizations that they manage and minimize the

negative impacts of the enantiodromic, compensatory, pendulum-swing dynamic from pole

to pole often experienced in organizations. This study sought to discover if that is true.

A theory building model for this study –Dubin’s model

Drawing on Dubin’s theory building model (Lynham, 2002), the researcher wished to

lay out some parameters of the theory to be tested in this study in the following realms: laws

of interaction, boundaries of the theory, and system states that impinge on the theory.

There were limits to the researcher’s ability to explicate the laws of interaction for the


44

domains of interest related to the theory (units in Dubin’s language): sense-of-self, operating

theory of leadership, problem identification and problem solving, communication, conflict,

and organizational working relationships. The researcher made the supposition about the

sequential order such that it was posited that if leaders as individuals and the leadership team

as a collective in an organization consciously and intentionally utilized polarity thinking,

their sense-of-self should be broadened. That change, as a precursor, should impact the other

domains. The personal change in perspective and thinking was thought to be the necessary

precondition for related changes on the individual level in the other domains. However,

change at the collective team level, it was supposed, would not be significant without a

critical mass of change in the individual mindsets of its members.

The researcher saw no boundaries in the theory. The theory was seen as universally

applicable among all human beings in all cultures. However, cultures of many types or

individual characteristics might present significant barriers to the exploration of the realities

of polarities. For this study the boundary was set around organizations of any type in North

America.

Restating the point just made described system states that might have interfered with

a conscious, intentional embrace of polarity thinking. The system states that might block the

realization of the theory could be individual or cultural predispositions, assumptions, or

taboos that would block awareness of polarities. Circumstances that emphasized or even

mandated either/or approaches might block or repress awareness of polarity thinking, but

would not alter the reality of polarities as in inescapable aspect of human experience.


45

CHAPTER 3

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This positivist case study tested the researcher’s theory that individual leaders and the

collective leadership team within a corporate, for-profit organization would be positively

impacted by the conscious and intentional focus on polarity thinking. Polarity thinking was

defined as the on-going, active, and intentional mindset that assumes that un-resolvable

polarities (both/and) underlie most of life’s challenges and that conscious, intentional

attention to the fullness of the polarity will lead to greater realization of personal and

organizational potentials. This study did not seek to evaluate the impacts of Johnson’s

Polarity Management model specifically, nor of Jungian conceptualizations. It did seek to

discern impacts of polarity thinking as defined above through the self-report of the leader

participants. Based on the literature and this researcher’s theory, learning and conscious

attention to polarity thinking would lead to positively directed impacts in the following

domains:

• Sense of self

• Operating leadership theory

• Problem identification, labeling and analyzing

• Problem solving and taking action

• Communication

• Conflict

• Organizational working relationships

These were defined for this study as follows:

Sense of self is how the leader understands herself or himself and includes conscious


46

awareness of personal strengths and challenges. Operating theory of leadership is the

leader’s conceptualization of the use of power, authority, vision, and motivation with

subordinates and colleagues to develop and achieve organizational goals. Problem

identification is the ways in which organizational challenges are surfaced, diagnosed and

framed. Problem solving is the array of intervention strategies utilized. Communication

includes written and verbal exchanges of information and includes awareness of non-verbal

modes of communication and potential unexpressed “missing voices.” Conflict includes both

the personal experience of stress and incongruence, and discontent and lack of shared

meaning and goals between individuals. Organizational working relationships are

interpersonal working processes between individuals or organizational entities.

Research Design

It was important in proceeding with this research that the process followed and the

protocols utilized yield a product that would meet the standards of quality expected from case

study research. Dooley (2002) identified six elements that contribute to the methodological

rigor, validity, and reliability of case study research (p. 338). To that end, this methodology

section will outline the following elements.

• Determine and define the research questions

• Select the cases and determine data-gathering and analysis techniques

• Prepare to collect the data

• Collect data in the field

• Evaluate and analyze the data

• Prepare the report

Yin (2003) outlined a particular model for case study research that provided the


47

guiding approach for this study. Following his model, a “complete [case study] research

design will provide surprisingly strong guidance in determining what data to collect and the

strategies for analyzing the data” (p.29). His model captured the research project elements in

three main stages of process:

1. Define and design the research study

2. Prepare, collect, and analyze data

3. Analyze and conclude

A positivist case study is different from its interpretivist counterpart in that rather

than the researcher going into a situation, gathering data, and then comparing the findings to

existing theory, the researcher proceeds through the project in a significantly different

manner. Yin (2003) stated that:

This role of theory development, prior to the conduct of any data collection, is one

point of difference between case studies and related methods such as ethnography and

“grounded theory.” Typically, these related methods deliberately avoid specifying

any theoretical propositions at the outset of an inquiry. (p.28)

In the positivist case study, the researcher performs an extensive literature review,

from that builds a theory, and then tests that theory in the field. Lynham (2002) summarizes

the approach as a “theory-to-research strategy for theory development and verification” (p.

243). This researcher believed that conscious and intentional use of polarity thinking would

impact the domains defined above. The intent of this study was to see if and how that was the

case.

Yin stated that “a research design is a logical plan for getting from here to there

where here may be defined as the initial set of questions to be answered, and there is some


48

set of conclusions (answers) about those questions” (p. 20). The researcher’s adaptation of

Yin’s research process diagram (p. 50) and modified by Dooley (2002, p. 338) is displayed in

the original plan for this study in Figure 2.

Design Data Collection and Analysis

Cross-Unit Analysis and Theory

Modification

Develop Theory

Select Units

Design Data Collection Protocols

Conduct Study on Individual

Unit of Analysis

Conduct Study on Collective Team Unit of

Analysis

Analyze and Interpret Individual Impacts

Analyze and Interpret

Collective Team Impacts

Draw Cross-Unit

Conclusions

Modify Theory

Develop Policy Implications

Write Final Report

InterviewsSurveysObservationsDocumentsPolarity AssessmentsEarlier Assessment

InterviewsSurveysObservationsDocuments

Adapted from: Yin (2003), p. 50 & Dooley (2002), p. 347.

Units of Analysis: Individual leadersLeadership team

Data Collection Methods:InterviewsSurveysObservationsDocumentsPolarity AssessmentsEarlier Assessment

Figure 2

Original Research Design

Limitations in access to the leaders, leadership team processes, and documents

considered by the corporation to be too proprietary required a modification of the original

plan. The final design plan is illustrated in Figure 3.

A significant departure from the original proposal was the decision to forego surveys

meant to both gather data and provide an element of triangulation for the findings. The

decision was made from expediency. The leaders who participated in this study, while

supportive and interested, were extremely busy people for whom a 45-minute block of time

away from their executive duties for an interview represented a significant commitment.

Requesting that they also complete a written survey seemed to push at their indulgence for

the researcher’s project and seemed to possibly be considered too redundant to them. The


49

researcher also did not have access to team meetings to observe their discussion processes.

Design Data Collection and Analysis

Cross-Unit Analysis and Theory

Modification

Develop Theory

Select Units

Design Data Collection Protocols

Conduct Study on Individual

Unit of Analysis

Conduct Study on Collective Team Unit of

Analysis

Analyze and Interpret Individual Impacts

Analyze and Interpret

Collective Team Impacts

Draw Cross-Unit

Conclusions

Modify Theory

Develop Policy Implications

Write Final Report

InterviewsObservations

Polarity AssessmentsEarlier AssessmentInterviewsDocuments

Adapted from: Yin (2003), p. 50 & Dooley (2002), p. 347.

Units of Analysis: Individual leadersLeadership team

Data Collection Methods:InterviewsObservationsDocumentsPolarity AssessmentsEarlier Assessment

Figure 3

Revised Research Design

Research questions

Emerging from the earlier theoretical discussion, the overarching research question

for this research project was: Were leaders as individuals and the leadership team as a

collective impacted by learning and using polarity thinking?

From this overarching question, the researcher identified eight subordinate research

questions. The questions did not change during the course of the study as data emerged.

Generally, these questions applied both to the individual and team units of analysis. The

exception was with Research Question 3, which did not seem to be particularly germane in

the team context. The italicized elements in the study questions are the domains of impact

identified above.

1. Did the leaders, as individuals and as a team, consciously and intentionally utilize

polarity thinking?


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2. Did polarity thinking impact leaders’ or team’s sense of self?

3. Did polarity thinking impact leaders’ operating theory of leadership?

4. Did polarity thinking impact problem identification, labeling and analysis?

5. Did polarity thinking impact problem solving and taking action?

6. Did polarity thinking impact communication?

7. Did polarity thinking impact conflict?

8. Did polarity thinking impact organizational working relationships?

Units of analysis

The corporation in this study was a Minnesota-based corporation that has its business

structured into operating divisions. The specific context for the study was one of those

divisions. The division was further comprised of autonomous business units. The Leadership

Team was comprised of ten senior leaders of the business units and senior leaders at the

division level. All ten members of the Leadership Team participated in some portion of this

project (one leader was unable to participate in the interviews).

Following Yin’s case study model (2003), the researcher chose the Leadership Team

as a single case with two embedded units of analysis. The two units of analysis were (a) the

individual senior leaders who are members of the Leadership Team, and (b) the Leadership

Team as a collective. This choice was driven by the researcher wanting to assess the

implications of polarity thinking from the perspectives of both the individuals and the

collective team. Analysis was done on data related to each unit of analysis separately and

combined (see Figure 3).

Initial participant exposure to polarity thinking through Polarity Management™ training

The researcher entered the project under the auspices of the division president, and


51

with the support of the other nine leaders. The researcher worked with Dr. Barry Johnson,

who provided the professional development process through his Polarity Management model

workshops.

Dr. Johnson came to the attention of the division vice-president when he presented on

his model for identifying and managing polarities at the heart of “unsolvable problems” to

the corporate executive leadership team at the corporation. The division vice-president saw

potential applicability for the leadership team of his division, with an especial awareness of

the business unit/division (part/whole) dynamic within the division.

Confidentiality and Protection of Human Subjects

The researcher signed a confidentiality agreement with the corporation and agreed not

to share proprietary information or even name the company in the final, published

dissertation. Additionally, the company sought to protect the participants from any harm.

Data collected through interviews, documents/archival material, or observation

contained no identifiers that would indicate specific individuals. Data was kept in a locked

file drawer in the researcher’s home. As agreed with the participants, the audiotapes from the

interviews have been erased. Although quotes were used to illustrate points in the final

document, they were screened to insure anonymity.

Participation of the ten participants presented no anticipated risk for personal or

professional harm. Likewise, no benefit accrued to any participant through participation in

the study.

Data Collection Methods

Table 1 displays the multiple data collection methods utilized to increase the validity

of findings from the study. Table 2 displays the sources of data and who collected them.


52

Table 1

Data Collection Methods Unit of Analysis Domain Method Focus of Inquiry

Sense of Self Interview Individual Leader

Operating theory of leadership

Interview

Individual Leader

Problem identification, labeling, and analysis

Interview

Individual Leader

Problem solving and taking action

Interview

Individual Leader

Communication Interview

Individual Leader

Conflict • Understanding • Experience • Management

approaches

Interview Individual Leader

Individual leader

Organizational working relationships

Interview Individual Leader

Sense of team self Interview Documents Polarity Assessment Controlled Self-

Assessment

Leadership Team


Interview Documents Polarity Assessment Controlled Self-

Assessment

Leadership Team

Collective Leadership Team



Assessment

Leadership Team


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Table 1, continued Unit of Analysis Domain Method Focus of Inquiry

Communication Interview Documents Polarity Assessment Controlled Self-

Assessment

Leadership Team

Conflict • Understanding • Experience • Management

approaches


Assessment

Leadership Team Collective

Leadership Team



Assessment

Leadership Team

Interviews

One-on-one interviews were performed with nine of the ten leadership team

members. Data were gathered on their perceptions of impact in the different domains on

them as individual leaders and the leadership team as a collective. Data for both Units 1 and

2 were therefore gathered in the single interviews. As the interview schedule was prepared

some questions were created that seemed useful for the project. With input from a doctoral

committee member, twenty-five questions were eventually written for the interview schedule.

The interview schedule categories and the structure for the subsequent presentation of the

final findings and analysis, and the corresponding interview questions was as follows (L

represents Leader-focused; T represents Team-focused):

I. Acquisition of polarity thinking awareness and skill

Questions:

• Had you been exposed to polarity thinking or paradoxical thinking before you

were introduced to the Polarity Management model? Please describe. (L)


54

• Did the April and June sessions with Barry Johnson provide you the background

and skills necessary to learn and use the Polarity Management model? (L)

o Was the model and it’s application to your circumstances clear and

understandable? What did you find useful?

o What would you suggest to make learning the model more effective?

• What supported or impeded your personal use of polarity thinking? Personal traits

or beliefs? Organization structure? Organization culture? Business or market

realities? Time considerations? Other? (L)

• What supported or impeded the leadership team’s use of polarity thinking?

Individual traits or beliefs? Organization structure? Organization culture?

Business or market realities? Time considerations? Other? (T)

II. Unit 1: Perceived Impacts on Individual Leaders

Questions:

Sense of self

• Have the ways you think about your personal opinions and perspectives changed

as a result of your learning about and using polarity thinking? (L)

o If yes: Please describe the changes you have notice

o If no: Why would you say that there has been no change?

Operating theory of leadership

• Has your operating theory of leadership been affected by your learning and using

polarity thinking? (L)

o If yes: Please describe the changes you have noticed. Have your day-to-

day practices changed? In what ways?


55

o If no: Please describe the lack of fit between your operating theory of

leadership and polarity thinking


• Has your leadership approach to identifying, labeling or analyzing problems been

affected by your learning and using polarity thinking? (L)

o If yes: Please describe the changes you have noticed.

o If no: Please describe the barriers for you as a leader to incorporating

polarity thinking as a problem identification tool.


• Has your leadership approach to solving problems and taking action been affected

by your learning and using polarity thinking? (L)


o If no: Please describe the barriers for you as a leader to incorporating

polarity thinking as a problem-solving tool.

Communication

• Have your communication processes, approaches and skills changed as a result of

your learning and using polarity thinking? (L)

o If yes: Please describe the changes you have noticed?

o If no: Please describe the barriers for you as a leader incorporating polarity

thinking as a communication tool.

Conflict

Understanding of conflict

• Has your understanding of conflict as a leader been affected by your learning and


56

using polarity thinking? (L)


o If no: Please describe the ways polarity thinking doesn’t fit with your

understanding of conflict?

Experience of conflict

• Has the level of conflict you experience changed? (L)


Conflict management approaches

• Are you approaching conflict management as a leader differently as a result of

polarity thinking? (L)



• Have your personal working relationships with other departments or functions

within the organization been affected by learning and using polarity thinking? (L)


o If no: Please describe your explanation for the lack of affect?

• Have you received feedback from people in other departments or functions within

the organization that they have noticed you using polarity thinking? (L)

o If yes: Please describe the feedback you have heard?

III. Unit 2: Perceived Impacts on the Team

Questions:

Sense of Team self

• Have the ways the leadership team members’ opinions and perspectives changed


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as a result of your learning about and using polarity thinking? (L)

o If yes: Please describe the changes you have notice

o If no: Why would you say that there has been no change?


• Has the team’s approach to identifying, labeling or analyzing problems been

affected by learning and using polarity thinking? (T)


o If no: Please describe the barriers for the team to incorporating polarity

thinking as a problem identification tool.


• Has the team’s approach to identifying problems and taking action been affected

by learning and using polarity thinking? (T)



thinking as a problem-solving tool.

Communication

• Have the team’s communication processes, approaches or skills changed as a result

of learning and using polarity thinking? (L)



thinking as a communication tool.

Conflict

Understanding of conflict


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• Has the team’s understanding of conflict been affected by learning and using

polarity thinking? (T)


o If no: Please describe the ways polarity thinking doesn’t fit with the

team’s understanding of conflict?

Experience of conflict

• Has the level of conflict the team experiences changed? (T)


Conflict management approaches

• Is the team approaching conflict management differently as a result of polarity

thinking? (T)



• Have the team’s working relationships with other departments or functions within

the organization been affected by learning and using polarity thinking? (T)


o If no: Please describe your explanation for the lack of affect?

• Have you received feedback from people in other departments or functions within

the organization that they have noticed the team using polarity thinking? (T)

o If yes: Please describe the feedback you have heard?

III. Diffusion

• Have you made efforts to explain polarity thinking to others? Among your staff?

Outside of the platform?


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o If yes: What were the reactions or results?

o If no: What contributed to your not introducing polarity thinking to

others?

• Would you recommend polarity thinking to other leaders and teams in the

organization?

o If yes: Please summarize why you would make that recommendation.

- What kinds of support would be necessary for the leaders and teams to

learn and use polarity thinking?

o If no: Please summarize why you wouldn’t make that recommendation.

Observations

The researcher did not have the opportunity to observe individual leaders with their

staffs or the team as a whole for the purposes of this study. The researcher did have the

opportunity to observe the leaders as they answered the questions of the interview. The

researcher was also able to gauge the level to which the participants appeared to understand

the concepts of polarity thinking, at least through their exposure to the Polarity Management

model. The researcher was able to gauge in some visual manner their comfort with the

subject matter and the extent to which their responses appeared to be based on their actual

experiences versus simply generated at the moment of questioning

Controlled Self-Assessment (CSA) Report

The Controlled Self-Assessment is an instrument used by the corporation to facilitate

an audit of various aspects of a division from accounting procedures to divisional interactions

to environmental factors (Johnson, personal communication, March 31, 2003). The division

completed a CSA process in February 2003 and the results helped shape the awareness of the


60

team to existing challenges and the selection of particular polarities for focus in the Polarity

Management workshops. This is archival document data.

Polarity maps and assessments

Barry Johnson and the ten leadership team members created polarity maps and

assessments in two workshops in April and June 2003. The team and Dr. Johnson provided

this data for use in the current study.

On April 16, 2003, Dr. Johnson facilitated the first, full-day session with the

Leadership Team, on-site at the corporation headquarters. He introduced the Polarity

Management model and worked with the group to complete polarity maps for the two

polarities of focus: candor/diplomacy and business unit/division (part/whole). The morning

session focused on the candor/diplomacy polarity. This mapping process involved identifying

the positive potential outcomes anticipated for each pole of the polarity, candor and

diplomacy, and the negative potentials for each pole if it were overused. Additionally, the

higher purpose shared by both poles in the polarity and deepest fear shared by both poles was

identified.

When the map was completed, the individuals rated the extent of the presence of the

characteristics of each quadrant on a scale of Slight (1), Moderate (2), Great (3), and Very

Great (4). The individual scores of the leaders were then averaged for each quadrant. The

average provided a baseline measure for future comparison of each quadrant over the course

of time. From those results a composite score was computed, which in Johnson’s model

provides a measure of how well a polarity is being managed, ranging vertically from a high

of +6, closest to achieving highest actualization of both poles of a polarity, to a low of -6,

closest to experiencing the deeper fear shared by both poles of a polarity. Johnson’s process


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to compute the composite score is as follows:

Figure 4

Computation of Polarity Management Composite Score

Average of positive left pole + average of positive right pole

Minus Average of negative left pole + average of negative right pole

Equals: Result

Minus The difference between the averages of the two positive poles

Equals: The composite score

Ideally and barring extreme time-limited circumstances, the composite measure

would move in a positive direction as the fullness of the polarity is consciously managed.

The data from the initial mapping exercise and ratings and the follow-up ratings were

reported in the findings of this study.

The group then brainstormed and selected action steps (Green Flags) for each pole of

the polarity to achieve, strengthen, or maintain the positive outcomes from that pole. And

who would be responsible for implementation. Next, the group identified signs that would

indicate when a pole would be overused (Red Flags) and who would be responsible for

monitoring for those signs. Through this process the team identified and charted the fullness,

positive and negative, within the candor/diplomacy polarity and created a conscious,

intentional plan to maximize the positive potentials on both sides of the polarity and

minimize the full negative potentials.

The same process was repeated during the afternoon session with the focus shifted to

the business unit/division polarity. The day ended with the assignment of responsibility for

acting on agreed upon action steps (green flags) or monitoring potential overuse of either


62

pole of the polarities worked with during the day (red flags). Additionally, all agreed to

engage in continuing study of the Polarity Management model through reading his book or

using the online Polarity management training site.

For purposes of this research and in keeping with the confidentiality agreements

signed with the individual participants and the corporation, the Green Flags and Red Flags

were reported in the findings for the candor/diplomacy polarity examined by the team.

However, the similar data for the business unit/division polarity were not reported in the

findings because the content was too proprietary and the researcher wished to maintain the

integrity of the confidentiality agreement. The findings are in no way marginalized because

of this omission.

On June 23, 2003, a second workshop was held. At that time, the team, under Dr.

Johnson’s guidance, examined the theory behind the Polarity Management model, worked

more in depth on issues identified in the previous workshop, and again rated the extent of the

presence of the characteristics of each quadrant on a scale of Slight, Moderate, Great, and

Very Great. These individual scores were again averaged for each quadrant and a composite

score was determined. This provided a comparison with the results of two months previous.

Johnson and the Leadership Team provided the polarity maps and other to the

researcher for use in this study. The researcher appreciated that assistance greatly. The

researcher would have liked to also perform the ratings, personally, at six-months out from

the initial assessment by the team in April 2003. Unfortunately, this was not to be possible.

Data collection timeline

Table 2 shows the timelines for the different data collection methods and who

collected the data.


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Table 2

Data Collection Timeline

Source Data

How Initially Gathered Time 1

How Follow-up Gathered Time 2 By whom

Quadrant average scores

Group session – calculated

April 16, 2003

Group Session

June 23, 2003

Composite score

Group session – calculated

April 16, 2003

Group Session

June 23,

Positive potentials

Group session

April 16, 2003

Group Session

June 23, 2003

Negative potentials

Group session

April 16, 2003

Group Session

June 23, 2003

Barry Johnson and the Leadership Team

Green Flags Group Session

April 16, 2003

Group Session

June 23, 2003

Polarity Maps and Assessment

Red Flags Group Session

April 16, 2003

Group Session

June 23, 2003


Controlled Self-

Assessment

Areas of strength and concern

Archival material

February 2003


Interviews

All research question domains

Face-to-face

January-February 2004

Researcher

Data Analysis

At the conclusion of the data gathering process, the researcher analyzed the data in

relation to the study’s research questions and discerned the patterns that emerged. The

researcher examined the responses from the study’s participants for trends and patterns and

through the triangulation of data collection methods looked to see if there was support for the

researcher’s theory.


64

The interview responses were categorized, where appropriate, into categories of

strong, moderate, slight, and minimal or none levels of impact. This provided a means to

gauge the types of impact that learning and using polarity thinking had had on the individual

leaders and the team as a whole in the different domains of interest. The limitation in this

approach is clear. The categorization of the responses was purely subjective on the

researcher’s part and the researcher puzzled at times over which category into which a

response best fit.

The data was examined for meaningful frequencies and a scan of the raw data was

performed and it was determined that there was no value in performing cross tab analysis

using SPSS software.

Theory Revision

The findings that emerged from the data analysis were compared with the

researcher’s theory for support the suppositions or revision as appropriate.


65

CHAPTER 4

FINDINGS

This researcher focused this study on the impacts on a leadership team of learning and

using “polarity thinking,” the broader concept from which Barry Johnson’s Polarity

Management model emerges. The researcher sees Johnson’s model as a significant tool

designed to apply polarity thinking to organizational and other contexts. An assumption of

the researcher was that the primary introduction to polarity thinking would likely be through

Johnson’s model and the training he provided to the team in April and June 2003. Both

training sessions were full-day sessions held in corporate meeting space. The full leadership

team of ten people was present for both training days.

The researcher was present as an observer to see how Johnson provided the training,

generally, and to this team, specifically, as discussed in the Research Design and

Methodology chapter above. The researcher gathered no data from these events for use in this

study, since no proposal had yet been approved by the dissertation committee or proposal for

research submitted to the IRB. Johnson and the leadership team generated data on both

occasions and they provided some documentation to the researcher for use in this study. The

researcher used that data, as appropriate, holding in mind the confidentiality agreement

signed with the corporation protecting possible proprietary information. The data from those

trainings reflect the perceptions of the entire ten-leader team and will be discussed in the

“Perceived Impacts on the Leadership Team” section below.

Data that emerged through the interview process in January and February 2004 reflect

the perceptions of nine of the ten leaders. The tenth leader was experiencing a serious health

crisis in his family that precluded his participation. Data from the interviews will be reflected


66

throughout the findings in this study. All sections reflect individual leader’s perceptions of

the particular domain discussed, whether they be the impacts on them as individual leaders or

their perceptions of the impacts on the team as a collective. Four of the nine leaders were the

senior leaders for business units, four of the leaders were senior leaders for division-level

functional areas (marketing, human resources, finance, technology), and one leader was the

division president.

Because of an uneven ratio of nine men to one woman on this team (eight to one in

the interviews), any indication of a specific comment using the feminine pronoun would be

tantamount to identifying the lone woman as the speaker, where a specific male would not be

so easily identifiable using the male pronoun. Unless a gender-specific comment appears

relevant, the researcher will use “the leader” or the pronoun of the majority, in this case male,

throughout.

Also, the researcher has chosen to modify typical APA citation protocol in the use of

direct quotes. Part of the confidentiality agreement with the corporation entailed not

identifying anyone interviewed or directly attributing any quotes. All direct quotes fall within

the category of “personal communication” to the researcher, no tracking of an individual’s

responses through the findings is necessary, and anonymity is required and guaranteed as part

of the confidentiality agreement with the corporation and the consent form signed by each

respondent, Therefore, no citations for individual quotations will be included in the body of

this document. All quotes were gathered in one-on-one interviews of this researcher and the

respondents in January and February 2004.

The researcher was extremely grateful that all nine leaders graciously participated.

These are very busy people and the amount of time the researcher spent with each leader was


67

limited, typically forty to fifty minutes. This meant that the researcher’s ability to clarify

exactly what the researcher was trying to capture in a particular question or probe in great

depth was limited. Attempts were made, nonetheless. The researcher was humbled by the

challenge of framing questions as clearly and succinctly as possible and the limits

experienced in the process. Nowhere was this more challenging than in trying to separate

polarity thinking from Johnson’s Polarity Management model. Although I routinely

explained the focus of my study as similar to and different from Polarity Management, the

leaders often responded through a Polarity Management frame.

Acquisition of polarity thinking awareness and skill

Previous exposure to polarity or paradoxical thinking [Interview Question 1]

The researcher wanted to gauge whether polarity thinking concepts were new for the

leaders when they went into the trainings in 2003 and how they fit into their existing

concepts and experiences. The researcher looked for indications of previous exposure

through either definite yes responses or demonstrated awareness by the respondents of

polarity or paradoxical thinking.

Five of the nine leaders indicated that they had not been exposed to polarity thinking

or paradoxical thinking before, as such, or at least not in formal training or education. One of

the five indicated that polarity thinking is intuitive. “I didn’t have a term for it. I didn’t call it

paradoxical thinking or polarity thinking.” The leader went on to describe an earlier

management job where,

…we had sales on one hand and production on the other and it was just clear to me

that you just couldn’t run the way the production people wanted to run, because we’d

be making lots of product that nobody wanted to buy and we couldn’t run the way


68

sales people wanted, because we couldn’t make the product.

Another experience of polarity or paradoxical thinking was work in matrix

organizations as noted by two of the leaders. “I had worked for a long time in matrix

organizations and matrix organizations are, by design, paradoxical or polarity-type

organizations. So, it’s not a new area from that perspective.” Another leader commented that,

My experience with [my previous company] was … that not everything needs to be

black or white…. In a matrix organization you’ve got to be able to bring both/and

together. For example, [my previous company] had very strong functions and even

stronger categories or business units, but the point is both had to be strong and both

had to coexist and that was the power behind the success of [my previous company].

So, from a thinking standpoint yes, it wasn’t either/or; it had to be kind of

both….Nobody ever said, ‘OK, you’re in the middle of a polarity and you’ve got to

manage it’.…I now recognize that [it] was a polarity.

Finally, one leader commented that “Yes. I actually had a course in graduate school in

a scientific discipline on paradoxical issues in science….I hadn’t thought about it in thirty

years until Barry [Johnson] used it.”

The Polarity Management model [Interview Question 2]

The participants all found the model to be intriguing and illuminating. One leader

stated that,

First of all, the concept of polarity, dealing with polarity and the fact that we deal

with them day in and day out, … was revealing in a lot of ways. It was not a way that

I had thought of many of the things that I had dealt with. So, that was extremely

useful.


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Another leader stated that the Polarity Management model “provided a framework

and a methodology to better understand how to deal with polarities.” Another said,

“[Johnson’s model] is very clear and I think … it helped to get everybody in our

group … on the same page about the issues that we deal with.”

One leader captured the value of the model for him in:

…the idea that there are certain issues which are not problems to solve, which prior to

polarity for me everything would have been a problem to solve. In reality, if you stay

with something long enough, you would probably see yourself or your team coming

back to a certain issue time and time again and bouncing back and forth between the

poles, but not knowing that that’s what you’re doing. Having a conceptual framework

to understand … that is useful.

Five of the respondents, while remarking on the value of the model for understanding

and action, admitted that they hadn’t and probably won’t sit down and draw up a fully

developed polarity map. “I can’t believe that there is anyone who actually sits down and

draws up one of those in real life unless it is for pedagogical purposes. More importantly is

how you think about problems.” Another leader remarked:

If you mean taking the model, sitting down and putting it on a piece of paper…it’s

probably not [going to happen a lot]. I do this mentally, probably not in as rigorous a

fashion as Barry [Johnson] presented it … but just a few minutes ago when this

young fellow presented a paradox to me I mentally went through the paradox with

him, the plus and minus side of each pole and sort of illustrated for him that this

wasn’t a problem to solve. It had to be managed.

A notable exception mentioned was the one leader who was not interviewed, who was


70

repeatedly reported by the other leaders to be the greatest champion of the Polarity

Management model and who had on numerous occasions developed polarity maps to

illustrate significant polarities. This admission about generating polarity maps did not

appear in any way to undermine or negate the value the leaders found in the model or in

polarity thinking.

Training effectiveness in providing the Polarity Management model theory and skills

(Interview Question 2)

The leaders unanimously found the Polarity Management model very germane and

useful and applicable to their current circumstances. No one expressed any negative

comment about the training provided by Barry Johnson.

The entire group expressed appreciation for the clarity of Johnson’s training. One

leader stated,

I thought it was quite clear and the generic examples that Barry [Johnson] starts his

training with … [help you] get your head around them easily. Obviously, the power

of the model becomes [sic] when you start to bring it to your own situation and your

own circumstances, and then, I’d be surprised if most people couldn’t grab a hold of

it pretty quickly. It’s pretty intuitive.

Another leader said that the training “provided a framework and a methodology to

better understand how to deal with polarities.” Still another stated,

I think Barry [Johnson] does an excellent job. He’s very personable. The examples he

uses are very good. He uses real examples and so then you can kind of relate to those

and put them into your own context – in your own life, or your own issues at work –

to identify immediately what are polarities.


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The training by Johnson was seen as clear and effective. This doesn’t mean that no

challenges exist in integrating the model into day-to-day use. The challenge was highlighted

by one leader who remarked that Johnson

does a very good job of establishing what the concept is and the thing that becomes

difficult is trying to find ways to apply it to one’s particular situation. I think that’s

just a matter of time working with the process. I don’t think it has anything negative

to with the way he is presenting. It’s simply that it takes a period of time to assimilate

the concept and find where you might apply it.

Following this track, the researcher asked whether the respondents thought the model

and its application to their circumstances were clear and understandable. As before, there

were no negative comments. “The model has been useful and … [is] relevant as a framework

for analysis.” For another it was useful “just having a framework to basically diagnose a

polarity and understand the different sides of a polarity and how we can work together to

optimize a situation.” One leader found the usefulness in:

…working on real issues and applying them to the model, number one. Number two,

… I think doing it in small group dynamic was helpful to get the different points of

view, versus just an individual filling it out [the polarity map]. I think the third thing I

would say was helpful was the fact that we had to do it in four minutes or less. Barry

[Johnson] made the point that this doesn’t have to be a two-week exercise. Get it

down, use it; you can always refine it. I think that was helpful, both from a facilitation

standpoint as well from a usability standpoint, [and] that I would actually go out and

then use it because I realize I don’t have to do a two-day offsite to do this thing.

Finally, the researcher asked the respondents what suggestions they had to help make


72

learning the model more effective. There were numerous responses that focused primarily on

ideas for deepening the learning to make it more automatic. “The only thing would be

follow-up, more follow-up. You can kind of lose it with everything going on. It would be

good to have a follow-up session.” Another stated that,

Obviously, we were time-constrained…. My sense is that if you had more time, more

examples, it would be repetitious learning, but the fact that we were using real life

examples was extremely helpful. I just think doing more of them. It’s just like kind of

practice, practice, practice.

Another leader said,

I think like many other tools the real proof of people’s ability to internalize the model

is to teach the model. I would, if time permitted, and I think we restricted Barry’s

time and we typically do in many situations, … have flipped the roles around with

real issues facing this organization, have participants turning around and sort of

walking through the specific illustrations of the model’s effects, imparting the

wisdom of the model back to either the participants in the workshop or shortly

thereafter to a broader group of business people in a fairly in-depth way. Not have a

100,000 foot, ‘this is polarity and we’re using polarity to help manage the business,’

but rather, ‘let’s work an issue.’

Specific to training of the model, a couple of leaders offered suggestions. One leader

suggested that the poles being utilized should be clearly understood by everyone.

The biggest thing that I would recommend is defining the two poles clearly as a first

step….When you fill out a polarity map … you have different definitions [of the

poles]. When you ask people around here, ‘What is the definition of a division?’ some


73

people will say it’s just a loosely held collection of business units that share some

assets, and that’s true. I would answer it differently by saying it’s a very closely held,

strategically bound, hard-wired, meaning structurally, set of businesses that go to

market as a single enterprise. That’s a very different definition. And so, how I

populate that pole will be very different than the person who gave that first answer.

Not that either is wrong, but then you get into this whole other mess.

One exchange is illustrative of the challenges related to green flags and red flags used

as the means for action planning in the Polarity Management model:

[Leader:] I think more attention needs to be paid to what are green flags and what are

red flags, because, you know, if you look at what we did at [the leadership team

trainings], I don’t think that our green flags and red flags were all that effective. Some

of them are kind of vague. One red flag might be lack of communication between the

business units and the division. OK, how do you measure that? How do you make

that concrete? You could have two people who disagreed….So, you [need to] know

something about how [italics added] to pick a red flag and how to pick a green flag,

rather than just fill it in to fill it in.

[Researcher:] Having actual concrete, measurable outcomes?

[Leader:]….You can’t do it for every situation, but at least try to take

something that’s concrete. How do I know if I don’t have my home/work balance

right? Is it because I don’t make it home for dinner at least one night a week? Or two

nights a week or whatever your measure is. Something concrete would help.

Another leader suggested limiting the number of green flags and red flags recognizing

the limitations that he felt are givens:


74

I think on some of the quadrants, we came out with eleven action items. For a

leadership team, the way we are organized, I knew walking out of there that list

would never be accomplished. I also happen to believe that no individual can focus

on more than three significant accomplishments in a twelve-month period. And so,

when everyone leaves, they go back to their list of eighteen things [to do] on

something other than Polarity Management. That’s standard OE [organization

effectiveness] stuff.

Supports and barriers to learning and using polarity thinking (Interview Questions 3

& 4)

The researcher was interested in the leaders’ perspectives of the supports and barriers

to their learning and using polarity thinking. The results suggested categories of personal,

interpersonal, and business and organizational culture and structure.

The leaders had little to say generally about the personal supports or limitations in

learning and using the polarity thinking mindset. The leaders generally seemed to the

researcher to be very careful about sharing thoughts that might be too self-disclosing. They

generally shifted their responses from themselves as individuals to that of the team or that of

even more arms-length generalities about people in general. The researcher attributes this to a

number of potential factors: (a) The unseen audience of boss and peers on the leadership

team and not wanting to be identifiable in a final document; (b) a general tendency in

business, and for leaders generally, to speak in objective rather than subjective language; (c)

the limited time within the interview to reflect from the personal perspective on the questions

being asked; and, (d) the potential insufficient familiarity and comfort with the researcher.

The researcher, at times, needed to redirect a leader back to a personal frame from a more


75

conceptual, general frame. This raised the question for the researcher of whether it might

have been more advantageous to distribute the interview questions to the leaders before the

interviews to allow them time to reflect more deeply on their perspectives and experiences

From the personal perspective, the most noted support or barrier for using the polarity

mindset was the congruence of polarity thinking for the respondents with their natural

dispositions or past training. A number of leaders noted that polarity thinking is “intuitive”

and that they had been thinking that way for most of their lives. Without exception, when

those leaders were asked their preference for information gathering as indicated by the

Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), they noted a preference for Intuition. By theory,

Intuitives, as described by the MBTI, tend to be conceptual and abstract and looking for the

“big picture” that includes both sides of polarities (Myers, 1993). One leader stated:

Let’s be frank. Not everyone thinks conceptually. I think conceptual thinkers get this

immediately or learn it pretty quickly. So, I’ve always been a multi-dimensional,

multi-variable thinker. We have a lot of people that are linear thinkers; that go from A

to B to C to D.

As discussed earlier in these findings, experience in organizations that embrace

paradox or have matrix structures was identified by a number of the leaders as creating a

natural frame from which to learn and utilize polarity thinking. For these leaders, Barry

Johnson’s Polarity Management model provided a new language and process to differentiate

between problems to solve and polarities to manage in their day-to-day experiences.

Well, we have lots of paradoxical or polarity types of situations, do we go for volume

or do we go for pricing; do we go for standardized product or customized product;

how do we balance our desire to build for the future versus keeping a healthy P&L


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today? We all deal with this every single day. And so, I use it; I don’t sit and draw a

polarity map, but I use the thinking every single day and I try to talk my people

through that.

Experience, as creating a well-worn groove, was noted as a primary factor influencing

the ease of use of the polarity mindset. As one leader clearly stated, “Every one of our

leaders has been in business for anywhere from fifteen to thirty-six years, I believe. Their

DNA is now injected with [the experiences] of [those] years.” Another leader commented

that,

When somebody asks me a question, I go to my Rolodex of principles and say, ‘Is

this consistent with or inconsistent with the principles? Done!’…. So to look at every

situation from a polarity mindset standpoint, I don’t have that training; it’s not how

my mind immediately thinks because of my twenty years [in the] business

environment, my data pool.

The same leader noted that to operate routinely from a polarity mindset requires a

shift from years of experience and a lot of practice:

I always tell people that if you’re thinking about skating, you can’t play hockey. If

you’re thinking about what your feet are doing, the rest of the game is immaterial.

Muscle memory. To me it’s got to be the same way. You have to be trained around

[polarity thinking] and constantly be forced to practice the thinking. Not necessarily

the tool [Polarity Management], but the thinking.

As noted in the literature review, the most natural approach for anyone is to

automatically go to the time-tested, ingrained modes of thinking and analyzing born of years

of experience, especially under pressure. It takes energy to shift thinking or some sort of


77

external tickler to remind. As one leader aptly commented,

You have a million things going on throughout the day and [polarity thinking] doesn’t

immediately pop into your head. That’s where I think just the loops of always talking

about polarities and having little follow-up or update sessions where you’re thinking

about them [is important]. Maybe I need to hang a polarity map in my office so I

think of it more often. That would be helpful.

Shifting to a polarity mindset was challenge enough for many of the leaders

personally. Operating from that frame within the context of the leadership team presented

additional challenges. There are other dynamics that came into play in the situation. As one

leader stated: “I think what impedes reaching an effective course is getting people to be open

and candid and honest; getting away from trying to figure out how to manipulate a polarity to

get what they want to get out of it.” The leaders were operating within a business and

organizational culture that shaped their thinking and approaches, regardless of their natural

proclivities. The focus of the corporation on the outcomes of the business units as the

primary focus was identified by most leaders on the team as the most significant barrier to

operating from both a part and whole, polarity approach.

You have an overarching culture which has very emphatically and with great energy

put the emphasis of this corporation at the business unit level [that enforces] the

business unit as, whatever you want to call it, the front-line, the primary decision-

making; there’s all kinds of rhetoric around that. That goes back to when we

deployed….And, it’s consistent culturally going back as far as I know for [decades].

And because the primary focus for the corporation was on the performance of the

business unit (the part), rather than the division (the whole), it followed that,


78

The primary instrument of measurement is around business units for the corporation.

And the other thing that inhibits the polarity thinking is really around incentives. It’s

hard to be using polarity when the overwhelming portion of everybody’s

compensation is based on the optimization of the parts….We have 70-80% of

compensation being based upon the performance of individual parts.…Which pole

[part or whole; business unit or division] am I going to gravitate toward? Well,

obviously, I’m going to gravitate toward the part, my part/whole, because [it’s]

human nature. You have to answer the wisdom question: ‘What’s in it for me?’ If

there’s nothing in it for me to optimize for the whole, I’m going to optimize for the

part, because that’s the signal the corporation sends, culturally, financially,

hierarchically, whatever.

This natural orientation toward the business unit was primarily true for the business

unit leaders, while the leaders on the team operating primarily from the division level had a

different focus. One such leader stated that,

My own thinking tends to naturally gravitate to the whole. What’s in the best interests

of the [corporation]? I start there and then I work back toward the parts. Now, I view

that as intellectually enabling. Having said that, it’s sometimes a trap to not really

understand or empathize with those who come at their issues from being deeply

rooted in the part and who don’t necessarily think more naturally about the whole.

And so, it’s like polarity, I tend to gravitate to a pole myself which usually is

whatever the broader interests of the enterprise are, which I think in the end is the

more powerful solution to the problems that we face in this organization, but it can

create blind spots in me too, where other colleagues might be coming from where


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they are more deeply rooted to the parts.

So, structurally, within this corporation, it was thought that, “the very issue that we’re

trying to work with is a [division] kind of an enterprise that is at odds with what the

individual business units are incented [sic] to do.” Polarity thinking, however embraced by

leaders, may be moot if the structure and culture of the organization are inherently oriented to

the part (either/or) versus being oriented to both part and whole (both/and).

Diffusion

The key to any kind of leadership tool like the Polarity Management model is the

buy-in to it of a broad group of people and a willingness to use it as a discussion framework

but ultimately leading to making decisions on specific issues within the context of their being

a polarity or paradox. As more than one leader pointed out during our interviews, there was

an either/or cultural mindset that predominated in this corporation, that is fairly typical of

business organizations. For diffusion to occur, there needs to be a process of awareness

raising, generalized training in a practice model, and a consistent expectation of regular

infusion into day-to-day activity. The process is often promoted by leaders, who have the

power and resources at their disposal to move their teams into new ways of thinking and

operating approaches. In this section of the findings, the researcher examined the leaders’

efforts to promote polarity thinking to their staffs, and beyond the confines of their division

(Question 24) and whether they would recommend polarity thinking to other parts of the

larger organization (Question 25).

Efforts to explain polarity thinking to others (Interview question 24)

The researcher wanted to gauge whether the leaders had taken action beyond simply

using polarity thinking to the level of explaining or teaching the mindset to others, within


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their organizations, elsewhere in the corporation, or beyond the corporation altogether.

One leader was very emphatic about the value of polarity thinking and how he had

passed it a long to one of his direct reports:

I just did it an hour ago. This young fellow that we’ve asked to be the integration

manager in the UK was sort of plunked down as the corporation’s person in a rather

large organization working directly with the CEO of the [purchased] company who

used to run the show and now he’s part of this corporation and there have been a

number of things that have come up … [and in my mind, [he] didn’t see these things

as paradoxical; he saw them as behavior issues – ‘they’re just not behaving right’ –

and I see them as a paradoxical, highly innovative, entrepreneurial organization

versus the big bureaucratic monolith [corporation]. And, one hand we do need to have

the appropriate processes and procedures. On the other hand, we cannot destroy the

innovative spirit. That’s paradoxical. And so, I took him through that notion and told

him, ‘If you want to solve for the problem, you will destroy this little company. But,

if you want to manage this paradox, you will end up with a successful outcome.’ He

got it immediately and he wanted to learn more about it.

The most typical response from leaders was that they had explained or trained

polarity thinking through the Polarity Management model to their own division function or

business unit staffs. One leader exposed his staff to the Polarity Management model and the

researcher asked what sort of response he received. The leader commented, “I think it’s

intuitive. I think people get it pretty quickly.” He continued,

We had to take people back to the original construct, the original understanding of the

problem and the polarity concept, and while those people who participated [were]


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certainly not walking, talking polarity protagonists, they intuitively saw as we walked

through it, ‘yeah, this makes sense.’ So, it’s not as if people have a hard time

grasping the polarity analysis. The trick is what to do with it [italics added].

[Researcher]: So in a way you described the polarity involved in a way that

brought it down from just intuition into actionable language.

[Leader]: Basically, we were able to articulate what some of the emotional

levers were.

Another leader echoed that he thought his staff picked it up as rather intuitive:

[Researcher]: What sort of reactions did you find?

[Leader]: They were interested, but we never allocated sufficient time to do it

in the depth that I should have and so I have to say that I’ve only scratched the

surface.

[Researcher]: So, they were interested and you didn’t just get trout looks?

[Leader]: No, because I think it’s a fairly natural way of people thinking about

it. So, the first reaction you get from most people, when you explain polarity in the

first ten minutes of it is, ‘So what, we all think that.’ [To researcher]: Isn’t that the

case?

[Researcher]: I think [many people do]. I don’t know that people generally do

more than have the awareness though.

[Leader]: Yeah, right. I know. But that’s what you get through in the first ten

minutes anyway.

Again, another leader described what he had done with his new learning with his

staff:


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Yes. In my staff we’ve talked about it [Polarity Management]. I used the slides, et

cetera [from the Polarity Management training]. I breached [sic] the subject with the

entire business unit, but obviously nothing [as extensive as the leader training, just in

the business unit meeting, as opposed to spending a day or two specifically training in

this area.

[Researcher]: What kind of reactions or result did you notice?

[Leader]: Very positive.

[Researcher]: Did it feel intuitive for most people?

[Leader]: I think it’s intuitive and I think the positive is the fact that people

look at it and say: ‘That’s right and I’m glad that leaders see this.’ It’s really a good

tool. Like I say, it is intuitive in one sense, but to get people who are on either side of

the poles basically to sit down and utilize the tool and have a discussion about the

issues, I think is extremely positive.

[Researcher]: Even with matrix organizations and the like, it’s a fair

statement, I think, that business is driven primarily by either/or kind of mentality. Do

you see it as a steep climb to get to a point where it can be both problems to solve and

polarities to manage or do you see it as a fairly easy, or relatively easy, paradigm

shift?

[Leader]: I’m not sure that one way is correct in all situations. I’m very much

a believer in what we call situational leadership.

[Researcher]: I think that is what Barry [Johnson’s model] is about.

[Leader]: Yes. I think that if you have a mature team vertical might be a better

way to operate. If you have a young team that is inexperienced and needs direction,


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giving directions is important; if you have a team that is very experienced and more

time you get a better overall conclusion by doing the polarity approach.

Another leader commented that he had discussed polarity thinking,

With the staff and I may have referenced it in discussions with other business cohorts

in other business units or divisions and I even mentioned it to my wife, for sure we

talked about it.

[Researcher]: What kind of reactions or results did you observe?

[Leader]: I think the reaction was sort of an ‘aha.’ ‘Oh. Maybe that’s why I

haven’t been able to resolve this problem, because it isn’t going to go away.’ People

tend to think of things as…’fix it’ and not ‘I can’t fix it and I need to figure out how

to deal with it.’

And with a similar response, another leader from the team said that he had “exposed

it to the entire organization: we have [Division] Day, which was right after we had done the

training in April.” He continued:

There were 200 people in the audience. We had them do a polarity map at the table to

expose them to it to say that we as a leadership team are going to start using the

model, so when you see this type of thing, we don’t expect you to walk out of the

room and be able to use it, but now you’ll at least say, ‘They’re talking about Polarity

Management. What is that?’ Now, you’ll at least get it. I initiated that so, that’s a big

yes, exposing it to the balance of the organization. Every person that works for me,

I’ve exposed it to them. I’ve got new hires coming in here, four in over a three-week

period. So, I’ll make sure I expose them to it.

[Researcher]: What kind of reaction or response did you observe?


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[Leader]: Pretty positive. I think I’m a tough test, I’m a disaster check,

because I tend to [be] more of an either/or guy versus a lot of other people [who] tend

to be more compromising or both/and or let’s find the middle ground. I don’t. My

DNA does not immediately go to that way of thinking.

Perceived value of polarity thinking to other leaders and teams in the organization

(Interview question 25)

For diffusion throughout the corporation to occur, it would be important that there be

both internal sponsorship and organizational support. The researcher wanted to know

whether the leaders would recommend polarity thinking to other leaders and teams in the

organization and what sort of supports they felt would be important to put in place.

All nine leaders interviewed stated that they would recommend the further diffusion

of polarity thinking throughout the organization. One leader was very clear:

Absolutely, yes. Whether the underlying organization changes or not, the facility that

it brings about of people being able to interact more effectively makes it worthwhile,

even if nothing else changes in a systemic way. So, I think that’s very valuable.

Another leader echoed this enthusiasm:

Yes, because I think that it is a useful framework. I think also the larger the group that

you’re looking at, the more applicable this is. And so, in any organization, it probably

becomes an imperative the further up you get.

The responses continued in a similar vein:

Yes. For all the reasons I’ve talked about. It is a helpful way to think about issues and

to segregate which are polarities [to manage] and which are problems [to solve] and

stop banging your head against a wall trying to solve a polarity and understanding


85

that there are some critical issues to your business that are polarities that you don’t

have to solve and don’t want to solve. But then also, to distinguish that there are

problems that do need to be solved [that] you need to make decisions on, and so, to

have that way of thinking is very helpful and I don’t know if business people do that

naturally.

Another leader would recommend polarity thinking, especially through the Polarity

Management model, and offered some thoughts on limitations:

Yes, another tool. And, I think it’s an effective tool and seems relatively simple once

you’ve learned the tool. But again, people tend to put things in the framework of a

problem to be solved. They don’t seem to understand, why certain things don’t get

resolved. This helps provide a framework for doing that. So, I think actually going

through the exercise of the grid [Polarity Management map] in the formal structure of

laying things out is too time consuming and cumbersome to use pervasively. I think

it’s good for the first training thing, because it does give you a good framework.

Another leader added:

Definitely. Business is mostly a culture of black-and-white kind of decisions. I just

think it would help generate some more sophisticated thinking about issues. And, I

think part of the reason this change has taken hold is that our current leaders of the

corporation are more sophisticated than the previous generation, but there are still

vestiges….

[Researcher]: Is it beyond “flavor of the month” at this point?

[Leader]: I think so. I think it has some legs in [the leadership team]. I can’t

answer about the rest of the corporation, but I think, [the division president] got that


86

training and said ‘So that’s why this is so hard to manage.’ I think it helped him a lot.

[Researcher]: Your division is a classic example.

[Leader]: It is, because we’ve been trying to organize horizontally and

vertically and the horizontal people have been over here saying ‘The reason things

aren’t working is because it’s not horizontal’ and the vertical people have been over

here saying, ‘The reason things aren’t working is because it’s not vertical enough.’ So

it’s a classic example, and I think it was a real eye-opener for [the division president]

to kind of see that. I’ve been talking to my troops about vertical and horizontal

alignment and kind of talking about where [the corporation] is good. [The

corporation] is typically pretty good, fairly good, at the vertical alignment and pretty

bad at the horizontal alignment. I think it has huge applications for how we work

together, how we start strengthening the horizontal, because at [this company], one of

our big behaviors is supposed to be collaboration and that’s not nearly as effective.

Well, guess why? We’re really good at this and not good at that. So I think it has huge

application.

Further support for recommending polarity thinking came from another leader, who

stated:

Yes. I think the big thing is that it is a very good tool to bring different poles of

thought together in a logical, I’m not going to say non-emotional, but in a reduced

emotional way. It forms a way to communicate issues in a less personalized way so

that people can see the other’s point of view and the advantages in some situations of

the other’s point of view. So, I would like to see training actually across all of [the

corporation]. I think it would be extremely helpful. There are certain things in my


87

life, the situational leadership training I went through back in the eighties sticks in my

mind as one of the best courses that I’ve ever attended and I think for several reasons,

because it gets you past thinking that there is just one way to manage for every

situation and that’s not the case…It’s not the same tool in any way, but it helps to

resolve conflict and very few organizations today are pure vertical organizations;

they’re generally some type of matrix. There are controls that have to be in place and

it’s part of working in today’s environment. So, I think it’s a very important tool.

Another leader, when asked if he would recommend polarity thinking, pointed toward

the why and how of diffusion:

I think so, because of what you mentioned, getting people to know that they have to

manage both [poles in a polarity]....Set yourself up so that you can manage both. I

think [it] would be helpful. I think, however, as I said before [about] the barriers to

greater usage, if we really expect people to be living it, we have to be injecting ways

for them to practice it: training, those types of things. It’s not yet in my DNA and the

way that that could get into my DNA is practice. The muscle memory is not there yet.

Finally, a leader pointed toward what was already underway:

I think they’re [other leaders in the corporation] being introduced to it right now in

different forms and fashions. I think for an organization like [this company], which

always has been largely decentralized, which is constantly addressing and

readdressing the decision rights and organizational structure and so on, it is a very

powerful framework, and I think, I would be surprised [if for] any organization that

operates at anything close to the scale of [ours, that it] wouldn’t be a powerful tool for

those folks, because at the end of the day, it helps explain how things get decided. It


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puts it in a context.

The researcher wanted to know from the leaders what sort of supports they thought

would be necessary or advisable for leaders and teams throughout the rest of the organization

to learn and use polarity thinking. Some of the leaders pointed toward senior leadership

sponsorship, some toward education and training, and others pointed out the need to make

polarity thinking a cultural norm for people to pay full attention and develop deeper

awareness and skill.

One leader discussed a challenge that advocates of polarity thinking might face as

they attempt to introduce the mindset into broader corporate consciousness:

There are people in this organization, at the direct reports [level] and below, who

think this is baloney, who have physically come into my office and said so, because

they have come in to my office and vented on a topic and I’ve said, ‘Well, how has

your business unit leader dealt with this?’ ‘Well, they pulled out that polarity thing

and blah, blah, blah, blah, or talked of it in terms of a polarity.’ One direct quote that

actually incidentally came from somebody yesterday was, ‘To me that’s just a way of

avoiding conflict. They just don’t want to make decisions, so they send us away to do

the polarity and basically say ‘figure it out.’’ And what this person said is ‘I would

rather have them make a damn decision and let’s move on.’ That was the third person

I’ve talked to about Polarity Management. They heard a little bit about it, but it

sounds like pabulum, sounds like mush, just a way for us to all just get along. So, to

me it’s about an understanding and people kind of seeing the benefits of the thinking.

I didn’t necessarily agree with those folks, but that was somewhat of my initial

reaction.


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In order to partially offset that skepticism, one leader emphasized that the impetus for

learning and using polarity thinking:

…has to be top down. It has to be emphasized by the leadership of the people … you

want to use it. You have to keep the level of awareness up and remind people that it’s

a tool they should be incorporating into their way of doing business.

[Researcher]: Is there any kind of education or training support you would

suggest or incentives for use of it? It could be [seen], as Barry Johnson described, [as]

only “executive entertainment” where corporate says, ‘We want all of you to go

through this’ and they go through it and there’s no support to actually dig in and use

it.

[Leader]: There’s a lot of that type of thing, flavor of the month type of thing.

It all has some value, but I think in order to have the tool used effectively you have to

teach it, so you have to use it. If your leadership isn’t using it or myself or [the]

leadership team or other supervisors aren’t promoting it as a tool people should be

using, it gets dropped like a lot of the other training is. So, I’m not saying that it’s

difficult to sustain it, but you kind of have to let people know that it’s something that

you want to incorporate into your thinking over time. It’s no different than putting a

philosophy of “safety” in place or anything else you want to change in the culture of

your company. If you don’t continue to use it and reinforce [that], it becomes another

thing that gets pushed out of the way.

One leader pointed out how the diffusion was already occurring in senior

management and moving beyond that group. He identified the importance of,

Top leaders using it … The CEO talks about it, he’s mentioned it in town hall


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meetings. But, lots of people don’t know enough about it to pull out a polarity map

and say ‘this is how we laid it out.’ I think it would help. All of the corporate people,

at [our division president’s] level and above, have been trained in it and if they can

visibly use it, if people actually see leaders using the tool, [that will send a direct

message].

Another leader repeated the necessity of senior leader modeling the use of polarity

thinking and expecting others to follow suit:

I think it’s like anything else in a big company. You do have to get commitment from

the top. That is important, if they want this to be part of the toolbox. Once that’s done

then I think you have to have a concerted effort to train people, to teach, show,

encourage. One of the most effective ways of doing that is when leaders use it.

One leader commented on the training and continuing development of company

leaders and their direct reports. In part, to make that happen he said:

Well, I think classes have to be available and we as leaders have to be encouraged to

give our people the time to participate in this kind of thing. It’s always an issue. It’s

important for people to continue to learn and this would be one that I believe would

be good enough that we should support it. I don’t see it as a flavor of the month.

Another leader also addressed the question of how learning might be passed on and

said that there are various ways for the knowledge and skill to be passed on:

I don’t think it’s necessarily classroom training. I think it’s somehow building into

discussions, agendas, modus operandi of teams, that in the discussion or end of a

discussion [the questions], ‘OK, is this a polarity? Are there two ways to go about

this?’ [are asked]. Somehow, forcing that conversation. To me that would be helpful.


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It could be a role for HR.

And, the key for another leader would be,

Repetition. I don’t know at what level the returns to an eight-hour session would be,

where you reach a point of diminishing returns, so I don’t know, but at some point

you probably can’t justify educating people. So, the question is how you create that as

a cultural norm….

The only thing is whether the way it has been explained has been intuitive

enough because if it’s not been simplistic enough to seem intuitive, it won’t become a

cultural norm in the organization. And so then, we get to this issue of, ‘Okay, if [the

corporation’s] reason for bringing in Barry [Johnson] was to say For a group of

people, we think this is worthwhile and we think it’s worth bringing you in and

bringing Barry in and sitting you down and teaching you this, because we think that

it’s a useful form of analysis and problem solving.’ So, that’s one thing. If [the

company’s] desire is to have this be the way the organization thinks, then I believe

I’ve seen no work from the next phase and that is ‘How do you make this type of

thinking something that you can condense, something you can spread throughout the

organization, and something that you can distill into a few bumper sticker phrases.’

[Researcher]: Is it possible that Barry’s model, as helpful as it is, is still too

complex?

[Leader]: Oh, absolutely! I don’t think that most of us, by the end of the day,

had known it well enough to teach it and if the people who spent eight hours with it

don’t know it well enough to teach it, then those who only see it for half an hour will

never comprehend it.


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Unit 1: Perceived Impacts on Individual Leaders

This section of the dissertation examines the findings for one of the two units within

this inquiry: the perceived personal impacts of learning and using polarity thinking on the

leaders. A subsequent section examines the perceived impacts on the leadership team (Unit

2). Generally, the questions asked were parallel between the two sections. Throughout the

data for the two units, there were no directly identified or implied negative impacts of

learning and using polarity thinking. For this reason, the researcher sought to separate

responses into four categories of degree of impact of strong, moderate, slight, and minimal or

none.

Of note was that the concepts related to polarity thinking for corporate leaders were

not entirely alien and so at times a response was slight or minimal because the leader stated

that he or she had been using the mindset for a while without having a model attached to

what they were doing. Therefore, their response to a question like ‘Are you approaching

conflict management as a leader differently as a result of polarity thinking?’ may well have

been ‘No, not really’ and given their other comments may well have been reasonably

categorized as slight or minimal. The researcher supposed that even among those leaders

most grounded in an either/or mindset, they probably had been exposed to forms of polarity

over the course of their careers through training or experience, such that polarity thinking, as

a couple leaders explicitly stated, was somewhat “intuitive” to them. This made the

categorizing of responses challenging throughout.

Sense of self (Interview Question 5)

Sense of self, as originally conceived by the researcher, who is also a psychotherapist,

is broader and deeper than what was eventually operationalized through the question asked of


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interviewees. To capture a deeper sense of self of the leaders would have required

questioning far more intimate than the researcher felt appropriate for corporate leaders. The

question was framed toward the leader’s perspective on his or her personal opinions and

perspectives allowing freedom of interpretation.

Table 3

Impacts on Leaders: Sense of Self

Strong Moderate Slight Minimal or None

5 2 2 0

Seven of nine responses fell into the strong (5) and moderate (2) categories; two were

categorized as slight; and none were categorized as minimal or none (see Table 3). None of

the leaders expressed having any sort of flash of insight or personal epiphany. Among the

comments characterized as strong impact, one leader commented that,

It’s not something that I never thought about before, but I never thought about it that

clearly and concisely, nor did I think of it in the fact that certain quadrants [of the

Polarity Management model] are ways to better define problems. And so, in that

sense I guess it’s been helpful because it allows me to question the data that I’m

making my decisions on a little bit more precisely.

A second leader commented that,

I think what it’s done is made me a little bit more aware of recognizing that a polarity

exists versus a problem to be solved and certainly if you have a particularly annoying

problem that won’t go away, that continues to resurface, I think now understanding

that there is a polarity involved…[has] allowed me to maybe think about things a


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little bit differently.

Another identified that:

It’s given me a little more confidence, because the traditional mental model [of this

corporation] is to always have an answer, always have a black and white answer and

fight to the death to defend it and I’ve never been a black and white thinker. I’m not

that way, so this gives me a little more confidence to talk about balance and not get

pushed into a black and white kind of position.

Another take on the impact from a different leader pushed the impact beyond the

workplace:

I tend to think more now about polarized issues and how you manage those both in

my personal life and at work. The biggest frustration is that the other people that you

have to deal with are not thinking in the same way. So, it gives you a better

understanding. It doesn’t necessarily allow you to make bigger changes, but the fact

that you understand why you’re not making progress, I find to be helpful.

One leader stated that he wasn’t impacted personally so much, but that,

I think the biggest advantage is that by having the entire team exposed to this in the

same way in the same room, you have everybody looking at things in a similar way,

using a vocabulary that is similar, so that when we’re in a meeting we can talk about

the vocabulary that’s used in this model and people know where you are and I think

that is a very helpful approach.

Among those whose response the researcher characterized as moderate was one

leader for whom polarity thinking is congruent with previous ways of thinking.

I don’t know if it really changed the way I think. It changes the way I look at some


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issues, because, if anything, I think the polarity helped me clarify how I [think],

because it’s been kind of very much in line with the way I do things sometimes.

Before this, I never necessarily identified things as a polarity for example, but I’m

much less black and white, I think, than most people. I’m fine with ambiguity; it’s

usually not one or the other. It’s usually, you know, you’ve got to do both and

balance both. And, that’s more the way I think. So, if anything this was a good way to

talk about it, but it’s very consistent with how I do think.

The challenge of new thinking or approaches taking hold for anyone was clearly

stated by a leader when asked whether he thought about his own opinions and thinking

differently,

Not significantly. I would like to say yes. Part of it might be that I have been exposed

to probably six new kind[s] of personal or business management concepts in the last

six to twelve months. Things like alignment … [and] managing your personal energy

and I’ve adopted a couple of those things as higher priority, both in my personal and

professional lives. And so, Polarity Management, or polarity thinking, for whatever

reason, has not broken into that top two or three for me to really focus on.

Finally, taking on a new mode of thinking, while perceived as positive and helpful by

most of the leaders, isn’t without some difficulties. As one person put it, “It isolates you but

at the same time it gives you a degree of understanding that you didn’t have, at least I didn’t

have before.”

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Sense of self

It appeared to the researcher that the leaders thought of polarity thinking primarily

through the Polarity Management model and that their natural focus was toward the utility in


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helping them better understand their functions and areas of business responsibility, an

external focus, and not how they thought about themselves and their own personal

worldviews, an internal focus. This seemed quite understandable given their roles and the

context of their workplace introduction to polarity thinking and the Polarity Management

model. The responses fit primarily in the strong and moderate categories and showed shifts

in perspective, and yet didn’t display many markings of personal epiphanies. The researcher

concluded that the learning and use of polarity thinking did have impact on the leaders,

especially their organizational selves. It would be interesting to explore this area with them

following some sort of personal growth retreat where the explicit intent would be a focus on

the self. The researcher believed the responses for this domain would show greater impact

related to how they view themselves and their worldviews. This supposition was based on

observations of clients in psychotherapy, where the focus is explicitly on the personhood of

the client and the frequent struggles for clients trying to integrate that change in awareness

into their family and work lives, and significant gains were often experienced when clients

opened themselves to the “Genius of the AND.”

Operating theory of leadership (Interview Question 7)

The researcher was interested in whether the leaders reframed their operating theory

of leadership as a result of learning and using polarity thinking. In reviewing the responses,

the researcher would have liked to ask first if the leaders could briefly state their operating

theory of leadership as information against which to compare their responses to this question.

All leaders reported some impact, but not necessarily profound. None of the responses

indicated a significant shift in thinking on the part of the leaders. Nonetheless, the researcher

characterized the responses to the question on the impact on their operating theories of


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leadership by as strong (4), moderate (3), slight (2) and minimal or none (0) (see Table 4).

Table 4

Impacts On Leaders: Operating Theory Of Leadership


4 3 2 0

Among those responses characterized as strong, one leader said, “I guess the answer

is yes, because of the increased awareness around this range of issues that are in fact

polarities, not problems to solve but polarities to manage and role back and forth between

poles.”

Another said,

It’s been very beneficial in terms of my understanding some relationships with my

reports better that I have before….It’s been helpful in that I try to run my organization

in a matrix management system and historically that has never worked very well in

the organization even though theoretically it should. That’s why we keep going back

to it. But, the human element makes it very difficult to deal with. And I think that

Polarity Management has been extremely helpful in helping me to understand how

that relationship works and doesn’t work and having a reason for trying to get it

deeper into the organization as if my direct reports and I can at least be on the same

wavelength in terms of what we’re trying to do and the impediments to that. It should

give us a leg up in trying to get a matrix management system to work.

A third leader stated that,

I do catch myself saying, ‘OK, have I really put myself in that other person’s shoes


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and really understood where they’re coming from and could there be an and solution

to this versus probably prior to an ingoing assumption of there is a way to do it and

it’s probably one way or the other?’ So, I would say that I catch myself. And how

would I say that’s demonstrated itself? I think more openness, more listening and then

openness to an and solution.

A final example of a response characterized by the researcher as a strong response

came from a leader who said that, “I think definitely within the [company] context it has

helped me work with the rest of the organization.”

Examples of responses characterized as moderate include, “I learned some

terminology that allows me to be more specific to myself and to others as I’m

explaining it.” Or another leader, who stated that it had impact,

Maybe to the extent of how you communicate to your employees or the people you

work with or for…. So, it was helpful from the standpoint of framing up the issues if

you’re going to talk about and provide leadership to the issues.

Characterized as slight impact on his operating theory of leadership was the response

of one leader who said “I don’t know if it’s changed that. I see this more as another tool in

the toolbox. Clearly it’s raised my consciousness a little bit, but whether it’s changed my

opinions or my style or my beliefs on leadership…?”

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Operating theory of leadership

The researcher characterized the responses to this question as falling mostly in the

strong and moderate categories. The impact appeared to have been displayed through their

comments. However, the researcher did not get a sense whether the respondents had clearly

developed theoretical frameworks in the brief time spent on the question. This was an


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example of how greater time to explore with the leaders what sort of theory they might have

had before they went through the Polarity Management training and whether that had been

impacted after learning and using polarity thinking. Another approach, which might have

positively impacted the richness of the data on this question, and others in the interview,

might have been to give the leaders the questions to read and consider ahead of time. The

researcher recognized that some of the leaders might have given careful thought to the

questions ahead of time, some a few minutes of thought prior to the interview, and some no

thought until they heard the question.

Problem identification, labeling and analysis (Interview Question 8)

The researcher explored whether learning and working with polarity thinking had an

impact on the leaders’ approaches to identifying and analyzing problems. The researcher

intentionally differentiated between identifying and analyzing problems and crafting specific

solutions or action plans to be discussed in the following section. Key to the current question

is Johnson’s differentiation between problems to solve (either/or) and polarities to manage

(both/and) and whether the leaders directly or indirectly referred to that awareness.

Table 5

Impacts on Leaders: Problem Identification, Labeling, and Analysis


6 2 1 0

Six of the nine leaders indicated that learning and using polarity thinking impacted

their approach to identifying, labeling and analyzing issues that they encountered and were

characterized as strong. Two leaders’ responses were categorized as showing moderate


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impact and one as slight impact (see Table 5).

Among those who displayed a strong impact in this area, one leader stated that,

Yes, I think I pointed out that now can I appreciate those things that can be resolved

versus those that need to be managed. So, I tend to think in that way and differentiate

issues as they come up. The important thing and difficult element is now getting the

level below me to think in that same way, as well as the next level up. So, to [the]

point earlier about it being a burden, if you could get everyone in the level above and

the level below me to be thinking in the same way, then that would work smoothly.

But, obviously it doesn’t, so, we need to cope with that.

Another leader responded that he was impacted “just by how I look at issues and how

I talk about them, how I communicate them. It was helpful in that respect.”

Learning and using of polarity thinking raised consciousness about issues as they

were being discussed in some of the leader’s teams.

I think that the big awareness for me is the definition [difference] between a problem

[to solve] and a polarity [to manage] and how to deal with each of those situations….I

do realize more of a difference between a problem and a polarity and I do realize

when we’re having a group discussion about something that is a polarity, that that’s

what we’re dealing with and try and work with it formally.

Another leader said,

I have recognized polarity for a long time. I think it makes me more patient with the

fact that I’m not going to have an answer. So, more patient with myself. Rather than

saying, ‘These two people have completely different views. Let’s solve it.’ Well,

we’re not going to solve it; we’re going to manage it. I think it just gives me a little


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more patience with some of the stuff.

Still another leader commented that,

The idea that there are certain issues which are not problems to solve, which prior to

polarity for me everything would have been a problem to solve. In reality, if you stay

with something long enough, you would probably see yourself or your team coming

back in a certain issue time and time again and bouncing back and forth between the

poles, but not knowing that that’s what you’re doing. Having a conceptual framework

to understand that’s what your doing and it’s ok to do that is useful.

The same leader continued and added a caution,

I think, the risk, of course, is, there’s the dark side of polarity and we haven’t spoken

about that much yet, the dark side is the mis-quantification or the misanalysis that

says that this is … a polarity when in fact it is a problem to solve.

Among those responses categorized as moderate, was the response of a leader who

was emphatic when he said, “My initial reaction is no.” However, when the researcher

probed for more information, it seemed clear that, while not his natural approach, polarity

thinking had become more a part of his thinking then he had realized:

[Researcher]: Did you find that it provided some helpful insights that might not have

been there?

[Leader]: Yes. It helped more clearly understand the point of view that was

different than mine. But, I will say though, on one of the two times we used it, it was

an either/or; it was not a polarity. And it was interesting because I was trying to tell

the person, ‘I believe it’s an either/or’ and he kept saying, ‘No, it’s a polarity.’

Ultimately it came out and, I think, both agreed that it was an either/or. But still,


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looking at it and using the Polarity Management tool helped us get to that revelation.

[Researcher]: A greater clarity on the either/or?

[Leader]: Yes.

Finally, the response categorized as slight came from a leader who commented, “I

don’t think my method of analyzing problems has changed.” However, the same leader went

on to say that it “probably makes me more sensitive to others’ agendas, whether that is

internal [in the company] or with customers, potential partnerships or acquisitions. More of a

sensitivity of putting yourself in their shoes perhaps.”

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Problem identification, labeling, and analysis

The responses led the researcher to conclude that there was a significant impact for

the leaders on how they identified, labeled and analyzed problems. The researcher did not

assume that the leaders had never explored issues through a both/and lens; to the contrary,

the researcher assumed that the leaders had often seen the reality of polarities. Nonetheless,

as they made clear, the corporate and larger organizational culture in this country puts the

premium and rewards into clear-cut either/or analyses leading to definitive, un-muddied

solutions. The shift in this domain would seem to be in external, theoretical validation of the

realities of interdependent opposites (e.g., part/whole) and more significantly, a model (the

Polarity Management model) for fleshing out the polarity to manage, the up and down sides

of each pole, and an understanding of the dynamics of polarities. The fact that most

confessed that they didn’t routinely sit down and map out polarities did not change the fact

that the awareness had taken strong root in their perspectives.

Problem solving and taking action (Interview Question 10)

The interviewer wanted to examine the next step of the decision making process


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following the identification and analysis phase to see if the leaders noted any impact in how

they created action plans.

While the leaders generally appreciated the value of polarity thinking, the application

of polarity-oriented solutions appeared to be sporadic at best. Missing in all accounts of the

leaders were any specific business outcomes generated by the application of polarity thinking

to solution formation and implementation.

Table 6

Impacts on Leaders: Problem Solving and Taking Action


3 3 3 0

The sense that arose, specifically in response to this question and elsewhere in the

participants’ comments, was that it is one thing to think seriously about polarities that are

realities in their work and quite another to craft solutions with a both/and orientation

structured into them. This was highlighted in an exchange with one of the leaders:

[Researcher]: You know [Johnson’s] model, with the green flag piece, actually

putting in action steps of how to pay attention to both sides of a polarity at the same

time. Do you see barriers to you using that for yourself? Not the model itself, but that

way of thinking? Doing the both/and when you’re actually implementing solutions?

Or is that fairly natural for you?

[Leader]: The other side gets a vote. [laughs]

[Researcher]: So, you think that it’s quite doable?

[Leader]: I don’t know if it’s executable, but it’s certainly something that


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enables you to think about the pros and the cons. I think that it enables you perhaps to

see from the other fellow’s perspective a little better and makes it more clear when

there’s a much higher cost to what you’re asking in the mind of person who’s sitting

at a different pole than yours.

[Researcher]: Are there pressures to resolve toward one pole or another

typically?

[Leader]: Sure. Absolutely. In most instances, you make more money or the

operation runs smoother in one pole or the other at any given point in time.

The leaders’ perceptions of the impacts of polarity thinking in this area, while not

easily demarcated, are categorized as strong (3), moderate (3), and slight (3) (see Table 6).

Among those who responded with a strong sense of the impact was a leader who said:

Yes, absolutely. I tend to think of the issues that I deal with as either a problem to

solve or something that needs polarity management or a polarity approach. So, I make

that distinction, which I never used to do [clump everything into a problem category].

So, I make that distinction and that makes it easier for me to solve an issue or manage

it. That’s a very important distinction. And then, on those issues that need to be

managed, I tend to look at it in terms of what’s the best level of management: How do

I get the right level of infinity balance [the Infinity Loop in Johnson’s polarity map]

to decision-making.

[Researcher]: So, you are actually implementing through action an ongoing

awareness [of polarity]?

[Leader]: Yes.

[Researcher]: Is that difficult?


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[Leader]: Not really. Now, I don’t go to the extent of making polarity graphs,

but conceptually I deal with it and I find that pretty easy to do.

Another leader commented with a sense of an inherent challenge that,

The best issue that I can think of where we used polarity as a way of understanding

and tried to design a solution, that was accommodating to the poles involved, is an

issue [where] we got to what I’ll call what appears to be maybe 80-90% consensus.

Now that issue is currently under review at corporate center and, as I said earlier, I’m

not sure how that will come out. It will be very interesting if that business

opportunity, which was largely constructed on the basis of an understanding of a

polarity that was going to sit at the foundation, managing that and managing those

constituents [is approved]. We designed the business system with the polarity

absolutely front and center and a lot of people walked away and said: ‘This is the

most thankless job you can imagine someone having at [this company].’ We

intentionally didn’t go to one pole or the other. And so, whoever it is, if that is

implemented as proposed, whoever, whatever team over time takes on that

responsibility will be living a polarity. It will have to have a certain style of

leadership. The way I would term it: you have to be a collaborator as part of your

genetic code to do this. And some people can do it and some people don’t do it very

well.

A leader, who offered another strong response with a specific example said,

A good example yesterday was with someone who reported to me. I had a clear point

of view as to where I wanted to go and she had a differing point of view and we did

ultimately come to the conclusion that it was both/and; it was parts of both. It wasn’t


106

in the absolute my recommendation; it wasn’t in the absolute in her recommendation.

It was parts of both. So, we left it that she would go away and put together a short-

term and a long-term plan that would take into consideration elements of both. I

wouldn’t necessarily say that’s pure Polarity Management, but it’s pretty close.

The variety of applications of polarity thinking was supported in the response of a

leader characterized by the researcher as moderate, and yet still offered substantial support

for the value of polarity thinking.

I tend to see an awful lot of shades of grey and I tend to look for the

motivation and don’t assume that everybody thinks like I do. And so therefore, I like

to think that I’ve been doing this before. Now mind you, I think it has enabled me in

certain circumstances to think more broadly about certain things and it has enabled

me in other circumstances to define things more narrowly because the tools are

there….We’re in the process of a labor negotiation now and one recognizes the

tradeoffs that you have to make and the tradeoffs that you have to induce the guys on

the other side to make. And so, you tend to think in terms of polarity. The idea of

absolutes in that is nonsense.

Another leader’s moderate response suggested that polarity thinking impacted his

problem solving in one realm more than another.

It has [had impact] in terms of working with the [division presidents’ team]. Hard to

say whether at this point it’s changed my leadership style within my own team,

because I think within my own team, I have very open communication and people

much more openly express their views, whether they’re with something or have a

different view and I think we’ve always had that openness in our [business unit team].


107

A slight response of impact was expressed through an exchange with one leader who

offered that:

I would say to the point where you’re able to truly identify, more correctly identify,

which are problems to solve versus a polarity has affected how I approach problem

solving, yeah. If I’m identifying a polarity then I’m not trying to solve it.

[Researcher]: Do you find yourself doing a green flag on both sides [action

planning] approach?

[Leader]: Awareness doesn’t always translate into action.

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Problem solving and taking action

The responses of the leaders in this domain were mixed. As stated earlier, the

researcher surmised that the impact of the leaders’ acculturation in business generally and

this organization specifically emphasizes clear-cut decisions in the either/or mold that seem

unmuddied by the ambiguity and complexity that naturally comes with an awareness of

polarity thinking. Either/or action plans might be described as the default setting for leaders

and their reports in most organizations. Nonetheless, the responses showed six of nine

leaders indicating strong or moderate impacts on problem solving and taking action.

Although three leaders’ responses may have indicated a strong impact, the researcher would

be hesitant to assume that they routinely created polarity-focused action plans.

Communication (Interview Question 12)

The researcher wondered whether an understanding and use of polarity thinking

would impact the ways in which leaders perceived themselves communicating with others. In

particular, the researcher was interested in whether the leaders found themselves tailoring

their messages in language that spoke to the likely range of polarity perspectives in an


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audience. Although there was some report of impact on the leaders’ communication, it did

not stand out tremendously: strong (2), moderate (4), slight (3), and minimal or none (0).

Table 7

Impacts on Leaders: Communication


2 4 3 0

For the two leaders whose responses appeared to indicate an impact more strong in

character, they responded with tones of enthusiasm.

It gives a common language, although, as I said, not everyone’s sitting there and

drawing polarity maps, but at least I can say, ‘Remember the discussion about

polarities? This is one of those.’ It helps to give me a language to coach other people

a little bit more. ‘You’re not going to solve this one. It’s not going to be solved. It’s

something you’ve got to manage.’

[Researcher]: Is there ever a time where you find yourself anticipating a

discussion or a report where you think, ‘I just know that there’s going to be someone

sitting out there who is one the other pole,’ and actually crafting your message with

them in mind?

[Leader]: I try to do that anyway.

And the second,

I would say that my listening has been increased from an empathetic standpoint. So,

understanding another person’s point of view. So, I would say more of a listening and

probing questions and sitting back a little bit more than just jumping right in to it.


109

One leader whose response indicated a moderate level of impact, made the case for

communication using the language of polarity thinking:

I think communication is a piece of leadership; the answer is clearly, yes. I think

about communication as we’re taking something out of a small group in charge of

making decisions and implementing it so we can communicate. We haven’t done that

yet. Now, I could well imagine that if we had the opportunity to implement some

decisions that have been, that are rooted in our polarity thinking, that part and parcel

of that communication might be an acknowledgement and a reference to polarity as a

way to help explain what we’re trying to do on a modest scale or even potentially on

a broader scale.

Another leader whose response fell within this category noticed that,

I think it [his communication] has changed rather subtly. It’s not a dramatic

difference, but I tend to now use [polarity] thinking in trying to explain a situation or

trying to get to a place where a particular issue is managed appropriately and I find

myself doing that, not only here at but in my life outside of work as well,

professionally and personally.

Another leader stated that the impact on communication appears,

only to those issues. To the extent that I can identify something that we may have

thought of as a problem as a polarity: yes, that I can talk about it in that construct and

then that’s helpful to communicate issues to the team. But, like I say, I was able to

implement, use the polarity map right away. I mean like literally the day after.

This division-level leader reported that he used polarity thinking, specifically the

Polarity Management model, to illustrate issues around financial incentives with the CEO of


110

the corporation the day after the first training apparently with great effect. Although his

perception seemed to indicate moderate impact, it may well be that the impacts on the

leaders, generally and specific to communication, were more extensive then they had as yet

realized.

Another leader’s comments also suggested a moderate level of impact:

My skills haven’t changed. I think my sensitivity to the poles has changed. I’m not

sure if I did this before or not, but recognizing them…I sit in the middle in many

respects, and I respect those poles. So, when I communicate, I want to be sure that I

communicate that respect. I don’t think it changed my skills, but it probably has

adjusted my message.

Among those whose responses suggested only slight impact, one leader stated, “I can

only recall one specific instance of doing it. I may be doing it without thinking about it. I

don’t know that.” Another leader reported “Probably not a lot” and then went on to say that

he remembered few audiences where there appeared to be a split in perspectives along

polarity lines and would naturally adjust if that were the case. This leader continued by

indicating that the current realities of work have a significant effect in minimizing the uptake

of a polarity thinking approach in general and in communication in specific. A portion of the

exchange will illustrate:

[Researcher]: Is there any kind of expectation that when you communicate problems

and potential solutions that it is really in the either/or kind of framework, namely ‘We

want a solution from you. We don’t want to hear about a polarity; We want to know

what you’re going to do.’ Is there any pressure like that?

[Leader]: Just in general, you better deal with an either/or situation, get the


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facts and make a decision and hopefully address it and the problem, because the

problem won’t go away and get it resolved. Whereas in a polarity, it’s not going to go

away and it’s something you need to deal with on a continuous basis with a clear

understanding with people on both sides of a polarity as to how they are going to have

to change their behaviors a little bit to get it to work. So, I think we have a tendency

as managers, because we have so much to do and very little time…and move on to

the next thing. But polarities require continued thought and action.

[Researcher]: And it’s a real shift from what we learned in business school.

[Leader]: But most managers tend to put it, unless they really think about it,

they like to think in terms of get people together, get the facts on the table, make a

decision, and move on. We have to do the same thing five or six times. It’s kind of

what we’ve experienced with our leadership team. So, I think, coming up to the

polarity training, I think we made an attempt to deal with it and now we’re trying to

figure out ‘How do we recognize that it’s a polarity, not a problem; How do we

behave and redefine our behaviors to try and deal with the situation?’

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Communication

From the responses related to the impacts of polarity thinking on communication

emerged a pattern that suggested an increase in awareness of the existence of polarities and a

resulting increase in empathy and understanding when listening to the issues and concerns

raised by reports. Some leaders reported that they found themselves articulating that

situations were polarities to manage, rather than problems to solve. The researcher did not get

a sense that the leaders consciously framed messages with an awareness that advocates for

different poles in a given polarity would be among the recipients of the message. The impact


112

in this domain seemed to be slight to moderate overall. Perhaps, part of the difficulty could

be trying to communicate about a polarity if and when the listeners are unfamiliar with the

concepts and expect information to be transmitted in the more familiar either/or frame. This

gap would seem to have a strong effect on the timeliness and extent of diffusion of this

additional mindset.

Conflict (Interview Questions 14, 15, and 16)

The interviewer was particularly interested in ascertaining whether there were any

perceived impacts from learning and using polarity thinking on conflict. There were three

primary areas in this domain that the researcher wanted to explore: whether the leaders’

understandings of conflict generally had been affected; whether the level of leaders’ personal

experiences of conflict had been affected; and whether the leaders found themselves

approaching conflict management differently.

Conflict (a) – Understanding (Interview Question 14)

Of all the domains explored, the domain of conflict showed the most pointed results.

For the first of the three sub-areas explored, understandings of conflict, the responses fell into

categories of strong (7) and moderate (2) (see Table 8). The strong theme was that

understanding polarity thinking, specifically through the tool of the Polarity Management

model provided insights that were different and very valuable.

It helps you understand why someone maybe you’re disagreeing with holds the pole

that they do and just that understanding is infinitely helpful in terms of trying to

bridge some kind of decision that might work for both of you and I think before that it

was always, myself included, tended to operate more in a realm of problem to solve

and I got…if you tended to organizationally align with the whole, surprise, surprise,


113

your solutions tended to go that way and if you were organizationally aligned more

with one of the parts, surprise, surprise, you tended to go that way….

‘Ah ok, this is where this person’s fears are. You have the downside of the

pole and this whole idea of my upside is your downside and your upside is my

downside.’ If you are operating in that space and you don’t have a framework to help

you understand what you’re operating in, it is pretty polarizing and we’ve typically

had a very polarized leadership. And so, it’s some step forward to say, ‘Ok, we

maybe still hold our poles, but we appreciate and understand what it is about your

pole, the [the upside and] downside of your pole, before arguing the upside of our

pole, [and] to be cognizant of and in fact try to look for solutions that are somewhere

in the middle.’

Table 8

Impacts on Leaders: Conflict: Understanding


7 2 0 0

One leader made a connection between polarity thinking and Argyris’ ladder of

inference:

This whole notion of the Ladder of Inference is [the] understanding that people

operate with their own data pool and often times that in many cases there’s

insufficient data that is the root of conflict. That part hasn’t really changed. I think

maybe if anything is changed it’s been around this data pool notion and relating that

to the polarity. For instance, if we think about this graphically, we each have these


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data pools and largely these data pools have been generated at the poles that we

[favor]; it may be simply that we’re not willing to accept the data at another pole. It

might be available, but we don’t want it.

Another leader echoed the theme that understanding led to insights applicable to

everyday interactions. When asked about possible impact on his understanding he said,

Absolutely. I tend to be able to be more understanding of conflict, perceive why it

exists. I guess it gives me more of an appreciation of the other side of an argument

that I would normally just brush off. So, clearly it’s changed how I think about

conflict and how I deal with it.

Another related how understanding polarity thinking had provided a certain freeing

affect:

It’s probably just given me a little more confidence in being OK with the conflict…. I

used to worry a long time ago, when I was young and naïve … about the conflicts

between groups: ‘OK, if we just did this, it would fix that.’ I don’t do that anymore. I

think that was evolution, but sometimes when I go home at night I’m able to say, ‘I’m

not going to be able to solve it. I’m not going to worry about it.’ It’s a certain freeing

kind of thing, rather than thinking ‘If I only worked harder I could fix this.’

Another:

I do think that this is something that I can now do more definitively; do perhaps to a

deeper level, because I can more objectively analyze the situation. And, clearly in

communicating the issues to others involved in analyzing the problem, it almost

certainly would help me be more specific in the description.

And another:


115

I am very well aware that there are always two sides. There are always different

perspectives, but I think it raised my awareness again. It reinforced some things and it

raised the awareness a little bit about the point about [how] two very well-intentioned

people wanting the same thing can have different perspectives … or different

approaches to things or different views on issues depending on which pole they are

at…. this [has] reinforced and broadened the understanding.

And finally,

No question: yes, because it lays out the plusses and the minuses of the different poles

and how it affects the whole and being able to have an open discussion about those

kinds of issues is extremely important to get to the best solution as opposed to be

hidden under the vest.

For the leaders whose responses fell into the category of moderate impact, there was

still a sense that their understandings were enriched.

No. Only because I think I have a pretty good handle on the fundamental issues of the

conflict and I don’t think that has changed. I think where polarity thinking has helped

is how you then approach a solution for the conflict. So, if I’m recognizing and

understanding the conflict, I don’t think so, because I think I had a good

understanding of it before. In future conflicts it will be helpful.

And for another leader,

I genuinely don’t think that this is something that I didn’t do before. I do think that

this is something that I can now do more definitively, do perhaps to a deeper level

because I can more objectively analyze the situation. And, clearly in communicating

the issues to others involved in analyzing the problem, it almost certainly would help


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me be more specific in the description.

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Understanding conflict

The researcher concluded from the responses in this area that there was a significant,

primarily strong, impact of polarity thinking on the leaders’ understandings of the sources

and roots of conflicts that they experienced or observed. The leaders generally had added a

mental checkpoint to ascertain whether a situation they found themselves in personally or

hearing about from others was a reflection of an underlying polarity. For some of the leaders,

this confirmed their previous awareness and provided an organizing frame to label what they

noticed.

Conflict (b) – Personal experience (Interview Question 15)

Generally, the leaders did not report any impact on their personal levels of

experienced conflict – strong (0), moderate (5), slight (1), and minimal or none (3) (see

Table 9). It would be interesting to further explore this dimension. The responses in all but

two cases were very terse and where more verbal tended to be intellectualized responses. It

could be imagined that given their reticence to reveal personal intimate information, as

perceived by the researcher, they would be reluctant to do so in discussing this domain.

Table 9

Impacts on Leaders: Conflict: Personal Experience


0 5 1 3

One leader with a response characterized as moderate said that,

What it may do in some cases is allow a little bit of intellectual separation from the


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person. If you think about this in a pre-polarity context, ‘By God, every time I get

into an issue with Joe, we always disagree and, by God, after awhile I just begin to

think that Joe is a royal pain in the neck.’ And now if I look at it, I think, ‘You know

what? Joe and I tend to disagree on lots of issues, but at least I understand where Joe

is coming from with his disagreement.’ Ok, I can begin to, I don’t demonize Joe in

the same way that I might have and that by itself is constructive to say OK now let’s

find some issues where Joe and I can work together. Or, if I know this about Joe, even

if on this issue a year ago we would have locked horns, today we can figure out a way

to unlock them or just get through it.

Another leader said:

My personal level of conflict has probably decreased, but I can’t consciously

correlate it to the training. I’m not thinking differently, but I would say that the

conflict level and maybe this is a result of the training and the introduction of the

concept as a team, that the level of conflict … among our team has declined in the

past year.

A third leader simply stated, “Clearly it has. I tend to view issues as less conflicting

than I used to think.” A fourth: “I think so. I think spending time and being involved in these

kinds of discussions is helpful.”

Among those whose responses indicated a slight impact one leader commented, “I

think that the awareness is raised and that does impact the way that you approach a situation

a little bit more. I don’t know if I can really judge myself whether I’m better at it or not.

More aware.”

Minimal or no impact was seen in responses like, “Not really,” “No, I can’t tell you


118

that I’ve seen that,” and “Not much. I don’t’ think this changed me.”

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Personal experience of conflict

Although the majority of leaders’ responses indicated a moderate level of impact (5

of 9), the researcher’s sense was that the impact on the leaders’ personal experiences of

conflict remained muted. It was likely that a more significant reduction of experienced

conflict and stress would necessitate changes in multiple areas of their day-to-day

experiences in order to register as more noticeable in their perceptions, including the

awareness of polarities being more diffused throughout the organization as a given of reality

that all face together. It is very difficult to be on the front end of awareness and new

awareness generates it’s own internal conflicts and stresses, since it puts people outside of

the prevailing, group mindset.

Conflict (c) – Conflict management (Interview Question 16)

The third area within the conflict domain explored whether the leaders perceived

themselves approaching conflict management differently, specifically whether they found

themselves intervening differently with other leaders and their direct reports. The responses,

as before, were challenging to categorize. However, the researcher saw the responses falling

into strong (4), moderate (3) and slight (2) categories (see Table 10).

Table 10

Impacts on Leaders: Conflict: Approaches to Conflict Management


4 3 2 0

The exchange with one leader gave an example of a strong impact of learning and


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using polarity thinking in conflict management:

[Researcher]: What kinds of things might you do with your staff or your direct reports

that are different?

[Leader]: I tend now to let things move out a little further so that the points of

difference become clearer and then try to bring it back in terms that these things are

so different that neither side is ever going to go away. And so, the question becomes:

‘How do you manage it.’ That the conflict requires some polarity approach to it

becomes more evident to the participants, whereas in the past, I would have tried to

pick one side or the other immediately.

[Researcher]: A fire to put out rather than to tend?

[Leader]: Yes. What I found is that by letting the participants go a little further

in developing their relative positions, then it becomes clearer to them that they’re

never going to do away with one or the other.

[Researcher]: Do they naturally come to that or do you find yourself having to

illuminate that for them?

[Leader]: You end up illuminating that and trying to guide them in the right

direction, but it has to reach a certain level of intensity on both sides so that it’s

evident that the other point that they’re opposing is not going to go away.

[Researcher]: So the heat is not all bad.

[Leader]: No, to a point.

Another leader with a strong response was clear in saying that although he had had a

similar framework previously, “this gives me a much better sense of definition and a much

better tool for analysis.”


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Another leader whose response fell into the same category suggested that polarity

thinking supported his existing approach to conflict management,

[Leader]: I’m using the language more and I think that helps with my staff, because

then it’s not ‘Oh, he’s being indecisive again.’

[Researcher]: So, it actually gives an external framework that provides

credibility to your efforts to manage the conflicts.

[Leader]: ….I have gotten feedback in the past, that I was indecisive and I

don’t think that’s true. I think what is true is that I see both sides of the situation and I

try hard to see both sides and I try to manage conflict, but I rarely try to take a side. I

think that for people who are black and white thinkers, that position looks like

indecision.

A final example of a strong response was shown in the exchange with the researcher:

[Researcher]: Have you had any kind of circumstances where as a third party, you

ended up seeing what was going on or helped a couple people think about what was

happening?

[Leader]: I frequently referee situations that fall as polarities and basically

form the standpoint[s] of a problem or conflict [that] exists and then I’m pulled into it

and people who are not able to resolve a situation don’t realize that it’s not a problem

to be solved and they can’t get there so they have to better understand… They may

not even know what a polarity is, but they understand that it’s not something that

they’re going to resolve because it’s always going to exist, something that they’re

going to have to deal with.

That’s pretty common for me to have people who have totally different


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viewpoints on something and they can’t quite seem to get the issue resolved, because

they’re looking at it as a problem [to solve] and then can’t quite solve the problem.

A leader whose response was categorized as moderate made the point that,

I don’t know if I would call it conflict management as much as, well, there are

opportunities to utilize this and no question that the model [would be] helpful in a

couple areas where you have functions that are sometimes in conflict with operations

or sales and marketing, where they have a regulatory role, some sort of policing type

role. In that area, I think, it is a very useful tool….

[Researcher]: Someone mentioned the conflict between sales and

production…

[Leader]: We don’t have that one in our group. We do have [one] more

between our regulatory function and our sales and marketing function. That’s a little

more difficult. In addition to that I would say issues between our business unit and

some corporate functions, who have never been exposed to our kind of business

before and the context is historical from [our corporation’s] perspective where we are

definitely on the front edge of bringing a lot of new things and new ideas to the

corporation. So, in that context I would say that there would be more and more; there

would be advantages for more and more training in this type of approach across [the

company]. There has been discussion, you know, [on] the whole issue of paradox? A

couple years ago in the senior management meetings they talked about paradox and

talked about this issue. The difference in the polarity [management] model is that you

have a model, if you spend time studying the model, and [if given] the opportunity on

specific situations to use it. I think it could be a very good type of session, for


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example, to have between our group and, let’s say, the legal organization, the

corporate legal group, or our group and corporate public affairs group. I think that

would be very helpful.

And for another leader:

[Researcher]: Do you ever find yourself mediating other people’s conflicts?

[Leader]: Yeah.

[Researcher]: So does that awareness [polarity thinking] come into play for

you there, as an outside party?

[Leader]: Yeah. It’s an interesting question because we went through a period

before the polarity workshop where there was, I would say, a fairly open level of

disagreement. It was already transparent to the broader enterprise….You could ask

people sitting out in the cubes on this issue [and they would say], ‘Ok, bing, bing,

bing line up over here; bing, bing, bing line up over there.’ They could pick it up and

frankly we were taken to task as a leadership team for making ourselves that

transparent. Ultimately, that[‘s] non-supportive of each other and at [this company]

we have a behavior that we try to follow: discuss, decide, and then support. And so,

when you get into these mediating issues your talking about in your question, the

question becomes ‘where are you falling in that continuum of discuss, decide,

support.’ And, where the polarity piece can be helpful is in the support mode; where I

might not necessarily agree wholeheartedly with a decision that was made by, let’s

say a business unit leader … and some of their people. Maybe the issue bubbled its

way toward me because people might suspect that I have a different point of view or

what have you and [that] they could find some solace or hope of reopening the issue


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[by] kind of coming through the back door. And, polarity can be helpful in terms of

understanding, ‘OK, that’s a decision where I might not have, that may not have been

a decision I would make,’ [and] reflects where that person is on their pole and is

consistent with that and so I can understand and articulate support for the decision in

that context of it’s [being] … grounded in that person’s reality.

For a couple of the of the leaders, their responses were best categorized as showing

only slight impact of learning and using polarity thinking. For instance, one leader

commented, “Only to the extent that I can clearly identify something, ‘Hey, this really fits the

polarity. Let’s talk about this.’ It might help in a discussion, but again to me that was

natural.” Or another leader, who said,

Slightly, but again, more on the depth of understanding the other person’s point of

view to see if there’s another way of approaching versus the way that I was going into

it. Now, have I carried that to the next step of saying there could be a both/and, I

think so in some cases, maybe not consciously like ‘OK now I’m going to go through

the steps [of the Polarity Management model].’

Interpretation of impacts on leaders: Approaches to conflict management

This sub-domain of conflict appeared to connect with the changed understanding

many leaders had about the sources and root causes of many of the conflicts that they dealt

with directly or encountered in interactions with other leaders or their direct reports. The

impact appeared to the researcher to be substantial overall (7 of 9 at moderate or strong)

because the awareness of polarities and the resulting understanding of the sources naturally

led to what seemed to be an altered approach to conflict management. The researcher

inferred from this that with continuing diffusion of polarity thinking throughout the division


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and its business units, as well as the corporation as a whole, that over time a greater reduction

in the personal experiences of conflict might be reported.

Interpretation for conflict domain

The researcher concluded in synthesizing the data from the three sub-domains of

conflict that the impact of learning and using polarity thinking in this area was substantial.

On reflection, the researcher would have changed the language in question 15 to read ‘Has

the level of conflict or stress you experience changed?’ The researcher cannot be clear

whether the leaders took “experience of conflict” to mean only external conflicts with others

and not also internalized feelings of conflict or what have been more immediately

understandable as “stress.” Nonetheless, it appears that the leaders were impacted

substantially with the responses on all questions falling in the moderate to strong range. The

changes appeared to the researcher to be in the initial stages of impact since the mindset

seemed to still have the nature of a tool, rather than an integrated mode of understanding the

world. The researcher posits that if and when polarity thinking became inculcated into a daily

frame of reference in the division and broader corporate culture, the impacts would be more

distinct and meaningful. This domain is perhaps the one most likely to be strongly impacted

for individuals and organizations.

Organizational working relationships (Interview Questions 20 and 21)

The researcher wanted to gauge whether working relationships with people or

functions within the organization and outside of the division had been impacted by the

leaders learning and using polarity thinking. The basis for the inquiry was the awareness that

changes in relationships may occur more readily and naturally within one’s own immediate

group and less so with people more removed, even within an organization. The phenomenon


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of silos occurs frequently between different functional groups, e.g., marketing and finance,

and also between different business units or divisions that compete for resources.

Not all of these leaders had routine interactions with staff in other parts of the

organization. Interactions outside of the division with other people or functions in the broader

corporation were more frequent for the division presidents than they were for the business

unit leaders. The leaders’ responses fell across the scale with strong (2), moderate (4), slight

(1), and minimal (2) ratings (see Table 11).

Table 11

Impacts on Leaders: Organizational Working Relationships


2 4 1 2

One leader emphatically noted positive impact, especially when others in the

organization were also familiar with the concepts of polarity thinking:

Yes. Absolutely. And, it’s somewhat driving reorganization efforts in another

division [that’s] related, and the way it begins to think about [reorganizing]; they

brought me in to help them think about the reorganization and a number of the issues

that came up are clearly paradoxical now. The leaders of that division have been

through Polarity Management [training]. So the concept was pretty [new]…but it was

clear that it was effective.

Another leader made a strong response and the exchange with the researcher pointed

out the reality of nested systems through the part/whole polarity where an organizational unit

constituting the whole is also a part of a larger whole.


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[Leader]: Absolutely. Again, much as I described within my organization, my dealing

with my peers in other units has benefited from the same kind of thinking

tremendously.

[Researcher]: So, is [there an] equivalent [dynamic of] business unit to

division and division to corporate?

[Leader]: Yes.

[Researcher]: Do you find yourself [at the division level] operating, in effect,

as a business unit [within the broader corporation]?

[Leader]: Yes.

The leader went on to talk of how, unlike others, he had dual formal roles as a

business unit leader within the division and also as the leader for a corporate entity that

operated across multiple divisions. From that perspective, he saw the part/whole polarities in

multiple settings and variations.

Another leader, whose response was categorized as moderate echoed this idea:

The illustration I used earlier regarding a recommendation that was rooted in polarity

thinking is then, that recommendation was extended to include a broader swath of the

corporation and that’s one division with five or six business units extended out to

include virtually four divisions and thirty to thirty-five business units. The interesting

thing was that when you, as you address the polarity issues between our business

units and our division, you could see other business units being pretty accepting of

the approaches we were taking, but then the question came between the divisions. So,

suddenly we had four divisions at the table and so all those part and whole questions,

which had been business units and a division, now became between divisions and the


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corporation. And so again, where do the decision rights reside and so on, which is

part of the reason that the whole discussion gets elevated to the corporate team and

takes on a life yet of its own. It will be interesting, as I said earlier, to see how that

comes back out and see how closely it resembles the original recommendation and to

what extent the, I’ll call them the division tussles, have reshaped it.

[Researcher]: Are you finding that you are thinking about what other

platforms are advocating for differently?

[Leader]: Not specifically.

For another response categorized as moderate, a leader again referenced the value

that could be gained in using polarity thinking in cross-functional interactions: “Yes. I’d like

to see us use this between our business unit and some of the corporate functions, legal and

public affairs in particular.”

Another leader commented:

You know, when you do something [in a particular] way, you do tend to do that in

almost every manifestation of it and so, I may say that I saw this and I would have

articulated it problems versus conditions. Now, I think of it in terms of the polarity,

because the tool is there, convinced already of the usefulness of it because it’s

something you think you’ve been doing anyway. A tool that allows you into it a little

bit further, you tend to do it. Sure, I guess that’s affected my relationships with my

peers and with my partners here in the business.

A slight response came from one leader who said, “Not significantly, but again, it’s a

tool to understand a situation and why we don’t end up working. I’ve used it in thinking

about how we’re interfacing with other business units.” Another replied, “In general, no, but


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I can give you one example with a customer where we were at a stalemate around a value

proposition….I tended to look at it more as a compromise, than necessarily a clear polarity.”

The two leaders with responses characterized as minimal shared the theme of little

interaction with the broader corporation. One leader said, “I have not had any issues that I’ve

had to deal with regarding different parts of the corporation. But again, would my approach

be changed? Potentially.” The other response, while saying little about the organization,

made the point that polarity thinking has had an impact elsewhere: “I think about my

personal life, my home/work life balance that way. I can’t say that other parts of the

corporation have been affected because I haven’t had enough interactions recently. Almost

all of our interactions are here.”

Finally, the researcher inquired whether the leaders had received feedback from

people in other parts of the corporation who may have noticed something different in their

approaches to interactions and decision-making (Interview Question 21). The responses were

primarily that little feedback had been received. One leader stated:

If the question describes the [divisional] domain the answer is yes. Both the language

and the thinking, clearly have taken root, to varying degrees with different people, but

have clearly taken root. And so, even if an issue is not being explicitly discussed in

polarity terms, there often are references to polarity or a both/and kind of thing,

within in the divisional environment. When you extend beyond into the balance of the

corporation, I think it gets much softer.

[Researcher]: There are no comments from others that ‘in the past you would

have been absolute on what you thought should happen?’

[Leader]: Within [the division] perhaps, but not outside. There’s no context.


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The leader who had provided consultation on reorganization to another division said,

“Not other than this one instance that I referred to.” Another commented, “No, can’t say as I

have. I’m feeling more comfortable in my relationship with others and the progress that I’m

able to make, but I haven’t gotten any feedback.” The other responses were “no” responses.

Interpretation of impacts on leader: Organizational working relationships

The responses from the leaders about impacts on organizational working relationships

indicated to the researcher that those impacts were slight to moderate at most and were

probably more isolated than general in nature. Many of the leaders’ interactions outside of

their business unit or the division were limited and so others in the broader corporation

wouldn’t experience differences in the leaders’ approaches or have opportunity to comment

if they had noticed something. Also, given that the training of polarity thinking through the

Polarity Management model was still in its beginning stage, others in the corporation might

not know what they were looking at, if they saw it. The reports of a couple of the leaders

pointed to what might come down the road as senior corporate management pushes the

corporation to learn about polarity thinking and as this team of leaders and their particular

functional areas within the division, develop more immediacy and skill with the mindset and

display that knowledge and skill routinely.

Unit 1: Summary and interpretation of findings

The researcher established a threshold of 2/3 of the responses (6 of 9) in the strong

and moderate categories as indicative of significance to answer the research questions in the

affirmative (see Table 12).

Did polarity thinking impact leaders’ sense of self? Seven responses, five strong and

two moderate, indicated that the sense of self of the leaders was significantly impacted in a


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positive direction. The leaders consciousness of their own thought processes seemed

genuinely to have been expanded. However, the researcher did not assume that this impact

was at a deep transformative level, perhaps, because of the countervailing forces that

maintain the personal and cultural status quo. Deeper personal issues that might have

indicated more transformative impacts were not explored.

Table 12

Impacts on Leaders: Unit 1 Summary

Domain Strong Moderate Slight Minimal

Sense of self 5 2 2 0

Operating theory 4 3 2 0

Problem identification 6 2 1 0

Problem solving 3 3 3 0

Communication 2 4 3 0

Conflict: Understanding 7 2 0 0

Conflict: Experience 0 5 1 3

Conflict: Management 4 3 2 0

Working relationships 2 4 1 2

Did polarity thinking impact leaders’ operating theory of leadership? The researcher

discerned that seven of nine leaders’ responses indicated a significant impact on their

operational theories of leadership. The impacts were noted through their responses, and yet,

none of the leaders specifically referenced the theory of leadership that they had held

previously. As mentioned above, the researcher wondered if some lead time with the


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interview questions, especially this particular question, might have stimulated more explicit

responses of personal theories of leadership. Further exploration could tease out the nature of

the impacts in this domain.

Did polarity thinking impact leaders’ problem solving and taking action? While six of

nine responses fell into the strong (3) and moderate (3) categories, the researcher was

hesitant to ascribe significant impact of learning and using polarity thinking in this domain

for at least four possible reasons, (a) operationalizing action steps that support both sides of a

polarity, as with Johnson’s “green flags” and “red flags,” would require familiarity and

support throughout the system, especially from the higher levels of the corporation; (b) the

risks of stepping out of the usual, either/or approach to problem solving generally supported

and encouraged by the corporation (Persona) may have been perceived as too risky; (c) for

many, the financial incentives continued to support more traditional either/or solution

approaches; and (d) the ability to shift from problem solving approaches born of years of

experience (Persona) required a leap to embrace both sides of what might have been

consciously or unconsciously perceived as an either/or – both/and polarity in itself. The

researcher posited that for the impacts on problem solving, labeling, and analysis to flow

through into problem solving and action taking, the corporation would and will need to

support, nurture, and resource experimentation and allow time for organizational learning to

occur.

Did polarity thinking impact leaders’ communication? Six of nine responses, strong

(2) and moderate (4), exceeded the threshold for significance set by the researcher. Many

leaders, by report, appeared to be incorporating polarity into their thinking about how to

communicate with others. While the overall impression appeared significant, the researcher


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perceived it to be soft and attributed that softness to lack of diffused polarity thinking

awareness and common language within the business units, division, and larger corporate

cultures. Leaders might have been hesitant to speak in polarity thinking terms to others where

comprehension was limited and likely to raise initial skepticism. The researcher supposed

that significant increases in this area would occur after a general education of the corporate

workforce on polarity thinking and senior management expectations of its implementation

occurred.

Did polarity thinking impact conflict? The sub-domain showing the most significant

impact was related to the leaders’ understanding of conflict, nine of nine–strong (7) and

moderate (2). The general theme was that understanding differences with others as often

reflecting deeply held opposing preferences for one pole over another in a polarity changed

how the underlying conflicts and positional opponents were perceived and judged. The

disagreements didn’t necessarily dissolve, but they were reported to have become less

personalized and had shifted to a larger, arms-length context where increased exploration and

discussion could occur.

Six of nine responses, strong (4) and moderate (2), for the sub-domain of approaches

to conflict management indicated that the threshold for significance as set by the researcher

had been reached. Missing for the researcher were many specific changes in conflict

management beyond acting as a neutral third-party mediator of disputes. This is an area the

researcher sees for potential development.

Finally, the responses in the sub-domain of personal experience of conflict did not

show significant impacts as established by the researcher. Five of nine the responses, strong

(0) and moderate (5), although a majority of the responses, did not reach the 2/3 threshold


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established by the researcher. The researcher found this surprising, especially given the

strongest impact throughout all domains was in the sub-domain of understanding conflicts.

The report of many leaders that the tensions that they felt on the leadership team had abated

and the ability to work through the issues had increased, belied the lower ratings on this

domain. A possible interpretation previously mentioned related to how the question was

interpreted. Conflicts did not go away; they just were altered. If the researcher had asked,

whether the leaders’ experiences of stress and ability to work with others related to on-going

conflicts had been impacted by learning and using polarity thinking, the responses might

have been higher. Implicit in many of their responses in this domain was that the stresses

decreased for many. Also, this question cannot be looked at out of context of the leaders’

broader corporate experiences. Although mentioned by no one specifically, a reasonable

argument might be made that initially learning and using polarity thinking, as outside of the

mainstream corporate mindset, could actually increase stress and conflict for a period of

time.

Did polarity thinking impact leaders’ organizational working relationships? The

threshold for significance was technically reached with six of nine responses characterized as

strong (4) and moderate (2). However, as it turned out many of the leaders had limited

interactions with people and functions outside of the division and those whose responses

were characterized as strong were typically division level leaders interacting with other

divisions or the corporate center. Perhaps partly for this reason, very little feedback from

people outside of the division had been received directly about perceived changes that could

have been attributed to learning and using polarity thinking.

In summary, with eight of nine of the domains or sub-domains showing significant


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impact, the researcher found sufficient support for the theory that members of this corporate

leadership team were significantly impacted in a positive manner by learning and using

polarity thinking.

Unit 2: Perceived Impacts on the Leadership Team

The second unit for this study was focused on the leaders’ perceptions of impacts of

learning and using polarity thinking on the leadership team as a collective, that is its

collective interactions and behaviors. The leadership team was introduced to polarity

thinking through the April and June 2003 training sessions described in the methods section.

Controlled Self-Assessment and other documents

Included in this section of the findings are the results of the Controlled Self-

assessment instrument, an auditing tool routinely used by the corporation and administered to

the ten members of the leadership team in February 2003, and other documents that focused

the workshops provided to the leadership team in April and June 2003 by Barry Johnson. The

assessment provided an audit of the division in a number of domains ranging from

accounting practices to the environment (B. Johnson & corporate organization effectiveness

staff person, e-mail communications, March 24 & March 31, 2003). In those

communications, Johnson and the corporate representative noted the areas in the audit as

potential useful areas of focus for the trainings they were planning. In his reading of the

assessment results, Johnson identified seven categories from the instrument and

corresponding polarities for which he thought the Polarity Management tool would be helpful

for the leadership team:

Effects on others…part and whole…. Effective team…individual [leaders] and

team….Resolve conflicts [managing polarities]….Problem prevention [green flags


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and red flags]….Effective structure [responding to the needs of both poles of a

polarity]….Effective changes [stability and change], and Follow-up [monitoring and

course correction. (B. Johnson & corporate organization effectiveness staff person, e-

mail communication, March 24 & March 31, 2003)

From that, Johnson identified some specific polarities for possible team focus:

• Division functional roles and responsibilities and business unit roles and

responsibilities

• Enterprise [division] targets and business unit targets

• Retained authority and delegated authority

• Retained information and shared information

• Relationship and task

• Problem prevention and problem responsiveness

• Problem solving and managing polarities (B. Johnson, e-mail communication,

March 24, 2003)

From that list and in discussion with the division president, it was determined by the

design team that the trainings would focus on two primary polarities, division/business unit

as a primary underlying part/whole polarity for most organizations, and candor/diplomacy, as

a common polarity impacting communication, conflict, and trust.

Interpretation of the Controlled Self-Assessment and other documents

The polarities identified through Johnson’s interpretation of the Controlled Self-

Assessment results appeared to be well founded. The researcher also noted that the polarities

identified are universal to all organizations, are ultimately archetypal and naturally existing

pairs of opposites and that the difference from organization to organization is the particular


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manifestation of the polarity, i.e., which pole is privileged and to what extent is the polarity

managed.

Polarity assessments of the leadership team

The Leadership Team and Barry Johnson created the maps and assessments of the

two polarities, selected as a result of the Controlled Self-Assessment, on April 16, 2003,

as discussed in the methods section above. The leadership team generated positive

potentials and negative potentials for each pole of the Candor/Diplomacy polarity during

the April workshop (see Figure 5).


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Figure 5

Candor/Diplomacy Polarity Map Trust

• Confront the brutal facts • No hidden agendas • Efficiency • Clarity • Transparency • Your intent is clear • Identify the real issues • Gets issues out on the table • Sense of urgency • Reduced stress from trusting the

reliability of what’s said

• Prevents hurt feelings • Impact on others is seen as

important • Colleague’s interests and intents

is respected • Others feel heard/listened to • Create buy-in by others • Engenders a further discussion • Opens the door for

collaboration/taps collective wisdom

Candor Diplomacy (Self) (Other)

• Hurt feelings • Undermines collaboration • Unilateral and hierarchical • Others don’t feel listened to • Low affinity • Shuts down discussion • Don’t get the best data pool • Creates avoidance from others

who have a diff point of view • Low self-awareness/out of

touch with your impact on others

• Lost time/inefficient • Duplicity/deceit • Lack of focus/precision • Difficult to get to the real issues • Misconceptions/misperception • Lack of transparency • Unclear intent • Lack of urgency • Greater stress/frustration

because less reliability of what’s said

Polarity Map® Mistrust Note: Adapted from: Johnson & Leadership Team, April 16, 2003.


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Table 13

Green Flags for the Poles of the Candor/Diplomacy Polarity

Candor

Confront the brutal facts

No hidden agendas

Efficiency

Clarity

Transparency

Your intent is clear

Gets issues out on the table

Sense of urgency

Reduced stress from increased trust

Diplomacy

Prevents hurt feelings

Impact on others is seen as important

Colleague’s interests and intent is

respected

Others feel heard/listened to

Create buy-in by others

Engenders a further discussion

Opens the door for collaboration/taps

collective wisdom

Note: Adapted from: Johnson & Leadership Team, April 16, 2003.

As an additional step in this process, the team generated a list of green flags, “Action

steps to gain or maintain the positive results from focusing on [each] pole” and red flags,

“Measurable indicators That will let you know that you are getting into the downside of

[each] pole” (Johnson, personal communication, 2003).

The green flags (related to positive potentials) identified by the team for the Candor

and Diplomacy poles are represented in Table 13. The green flags may be desired positive

potentials and/or specific action items designed to maximize those positive potentials. In this

case the items generated were more generic potentials

Next, the leadership team listed red flags (related to negative potentials) for the

Candor/Diplomacy polarity (see Table 14). Again, these may be generic in nature or specific

monitoring signs and mechanisms designed to alert a team to the presence of a red flag


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condition.

Table 14

Red Flags for the Poles of the Candor/Diplomacy Polarity

Candor

Hurt feelings

Undermines collaboration

Unilateral hierarchical

Others don’t feel listened to

Low affinity

Shuts down discussion

Don’t get the best data pool

Creates avoidance from others who have a

different point of view

Low self-awareness/out of touch with your

impact on others

Diplomacy

Lost time/inefficient

Duplicity/deceit

Lack of focus/precision

Difficult to get to the real issues

Misconceptions/misperceptions

Lack of transparency

Unclear intent

Lack of urgency

Greater stress/frustration because less

reliability of what’s said

Note: Adapted from: Johnson & Leadership Team, April 16, 2003.

As part of the Polarity Management assessment process, the team rated the extent of

the characteristics identified for each of the quadrants on a scale of slight (1), moderate (2),

great (3), and very great (4). The ten leaders made two separate ratings at the April 16, 2003

workshop for each quadrant of the Candor/Diplomacy polarity: 1:1 Relationships and As a

Team. The same process was repeated at the June 23, 2003 workshop. The comparison of the

ratings from the two events provided a gauge of how the characteristics and behaviors

identified by the team members at the second workshop differed from their perceptions at the

first workshop. The averaged results for the four quadrants from the 1:1 perspective are


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displayed in Table 15 and the averaged results for the four quadrants from the As a Team

perspective are shown in Table 16.

Table 15

Average Candor/Diplomacy Polarity Quadrant Ratings: 1:1

Candor

Upper left

Time 1 Time 2

+2.5 +2.4

Lower left

Time 1 Time 2

-1.9 -1.4

Diplomacy

Upper right

Time 1 Time 2

+2.4 +2.3

Lower right

Time 1 Time 2

-1.6 -1.9

Note: n=10. Time 1 was April 16, 2003; Time 2 was June 26, 2003. Adapted from: Johnson & Leadership Team

Of note in the 1:1 Relationships assessment ratings the leaders evaluation of the

extent of the positives of the two poles, as an average, in this polarity remained consistent

from Time 1 to Time 2, between slight and moderate. The negative potentials on the Candor

side of the polarity decreased from near moderate extent to midway between moderate and

slight. However, the negative potentials on the Diplomacy side of the polarity increased from

midway between slight and moderate to nearly moderate in extent. The researcher supposed

that this was due to increased awareness of the downsides of diplomacy identified as a

significant barrier for the team at the April workshop. Were they noticing more after the first

workshop what was problematic in their usual approaches with each other?


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Table 16

Average Candor/Diplomacy Polarity Quadrant Ratings: As a Team

Candor

Upper left

Time 1 Time 2

+1.8 +1.8

Lower left

Time 1 Time 2

-1.4 -1.9

Diplomacy

Upper right

Time 1 Time 2

+1.8 +2.2

Lower right

Time 1 Time 2

-2.9 -2.6


The ratings focused on Candor and Diplomacy, As a Team (Table 16), display that the

leaders saw the positive potentials of both poles reduced and the negative potential behaviors

increased relative to the 1:1 Relationships ratings. Again, most telling was the identification

of the extent of the downsides of their typical diplomatic approach.

For this rating, the extent of the upside of diplomacy increased and the downside of

Candor increased, and the downside potentials of diplomacy decreased between Time 1 and

Time 2.

The composite score for the 1:1 Relationships assessment of the Candor/Diplomacy

polarity as a whole was calculated at both workshops. This provided a sense for the leaders

of overall placement, based on their ratings, between the higher purpose, Trust, and deeper


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fear, Mistrust, as identified by the leaders. The April workshop composite score was +1.3;

the June workshop score was +1.0. The composite score for the As a Team assessment of the

Candor/Diplomacy polarity was calculated at both workshops. The April workshop

composite score was -.70; the June workshop score was -.10. (Johnson and the Leadership

Team, personal communication, April 16, 2003 and June 23, 2003). This seemed to indicate

that the leaders felt greater overall trust with each other in 1:1 interactions and that the team

environment created a dynamic where the trust was less pronounced. Although, a positive

shift occurred on the As a Team composite score, the scores seemed to continue to display

that communication within the leadership team, as a collective, was challenging.

Without observation of the leadership team in its regular meeting processes, the

researcher was unable to identify noticeable changes in behaviors related to candor and

diplomacy from Time 1 to Time 2. This would have added a good additional source of data.

The other polarity of focus at the April and June workshops, Business Unit/Division,

went to the heart of many of the conflicts and challenges identified by the leadership team.

The polarity was mapped at the April session (see Figure 6).

The leadership team members again generated green flag action steps to maximize

the positive potentials and red flag indicators to minimize the negative potentials for both

poles of the Business Unit/Division polarity. Those data are not reported because of the

proprietary nature of the information.


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Figure 6

Business Unit/Division Polarity Synergistic value

– achieve the Division’s vision. Greater value to businesses in the corporation

• Reason to believe – further

along on the life cycle – operational

• More clear goals/focus • Brings in cash • Speed/nimble • Easier for employees &

customers to be connected (more traditional)

• High level of control within the BU

• BU initiative and creativity • Products/services better defined • Align interest/skill sets w/BU

• Synergy/coordination • Strategic advantage (distinctive) • Greater leverage of capabilities

and broader skill set • Integrator • New revenue streams • Insulation of specialized

product sales • Different customer relations • More emphasis on intangibles • Less capital intensive • Knowledge generation/sharing

Business Unit (BU) Division (Part) (Whole)

• Higher costs/duplication of

effort • Focus is too narrow, siloed, and

myopic • Loss of business opportunities • Less sustainability of value • Lessened ability to integrate

techs • Less leverage of capabilities • Less competitive advantage • More intense external

competition • Less knowledge sharing • Less employee

networking/career opportunities

• More overhead • Bureaucratic and slow • Lack of clarity (internally &

externally) • Lack of focus on specialty sales • Narrower customer base • Slower to market/slower dev. of

new specialized products • Loss of cash flow • Loss of some specific

capabilities or individuals

Polarity Map® Some of the existing BU’s (in the division) will not exist

Note: Adapted from: Johnson & Leadership Team, April, 16, 2003


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The leadership team was comprised of four Business Unit-identified leaders and six

Division-identified leaders. The ratings for this polarity were done separately by each group

and combined for the team as a whole. Table 17 displays the ratings for the four Business

Unit-identified leaders.

Table 17

Average Business Unit/Division Polarity Quadrant Ratings: Business Unit-Identified Leaders

Business Unit

Upper left

Time 1 Time 2

+3.0 +1.75

Lower left

Time 1 Time 2

-2.0 -2.0

Division

Upper right

Time 1 Time 2

+1.50 +1.50

Lower right

Time 1 Time 2

-2.75 -2.25


The scores for Time one of the Business Unit-identified leaders displayed a clear

sense of the upside of the Business Unit pole of the polarity and downside of the Division

pole. Both shifted in the Time 2 ratings. The positive potential of the Division pole rating at

Time 2 and downside of the Business Unit pole remained the same.

There were six Division-identified leaders. Table 18 displays the ratings for the six

Division-identified leaders.


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Table 18

Average Business Unit/Division Polarity Quadrant Ratings: Division-Identified Leaders

Business Unit

Upper left

Time 1 Time 2

+2.67 +2.17

Lower left

Time 1 Time 2

-2.83 -2.83

Division

Upper right

Time 1 Time 2

+1.33 +1.50

Lower right

Time 1 Time 2

-1.5 -2.33


The Division-identified leaders rated the extent of the positive characteristics for the

Business Unit pole higher at both Time 1 and Time 2 than the Division pole. Nonetheless,

they seemed to have had a strong awareness of the downside of the Business Unit pole at

Time 1 and Time 2 and an increased sense of the downside of their preferred pole between

the two rating events. Table 19 combines the ratings of all ten leaders into a combined rating

of the polarity.

The composite scores for the Business Unit-Identified Leaders, the Division-Identified

Leaders, and the Combined Leaders of the Business Unit/Division polarity were calculated at


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both workshops. The April workshop composite score for the Business Unit-Identified

Leaders was -.75; the June workshop score was -.75. The April workshop composite score

for the Division-Identified Leaders was -1.67; the June workshop score was -.82. The April

workshop composite score for the Combined Leaders was -.90; the June workshop score was

-.80. Although, overall, the Business-identified leaders rated the full polarity more positively

than the Division-identified leaders at both events, both were closer to the Deeper Fear that

“Some of the existing BU’s (in the division) will not exist” than the Higher Purpose of

“Synergistic value – [to] achieve the Division’s vision.” Nonetheless, comparison of all three

sets of composite scores showed positive score changes toward the Higher Purpose.

Table 19

Average Business Unit/Division Polarity Quadrant Ratings: Combined Leaders

Business Unit

Upper left

Time 1 Time 2

+2.6 +2.0

Lower left

Time 1 Time 2

-2.1 -2.5

Division

Upper right

Time 1 Time 2

+1.4 +1.5

Lower right

Time 1 Time 2

-1.6 -2.3

Note: n=10. Adapted from: Johnson & Leadership Team, April 16, 2003 and June 23, 2003

Interviews with the leaders

The researcher interviewed in January and February 2004 nine of the ten leaders


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involved in the workshops, the polarity mapping and the polarity rating. Four were Business

Unit-identified and five were Division-identified. The leaders were asked about their

perceptions of the impacts of polarity thinking on the team as a collective, similar to those

questions focused on them as individual leaders. The exception was the elimination of the

questions related to operating theory of leadership.

Supports and barriers to the team’s use of polarity thinking (Interview Question 4)

The researcher was interested in knowing the factors that either supported or limited

the learning and using of polarity thinking within the team setting. The leaders’ responses at

times reflected impressions about unidentified individuals on the leadership team rather than

the group culture. However, the responses appeared to be germane to the culture of the group

processes. The leaders readily homed in on the factors they felt impeded the integration of

polarity thinking into the team culture and had little to say about supports. None of the

leaders in response to this question referenced the fact that the senior leadership team of the

corporation had been exposed to the Polarity Management model and were very favorably

impressed and that other divisions were also exploring the Polarity Management model. The

sense of the researcher was that the model and polarity thinking were still too new within the

corporate culture for the senior support for diffusion throughout the corporation to be

especially noted. This will be discussed further below in the section on diffusion.

One leader offered that,

What supports is that we have the training, we did have the one follow-up and that we

do use it. So, every now and then somebody will talk about an issue in the context of

a polarity or problem to solve so that supports. What impedes?

[Researcher]: For instance, one thing I heard was the reality of incentives and


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how they work actually gets in the way of using polarity thinking, because they’re

incentivized to think in terms of the business unit and not the division. So it creates a

barrier for them even though they might like to do it otherwise. Sometimes it can be

organizational structure that can create barriers.

[Leader]: Structure clearly did. Incentives, I would agree with that. But I think

the structure here going forward will help support that now. I feel like we solved a

problem, but [I think] it’s just shifting to the other side of the polarity myself, but it

still is a polarity that we’ll need to manage.

[Researcher]: I heard a lot of clarity came out of that off-site [Leadership team

offsite, January 2004].

[Leader]: I think a lot of clarity came out. It will be interesting: did the

business unit leaders also say that or is it more the functional [divisional] people. I

would expect them to come out maybe being more clear and I wonder if you got that

same level from the business unit leaders. Did they also say a lot of clarity came out

versus the functional people?

Another leader commented that:

I think clarity of organization is always extremely important and this has been a

problem area in the division and I think it’s becoming more [of an issue]; it’s

probably being improved as a result of this polarity work….I think it’s helpful. I think

it’s been good to work with my team [business unit], my own team, in terms of

utilizing this thinking, helps them explain the differences in how we have to work in

the future. If people have been always in a sort of vertical organization and have not

worked in a matrix organization, having this type of course work is extremely helpful.


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So, from that perspective, it’s been helpful for our team [business unit].

There were comments from all leaders on the factors they thought impeded the use of

polarity thinking more routinely. The two most mentioned factors that impede were

organizational structure and the current incentives for business performance. One leader

made a case in some detail:

Frankly, I think that there are more things that get in the way. You have a couple of

things that obstruct it. You have an overarching culture which has very emphatically

and with great energy put the emphasis of this corporation at the business unit level,

enforce the business unit as, whatever you want to call it, the front-line, the primary

decision-making, all kinds of rhetoric around that. That goes back to when we

deployed … in 1998. And, it’s consistent culturally going back as far as I know [over

100 years]. [The company] has typically been a fairly decentralized organization. We

used to call the business units “divisions,” but business unit is in many respects

generally a smaller organization set-up than the old divisions were. So, that’s one

thing, sort of a cultural situation and with that comes sort of a leadership

reinforcement of the business unit perspectives, the way things are measured. The

primary instrument of measurement is around business units for the corporation. And

the other thing that inhibits the polarity thinking is really around incentives. It’s hard

to be using polarity when the overwhelming portion of everybody’s compensation is

based on the optimization of the parts. So, if we have 70-80% of compensation being

based upon the performance of individual parts, you sort of figure the

leadership…Which pole am I going to gravitate toward? Well, obviously, I’m going

to gravitate toward the part, my part/whole, because of human nature, you have to


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answer the wisdom question: “What’s in it for me?” If there’s nothing in it for me to

optimize for the whole, I’m going to optimize for the part, because that’s the signal

the corporation sends, culturally, financially, hierarchically, whatever.

[Researcher]: So, paradoxically the emphasis on the part is ultimately meant

to enhance the whole, the bottom line of the whole, but paradoxically may undermine

the whole in some ways.

[Leader]: Yes

Another leader echoed the theme raised by his colleague:

Great question. I think probably the greatest impediment is the system within [the

corporation] that we have of incentivizing people to certain behaviors and that’s the

fundamental flaw, [the] fundamental problem that we face [and] why we looked at

Polarity Management as a way of getting around that and the difficulty is changing

how one thinks about how to deal with apparent conflicts. It doesn’t allow you to

make any progress in altering that, unless the fundamental driver of that: which is

having financial incentives [in] a financial incentive system [that] is driving it in a

different way. So, the very issue that we’re trying to work with is a division kind of

an enterprise that is at odds with what the individual business units are incented [sic]

to do.

[Researcher]: That’s pretty major.

[Leader]: So, you could smooth some of the rough edges, but you’ll never get

to making the system fully functional until you deal with that issue.

Other leaders highlighted authenticity issues and past experiences of people on the

team as barriers. One leader stated that a challenge is getting the team members to be “totally


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open and honest about their feelings regarding who they are and where they thought the

others were. I mean for people to actually be honest about where they are, they’ll say one

thing, but not necessarily believe it.” This connects quite directly to the candor/diplomacy

polarity that was one of the focuses of the leaders’ Polarity Management training sessions.

And another stated, “Every one of our leaders has been in business for anywhere from fifteen

to thirty-six years, I believe. Their DNA is now injected with those numbers of years and it’s

not about Polarity Management. It’s not the first thing [that comes to mind].”

The same leader commented that differences in the part/whole mindset between the

business units and the division created a major barrier:

I would say the largest reason is, and this is the root cause of many issues, that we

don’t think as an enterprise, a single, go-to-market enterprise. We’re still thinking in

terms of individual parts. The primacy of the whole has not taken over the mindset.

So, to me that’s the biggest barrier; that people aren’t thinking both/and; they’re

thinking ‘My world.’

It’s interesting to note that this leader’s perspective clearly emphasized his preference

on the part/whole, business unit/division polarity and didn’t explicitly reflect the deeper,

more challenging both/and of emphasizing the business units (parts) and the division (whole)

simultaneously.

The barriers cited by many of the leaders seemed understandable and reasonable and

the researcher thought that the ability to name those barriers was a positive sign. The leaders

could probably have a discussion about these barriers and reach understandings of how to

intervene directly or adapt to neutralize the barriers. It appeared to the researcher that the

system of incentivization might pose the greatest barrier to change. Nonetheless, one of the


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leaders commented during the interview that he had specifically addressed the incentives

issue with the corporate CEO through the Polarity Management framework and received

positive response. The primary support mentioned previously and not mentioned directly by

the leaders to this specific question would be the decision of the senior corporate team to

integrate polarity thinking, perhaps through the corporate-wide diffusion of the Polarity

Management model.

Sense of team self (Interview Question 6)

The researcher was interested in discovering whether the leaders perceived any

impacts on how the team’s sense of self in the sense of how the team thinks of itself as a team

differently. The responses skewed only slightly toward the strong end of the scale and most

comments seemed to exhibit a sense of reserved optimism. The responses were characterized

as strong (0), moderate (6), slight (2), and minimal (1) (see Table 20). The researcher

included some lengthier responses since they seemed to be one of the questions where the

leaders were most verbal about their perceptions.

Table 20

Impacts on Team: Sense of Team Self


0 6 2 1

One of the leaders whose response was characterized as moderate was quite verbal

about the progress and the challenge:

I wish the answer were a bit more profound. I will have a better sense of that later this

month when we are going to ostensibly craft some new roles and responsibilities, that


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hopefully, for at least a period of time, address our core issues or let us to utilize

Barry’s [Johnson] methodology and so on. I’m sitting here feeling like how people

react to those changes will speak volumes about how deeply rooted the concepts were

in terms of part and whole. I would have to say today, it’s pretty, obviously variable

depending on the individual and I think the concept has taken pretty deep root in a

couple of people and more moderate root in most and maybe at best a shallow root in

a few. I haven’t noticed a, certainly not a discernable shift, but maybe more of a

nuanced modest [shift].

I don’t think we’ve tested ourselves yet. We haven’t challenged ourselves to

delineate an issue make a decision and then implement all the way through to say

‘OK, you can look back and say we discussed that issue, we characterized it in terms

of a polarity that helped get us to a decision, we took a decision, [and] we held a

decision in implementation.’ We haven’t done it. We’ve used the tool [Polarity

Management] to do some delineation around some issues. We’ve come up to some

decisions and things have still tended to fracture and maybe not quite as much as they

use to fracture, but I can’t think of an issue into implementation where we can say,

‘OK, we’re walking it versus still just talking it.’

Another leader was equally candid and illuminating:

I think people are more willing to try to find the middle, rather than for a long time

we had everybody staked out in their positions in the corner and I actually had gotten

some confirmation from some of my colleagues and so it’s not just my own self-

perception, but I was viewed as one of the few people in the middle, like probably

one of the only other than [the division president], because we have people over here


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and people over here and I was always like ‘Come on, you guys know.’ So, I’ve been

in the middle for a long time.

[Researcher]: If you’re a natural both/and thinker, that’s where you’ll stand.

[Leader]: Right. Sometimes I envy the people [who are either/or thinkers]; I

think it must be so much easier to view the world that way; however much more

incorrect. It must be so much easier to like look at that and say ‘Right, wrong; right,

wrong;’ all the time, but I’ve never been that way. So, I think people are softened to

this. The truth is going to be in the pudding as we try to do some organizational

changes over the next month, whether or not people will really walk the talk. I think

we have a lot less of this staked out in the corners [poles].

What I tell my team [is] that on any given [day], you have to look at decisions over

the continuum, because on any given decision, we might be over here on one pole and

then we might swing over to another pole on another decision, but the point is that

over time we’re oscillating around the middle. And so, we have to think about it that

way, because what you can’t do is have production, back in my classic example,

saying ‘Oh, he sided with sales this time,’ and then that’s all they remember. There

are plenty of decisions that you make that aren’t in the middle. There are lots of

isolated decisions that can’t be made in the middle; either you do something or you

don’t. You have to look at it over time and see if your oscillation is toward the

middle.

Another leader’s response touched the issues surrounding change in general and the

trepidation people might experience stepping away from familiar perspectives and

approaches.


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I think so. I don’t know if the way they think changed, but how we talk about issues

has changed. I mean it comes up and we talk about polarities, we talk about problems

to solve. In fact we did in this last offsite meeting, we talked about that and people

understood, having that construct, people then understood that, ‘OK, we’re making a

shift, a conscious shift in how we approach and we’re moving kind of from one pole

more to the other. It’s not all the way over, but we still have to do some of this so

don’t forget about that.’ So, it was a helpful construct or framework to think about

what we’re doing here and what this shift means, so that people didn’t think of it as,

‘We’re abandoning this and now we’re doing this and it’s this big change.’ They look

more of it as a shift. And I think that’s an important distinction. So, in that way I

thought it was very helpful.

Another leader’s response characterized as moderate:

I think so. Some of the behavior has changed. It has created a common language

among the team. When we do have debates often times people say ‘This is

paradoxical’ and everybody gets it. So then, we now know how to behave. It may not

necessarily mean that people [don’t] still hold those opinions. Know what I mean?

But, I think there’s willingness and there’s certainly a level of recognition that we’ve

got to get about managing the paradox.

[Researcher] Do you find that it’s ever used to close the discussion?

[Leader]: Well, maybe. I haven’t seen that so much. It’s more about ‘OK, it’s

a polarity; then what?’ Let’s us then flesh it out and understand it better. Now we can

get at it with a common understanding of what it is and how we manage it.

And, a final leader’s comments illustrated that other basic factors can enter into a


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change in the group’s way of being. Polarity thinking generated a,

…definite change in the way that we operate. But to be honest, just having a couple

days to spend together has been very helpful to work through these things, because

one of our issues before is that we didn’t spend enough time together and a leadership

team needs to spend time together.

One of the leaders perceived impact that the researcher characterized as indicating

only slight impact. Nonetheless, his comments indicated potential for the future. This leader

commented that there were,

Not dramatic differences. There are some subtle differences. So, it’s progress in the

right direction. The difficulty is that it’s so easy to fall back into the old way of

thinking and obviously, many people do that. So, as a team, I don’t think we; I still

think we need some additional work together as a team to really develop that sense of

working together and using the approach.

Two leaders comments suggested only minimal impact.

No. Let me elaborate on that as well though and that is that no in the sense that

anecdotally people have referred to things as polarities and people have referred to

compromises that we make as polarity management, but I detect that as being more

releasing statements as to how you could have those views, than to suggest that it is

an entirely different framework in thinking.

And the other leader commented,

I’d say overall no. I would say that there are two, one for sure, maybe one and a half

exceptions. I think of one person of our team who has adopted it and used the tool

twice, Barry’s [Johnson’s] tool, to help resolve some issues to varying degrees of


157

success, but trying to change the thinking and he personally has changed his

approach. But, [only] one out of ten or twelve of us.

Interpretation of impacts on the team: Sense of team self

The perceptions of the leaders about any shifts in the team’s sense of self were

generally categorized as moderate, six of nine responses, with some comments of

observations of distinct differences in this domain. A barrier in this domain was the limited

contact that the leaders had, as a team, with only periodic, rather than frequent meetings.

Polarity Management had provided the team members a new way of looking at the team

culture and a common language to differentiate the issues. Nonetheless, the sense of the

researcher was that the potential diversity within unity (part/whole) had not taken root yet

Problem identification, labeling and analysis (Interview Question 9)

The researcher wanted to know whether the leaders perceived impacts of polarity

thinking on the teams approach to identifying and labeling problems. This team, as many

naturally do, experienced conflicting perceptions of the problems that existed leading to

disagreements around how to define the problems faced. No leaders responses suggested

strong impact, four suggested moderate impact, three suggested slight impact, and two

suggested minimal impact (see Table 21).

Table 21

Impacts on Team: Problem Identification, Labeling, and Analysis


0 4 3 2


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The responses pointed out different factors that help understand why the responses

weren’t stronger. Among the responses characterized as moderate, one leader said,

I’d say there were three or four attempts to map a polarity and maybe one or two have

been successful in arguing the point. Some of those decisions have been moved

beyond the team and need at least concurrence with or support of the corporate

leadership team and so then you get into a whole other realm and a different set of

concerns. The way our team got to a decision may not be relevant to the way the

corporate team might dictate what it might do. We tried very hard to work it if we

thought it was a polarity. We tried to work it recognizing that and when it reached the

corporate team got caught up in a bunch of other issues. I’m not sure we will

recognize the decision when it comes back.

[Researcher]: Even if the corporate leadership team saw some value in the

perspective, there are other factors that could get in the way; politics and the like?

[Leader]: Again, you get into just another illustration of the part and whole

question. There’s a big a issue going on right now in [the company], which has been

dubbed ‘decision rights.’ Does that sound like a polarity coming out? Who gets to

make decisions about certain types of issues: business units, divisions, or the

corporate center? And, there are a lot of different points of view about where those

decision rights reside and how even if they reside in one place, who can influence

those.

Another leader observed,

I think it has. I’ve seen this come up in debates, even ones I’m not involved with,

among the team members. I’ve seen some of the functional heads [division level],


159

specifically, and at least one business unit leader that I know of, actually use the

mapping exercise within their business unit. So, I think it’s changed.

[Researcher]: Are you seeing any difference within the leadership team

meetings?

[Leader]: Yes, there are several examples where in heated debates [we used

it]. It happened in our offsite recently where we just said ‘Stop, let’s just test to see if

this is paradoxical.’ In the past, we would have stayed on each pole.

A final example that suggested that polarity thinking had moderate impact on

problem identification came from a leader, who said,

The big thing is that when we get into discussions, for instance business units versus

divisions, that we can talk about the advantages and disadvantages of doing things a

certain way and that, in itself, sort of opens up communications. It just opens it up

because people can utilize the model to describe the plusses and the minuses without

making it a personal thing and I think that’s important.

Among the responses that suggested that a slight impact was perceived, in learning

and using polarity thinking, one leader said,

I think so. Like I said, I think we have more patience with the other side. The poles

have more patience for each other. I think I definitely have seen that.

[Researcher]: What sort of barriers have you noticed to using polarity thinking

as a problem identification tool?

[Leader]: The biggest barrier is that everybody is trying to protect their own

turf. Both poles see the middle as having to cede power and that’s the biggest barrier.

[Researcher]: Is there anything structurally in the organization that supports


160

that kind of thinking?

[Leader]: Oh, of course. The corporation is a culture where you have to have

the answer and if you don’t have the answer, you’re weak. And [this corporation] is

not the only company like that. I think we’re getting better at this, but it’s hard. The

other thing I said early on in our discussion in our training on polarities, [is that] you

can’t use polarities as an excuse for not making decisions. Frankly, some tough

decisions weren’t being made or they weren’t being enforced. And so, that feeds both

poles, both ways. The pole that doesn’t listen sits there and says, ‘I can just do what I

want to anyway’ and the pole that feels that this decision wasn’t enforced feels like

the middle isn’t fair because… Some of the decisions and some of the roles and

responsibilities haven’t been explicit enough and that’s allowed people to interpret

[that as], ‘I can go back to my pole; I don’t have to go to the middle.’ That’s the story.

[Researcher]: How about incentives? Do incentives contribute to the

polarization?

[Leader]: Absolutely, and that’s some of the stuff we’re talking about

changing, but it’s in process right now.

Another leader commented that, “there are actually a couple of situations where

people, one situation where one of our leadership team members actually used the polarity

format to lay out a particular issue. But not on a wholesale basis.” And, another stated,

Anecdotally, yes. I don’t want to say that the vocabulary has become a buzzword, but

let’s face it, that’s the case. I’m sure that you find yourself using terms like “low-

hanging fruit” that you never used before you heard that expression. And so, we’re to

the point where people are using the terms more. Does that mean that they’re thinking


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more in that way than they had been beforehand? Probably, but I couldn’t say that

definitively.

One leader, whose response suggested that the impact had been minimal, raised issues

that suggested that change in this area might not be very likely:

Not materially. For some people it has. For the team as a whole, I don’t think it has. I

think we need some ongoing work in that area.

[Researcher]: What do you think the barriers are?

[Leader]: As I mentioned, it’s just how people incentivize. There’s a great gulf

between people in the business units and the people in the division because the

incentives are totally different. In the business units they’re incented [sic] to meet

their P&L. That’s the major objective and that brings a short-term focus to what

they’re doing. It’s getting to this year’s results and worry about next year, next year.

Whereas at the division level, we’re incentivized to think longer term and to make

things happen and be impactful three, four, five years down the road. And those two

elements are just at odds with each other. Things that you might do for short-term

gain don’t necessarily contribute to the long-term perspective and vice versa.

[Researcher]: So there are structural pieces that actually continue to support

polarization.

[Leader]: And, That’s probably the major conflict that we’ve had from day

one and one of the reasons we’re trying to adapt Polarity Management to the division.

[Researcher]: Can you see polarity thinking or Polarity Management really

taking root if the incentive issue isn’t resolved?

[Leader]: No, I don’t think so. I mean we’ve tried to do it by taking at least


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business unit leaders as part of the leadership team of the division and linking part of

their compensation, shared between the business unit and the division so that the two

work together. Conversely, [for] those of us on division level, … one part of our

bonus system is based on the division, longer-term view, but we also share in the

success or failure of the business units. So, that’s the hope: that we can bring a

common objective to both business unit leaders and the division people. But, the fact

is that the business unit is still compensated up to 70% based on how effectively they

meet their bottom line. That’s very different than what we’re trying to do at the

division [level]. And everyone beneath them is still totally compensated on how their

business unit performs.

[Researcher]: Is it strictly motivated for personal incentives or organizational,

business unit incentives?

[Leader]: It’s hard to separate those … It’s primarily personal incentives.

The other leader whose response was in the minimal impact range offered thoughts of

how that might change. When asked about the impacts of polarity thinking on team problem

identification, he said,

As a team: no.

[Researcher]: What gets in the way? What are the barriers?

[Leader]: One would be ownership of team issues, enterprise issues; that many

members of our team don’t think as a team. They still think of ‘I’m coming to this

team to represent my part of this enterprise’ versus ‘I’m coming to this team to lead

this enterprise.’ So, I think that’s part of it. I think the other issue has been that we

have not clearly defined the role of the operating team. If it was more of a decision


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making team, then I think people would be saying, ‘OK, what is the solution to this

decision that we have to make? Is it a polarity or is it either/or?’ I don’t think we

tackle enough of those decision-making topics to then give us the opportunity to use

this tool or any other approach.

Interpretation of the impacts on the team: Problem identification, labeling, and

analyzing

Five of nine responses were categorized as slight or minimal impact. This did not

suggest that the impacts of polarity thinking had been particularly apparent in the team’s

processes. One leader commented that polarity thinking, through a Polarity Management

frame, had become a “buzz word.” This would suggest that polarity thinking, even if utilized

by individual leaders to identify and label problems, was not readily transferred to the

leadership team level, nor would it be expected to. Perhaps a key factor was what one leader

identified as “everybody is trying to protect their own turf.” Whoever defines a situation

controls the focus of action; that’s a reason why internecine conflicts become so positional.

Problem solving and taking action (Interview Question 11)

As with Unit 1 that focused on the leaders as individuals, the researcher was

interested in whether the leaders perceived impacts of polarity thinking on problem solving.

The researcher supposed that a gap, between identifying and labeling problems as polarities

to manage, where appropriately such, and actually formulating solutions and action plans that

had polarity thinking at their core, might be wide. The leaders’ responses to the question of

whether the team’s approach to solving problems had been impacted were characterized

across the scale with two being strong, two moderate, three slight, and two minimal (see

Table 22).


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Of the two responses characterized as strong, one leader commented that,

I think understanding the construct of polarity was helpful in us having a more

successful meeting, because I think prior to that it would have been thinking, ‘I’m

losing something.’ Business unit leaders thinking I’m losing something and the

functional [divisional] leads of that team saying, ‘Finally, we’ve made a decision.’

That’s how I think it would have been, could have been, but with everybody

understanding the polarity structure, that it’s not that. We’re not picking either/or;

one’s not losing, one’s not winning. [It’s] that we’re shifting the balance a little bit

and we’re going to go forward this way knowing that we’ve got these issues that

we’ve got to figure out and it may not be perfect. So, it was helpful to us to get out of

that kind of thinking, this we/they, win/lose, business unit/enterprise question, but

thinking more in the context of shifting, not losing. We’re just going to pay more

attention to this polarity now. We’re going to go forward that way, but in some ways

it felt like we finally made a decision, but we made the decision [that] we’re going to

consciously shift a little bit. We still need to work out what are the flags and how we

manage that and that’s where incentive comes in as well is ‘OK, … right now the

incentive [is] to think this way, but you’ve got to make incentives so I think this way

and align. And, the corporation has to think that way too, because we might

understand it, but if [the CEO] or the corporation is still thinking [the current] way

then we’re screwed.

Table 22

Impacts on the Team: Problem Solving and Taking Action



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2 2 3 2

Another leader stated that,

It’s been improved. There’s no question.

[Researcher]: Have you seen some concrete examples where solutions have

been created and implemented?

[Leader]: We had an offsite just a couple weeks ago and it helped a lot, helped

tremendously.

[Researcher]: I heard that there was a lot of clarity that came out of that

meeting.

[Leader]: There was clarity and for [the division head] it helped him take the

next step in the [division] strategy in terms of organization, etc. So, from that

perspective, I think it was very helpful. I doubt very much that we could have done

that meeting and made the progress in that meeting if we hadn’t done the polarity

work earlier.

The responses of two leaders were characterized as indicating moderate impact, with

some significant indication of change as the result of learning and using polarity thinking in

problem solution formulation, as far as it went. One leader responded,

Yes, in the context of the training, we identified different polarities and came up with

a number of things that had to be dealt with to resolve the polarities and made good

progress on the action list, but we haven’t gone back afterward and tried to generate

action items to resolve additional polarities. But within the context of the original

training, I think there have actually been some actionable items and follow-up on


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those items and results taken and a follow-through on the plan.

[Researcher]: So there is a tracking of outcomes based on that original plan?

[Leader]: Yes, we did actually have a couple times we brought up that original

list of polarities and actually looked at the things on both sides and results that

occurred. And we’ll have a leadership team meeting and a two-day offsite meeting on

Monday and Tuesday. I haven’t seen the full agenda yet. I’m sure we’ll be addressing

some of those polarities in that meeting whether in the exact framework of what we

laid out or just in general, but I’m sure the heart of some of those meeting discussions

are going to be polarities.

[Researcher]: Thinking back to those action steps, do you feel that there was

enough in place to measure results? There were certain things that were identified that

needed to be done?

[Leader]: There were certain things that were [just] ‘Do this,’ but there were

other things that probably required more tracking and I think [with] some of the more

complicated ones I don’t think we’ve made as much progress. So, not being tracked

actively.

[Researcher]: If you do the entire process, does it become cumbersome to the

point where it gets in the way of people’s enthusiasm about doing it? I mean, you’re

busy people.

[Leader]: Probably. I think you can have a session, you know, where you

actually bring people together in a formal setting and you sit down and you identify

the problems and the polarities and you lay out a process and follow up on it, but I

think the formal follow-up is where it becomes cumbersome, because you just add


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that to the list of a hundred other things you need to follow-up on. So, systematically

and routinely coming back and saying this is what we said we were going to do and

actually measuring where we are against what we said we were going to follow up

on; I think that’s hard to maintain.

Another example was in an exchange between another leader and the researcher:

[Researcher]: So, you’re not seeing anything in the team’s process that would suggest

necessarily that as a group the polarity approach has taken deep root.

[Leader]: On the contrary, what I’m saying is that on an anecdotal perspective,

I do hear them use the terms and therefore I presume that that is what they’re

thinking. I’m the one guy who isn’t close enough to see the myriad of examples that

my colleagues who have a cup of coffee with each other every day might see.

The leaders’ responses that suggested only slight impact of learning and using

polarity thinking had a similar quality: terseness. One leader simply stated, “I know of one

case where two polar opposites sat down and did a polarity map and found a compromise in

the middle.” The researcher asked another leader “So, you’ve seen the team actually use

polarity thinking to problem solve? They are using it, even if it’s difficult?” [Leader]: “Yep.”

The final example was from a leader who stated that he had observed the use of polarity

thinking to problem solve,

In those couple of instances: yes. But, I still want to impress upon you the fact that it

wasn’t as a team. It was members of the team using this thinking to resolve issues, but

not resolving it with the team. It was resolving [issues] with senior management.

Among those leaders who saw minimal impact, one leader stated, “I don’t think so.”

And, another leader said,


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I don’t think I’ve noticed much of a difference

[Researcher]: What are the barriers there? The same as before?

[Leader]: Yes

[Researcher]: Is the leadership there within the team to promote it?

[Leader]: Yeah, I think it is, at [the division president’s] level. He’s clearly

supportive of it. I think the division group sees it as beneficial and the business units

see it as less useful. So, it’s still the same gulf that we had before.

Interpretation of the impacts on the team: Problem solving and taking action

Again, as with the previous domain, the responses of the majority of the leaders, five

of nine, supported the perception that polarity thinking had had only slight or minimal impact

on problem solving and taking action. There was no clear trend and every category had at

least two responses. So, while a couple of the leaders pointed enthusiastically to changes in

how problems were solved and action taken, that perception was not universally held.

Primarily, the more positive perceptions came from leaders interviewed after a team offsite in

which decisions influenced by polarity thinking were announced by the division president. It

would also be reasonable that the business unit leaders might have perceived change as

threatening to their best interests (incentives and deeply ingrained corporate expectations)

without a new incentive structure in place.

Communication (Interview Question 13)

The researcher was curious as to whether there was noticeable impact of polarity

thinking on the communication on the leadership team from the perspective of the leader

members of that team. The responses to the question were distributed across the scale and

categorized as strong (2), moderate (4), slight (1), and minimal or none (2) (see table 23).


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Of the two leaders whose responses were characterized as suggesting a strong impact

on communication, one noticed a:

…big improvement….Primarily, I think people had personal agendas which affected

the meetings and I believe that the business unit leaders and the division people had

completely different ideas about what they were doing and what they were supposed

to do and what their organizations were and what their responsibilities were and that

never got clarified and as a result we had serious issues. I also believe that there were

personal agendas that were significant. I still think there might be one or two of those

and I hope that they get crushed and eliminated. I think, again, having this model to

talk from is helping in that regard.

[Researcher]: So, in a way it might help to neutralize personal agendas?

[Leader]: Yes.

Table 23

Impacts on Team: Communication


2 4 1 2

The other leader commented that,

I think we’re tending now to be more candid [candor–diplomacy polarity]: candid

prefaced with a degree of respect. ‘I understand where you’re coming from, but let

me tell you what I think.’ We got a lot of this out in this discussion.

[Researcher]: So, does it seem to promote more dialogue as opposed to great

debates?


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[Leader]: Yeah, we had an extremely good discussion in our offsite. On a

scale of 10 we rated ourselves an 8 on candor.

Other responses were characterized as moderate on the edge of strong. One leader

stated that,

I think that we all realize now that when we get in a room and we can’t resolve a

situation, that it may be a polarity versus a problem. And with that, I think we all can

realize too what both sides need to do to address the polarity. But then, it is really

getting into that action phase where we actually start changing some activities and

behaviors where we can fall back a little bit.

Another leader, when asked about impact, observed,

How we communicate is….A broader audience is starting to also hear the

terminology. I think there’s probably been a different level of training or

communicating the message down [between business units]. Some may have done a

more thorough job. We’re starting to speak about polarities throughout the enterprise,

so that’s changed.

And another echoed the same observation. “I think so. I think the big message is that

people realize they can’t hang out at their pole all the time, that that’s just

unsustainable. I think that there is recognition there.”

The leader whose response showed slight impact stated,

I couldn’t say based on observed actions that across the board people have had this

mentality, but I think there is certainly a handful that have had it and certainly the

division president has operated that way from the beginning.

Not everyone noted any noticeable impact. One leader was blunt: “No. We just had a


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two-day offsite and I didn’t see any evidence of it.” The other leader with a minimal impact

response elaborated more:

Not perceptively.

[Researcher]: So, the process is still as it was?

[Leader]: I think the division president in our staff meetings will allude to the

fact that some issues that we deal with are polarities to manage, but it’s really from

the top down and there really hasn’t been the total participation by the team at this

point.

[Researcher]: Are there other barriers, other than the incentive issues?

[Leader]: Oh sure. There are a lot of personality issues. What drives some

individuals, and there some business units that see everything happening outside of

their business units as impediments in their way and that’s kind of hard to deal with.

So, there’s a whole array of issues. It’s not unusual; it’s a typical thing that you run

into when you get very successful, very aggressive kind of folks in the room. They

clearly are all leading and often times in different directions. That’s why we haven’t

been able to pull together.

Interpretation of impacts on the team: Communication

There appeared to be a clear trend in the perceptions of impact in this domain. The

responses were categorized primarily as strong (2) and moderate (4) and the moderate

responses leaned toward the strong category. The researcher attributes this to the common

language of polarity thinking provided to the team through the Polarity Management model.

Related to the Candor-Diplomacy polarity used as a focus in the April and June trainings,

some leaders reported a shift toward greater candor in team interactions as a sign of impact.


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Interestingly, where a couple leaders saw definite positive signs of change at the recent

offsite, one leader reported seeing no change at all.

Conflict (Interview Questions 17, 18, and 19)

As with Unit 1, where the focus was on the perceived impacts of polarity thinking on

the leaders’ experience of conflict, the leaders were also asked about their perspectives of

impacts on conflict within the team as a collective. Again, three areas of potential impact

were explored, (a) the team’s understanding of conflict within the team, (b) the team’s

experience of conflict within the team, and, (c) the team’s approaches to conflict

management. The three subcategories in this domain were not always clearly discrete, as the

responses indicated.

Conflict (a): Understanding (Interview Question 17)

The researcher was interested in gauging whether learning and using polarity thinking

had an impact on the team’s understanding of the conflicts within the team environment. Of

the nine responses, none were characterized as displaying a strong impact, six were

moderate, two were slight, and one was minimal (see Table 24).

Table 24

Impacts on Team: Conflict: Understanding


0 6 2 1

The leaders’ responses characterized as moderate certainly had a positive tone, albeit

not overly strong. Some level of meaningful change was noted by six of the nine leaders.


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One leader stated, “I think so, understanding it. Where it comes from, what it means. And,

more appreciation that somebody might not necessarily be wrong because they have a

different opinion.” Another simply reported when asked about possible impact, “I think so. I

think it’s another tool to understand why things aren’t working. I think in general it has.”

And another leader said similarly about the impact on the team’s understanding of conflict:

I think as a general statement [it has] and I don’t know to what extent to ascribe the

reason to the polarity workshops because I’m sure there are other things going on. I

think that the level of mutual appreciation or civility or manners, whatever, empathy,

is better than it was. It’s not to say that it was ill-mannered two years ago, but people

are more understanding … I can understand that [other] person’s point of view.

[Researcher]: Less demonizing, as you referred to it before?

[Leader]: Yes.

One leader expanded more on his perception of how the increased understanding of

some of the sources of conflict on the team had impacted behaviors:

I notice a more enrolling, trusting environment from the team members. Whereas

before it was, ‘Why are you asking me that question about my business?’ or ‘Hey,

I’ve got a personnel problem in your area of expertise, but I’m not going to talk to

you about it.’ The behaviors that I specifically noticed have been, ‘Hey, I’ve got this

business problem or this proposal. Would you mind taking a look at it?’ or, ‘I’ve got

this personnel issue; I need some help.’ So, the level of trust, the level of enrollment

has gone up and I correlate it to polarity, not directly, but there have been noticeable

behavior changes.

And, finally a comment from another leader also highlighted how increased


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understanding of polarities at play impacted behaviors on the team.

I think so. The division president is encouraging us to be more candid and I think that

the candor has improved a lot. He is encouraging us to be even more candid in the

sense of getting things out in the open so we can explore the polarities rather than

hide behind them or turn them into a bigger situation. We’ll have to see because

there’s been in the past a lack of candor and because people won’t say anything in the

meeting and then walk out and do whatever they want to, interpret things however

they want to and so hopefully that will stop because he’s taken some steps [that were]

desperately needed.

However, not everyone saw significant changes or observed that there was a gap

between understanding and behaviors. Two leaders’ responses appeared to fall more into the

slight category. One leader commented that, “I think the sensitivity has gone up a bit. So, I

think that there’s been an appreciation that’s been a result of the polarity exercises toward the

poles.” The other leader remarked the he thought that,

They’re expressing it differently. The fact that I understand your point of view

doesn’t change my enthusiasm for my own in most instances and so, I would say that

most people on the team understand perhaps a little bit better the other view, or they

may have always understood it, but are prepared to give it more credibility. But to the

extent that the team is allocating resources, I don’t know how profound an effect it’s

had.

One leader, whose response indicated minimal impact pointed to process issues on the

team that did and would continue to undercut increased understanding:

My sense is no [impact]. I think the major problem we have, and this hasn’t changed,


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is that it’s not so much a conflict that’s regularly occurring that you’re going to have

on this kind of a team. The frustration is that we never get resolution or

understanding. So, there’s always that kind of consternation that goes on. The

analogy is that we never get the elephant on the table and everyone knows that it’s in

the room and that hasn’t gone away. We still have a lot of that. I think that polarity

thinking is a way to get to that but we just haven’t been able to apply that across the

team to be able to deal with that. So, I [don’t] think that’s changed a whole lot.

[Researcher]: I would guess this is a group of people where outcomes are

everything and in polarity thinking a huge chunk of it is process.

[Leader]: Right.

[Researcher]: What are we dealing with here? And then I can imagine this

group of people going ‘This is getting really boring. What are we going to do about

it?’ The green flags and red flags in Barry’s model come later. Do people have the

patience to move through the first piece to get to the latter piece?

[Leader]: That’s probably what we’re dealing with. They probably need to get

it applied to a couple very obvious situations, which will make the point. Right now

we’ve been dealing with pretty fuzzy concepts, which may make sense, but until you

can apply it and show that it has some real tangible impact then it’s very difficult to

get everyone to gather around the flag.

[Researcher]: And actually be ahead of it and decide, ‘How are we going to

measure impact?’ rather than [ask] what was the impact after the fact? Because then

[after the fact] people will discount it.

[Leader]: Right.


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Interpretation of impacts on the team: Understanding conflict

Generally, most of the leaders noted a positive (moderate) impact of polarity thinking

on the team’s understanding of conflict. One leader noted a “more enrolling, trusting

environment from the team members.” It seemed that many of the leaders were able to use

the understanding of polarity thinking to move away from “demonizing” members of the

team with very divergent ideas and assumptions from theirs. Polarity thinking seemed to

provide a different contextual frame with which to understand the historical conflicts within

this leadership team. As one leader pointed out,

The fact that I understand your point of view doesn’t change my enthusiasm for my

own in most instances and so, I would say that most people on the team understand

perhaps a little bit better the other view, or they may have always understood it, but

are prepared to give it more credibility.

Conflict (b): Team Experience of Conflict (Interview Question 18)

The researcher was interested in whether the leaders perceived a change in the level

of team conflict as a consequence of learning and using polarity thinking. Of the nine leaders

the responses appeared to fall into the following categories of impact: strong (0), moderate

(4), slight (4), and minimal or none (1) (see Table 25).

Table 25

Impacts on Team: Conflict: Experience


0 4 4 1

Responses to this question in the interview were strikingly terse. The researcher


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supposed that this could have been because many may have felt that they answered the

question when they responded to the previous question. Typically, the researcher asked if the

leader had anything to add. However that question was often met with a shrug and an

indication of being finished.

Two leaders made points about the impact of polarity thinking on the level of conflict

characterized as moderate.

[Researcher]: I wonder if the frustration people might feel with the difference of

opinions is in any way impacted by being aware of polarity thinking.

[Leader]: Sure, absolutely, because it allows you to joke about it and there’s a

great release in that. Someone can be arguing their position still as strongly as they

ever did, secure in the knowledge that it’s a zero-sum game and they’re arguing for

the sum, but it’s an expression of, it’s essentially saying ‘Look I know you may feel

differently about it, but my demand for the resources is more valid than yours.’ And,

expressing it in terms that there is a polarity to be managed allows you to be far more

explicit that I understand where you’re coming from, but I don’t change my point of

view. And so to that extent, it certainly minimizes conflict. Let’s put it this way, what

it does, it changes, it hopefully helps change, contradiction to argument or if

argument is not likely to resolve the issue, allows people to understand that there’s a

contradiction here and I’m not giving up my point of view. So to that extent, sure it’s

useful, if for nothing else it allows you to cut to the chase quicker.

Another leader referenced Argyris’s Ladder of Inference and the researcher asked

him to say more about that.

[Researcher]: You referenced the Ladder of Inference. How do you see polarity


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thinking impacting the ladder of inference?

[Leader]: What it does is it forces you to sit down and create a new data pool.

If you are sitting on one pole or the other, all you see are the upsides. You could see

in those exercises [in the Polarity Management trainings] we said, ‘What are the

positives of being division-centric?’ Well the division guys, they populated that thing

immediately and there were a few business unit leaders that made a couple comments.

And when we did the same exercise on the business unit side, all the business unit

leaders could populate that top and just the opposite was true on the negative side.

That was clear as day.

While the leader indicated that he saw an impact of polarity thinking, part of his

response, nonetheless, showed a partiality toward the pole of the part/whole polarity where

he resided in his position:

The source of the conflict has been diluted. By being declarative, ‘This is the way

we’re going to behave,’ we introduced the primacy of the whole [italics added] or the

enterprise, i.e., the division. All business unit plans, people, execution, is superceded

by the primacy of the whole. All the division employees are owned by the division,

including the business units and the functions. Those kinds of declarations have taken

away a lot of the conflict. ‘No, no that’s my person; no, no, no, that’s the enterprise’s

person. Now, let’s sit down and figure out how to best serve them.’ Not that there

isn’t debate, because there is. It still doesn’t answer the question, ‘Who serves the

customer?’ But, it takes away the initial, the first stage of conflict, which is the

declaration of ‘This is mine.’ ‘No, This is mine.’

Among the other moderate impact responses, one leader commented, “Well, the


179

conflicts are still there. I think some of the heat has actually been diffused by this polarity

stuff. It’s turning it into more constructive energy.” Another leader observed, “I would say

after this leadership team meeting, I sensed much less conflict, not only during the meeting,

but also after the meeting. As you said, the proof will be in the pudding. We’ll see now, as

we implement, but I think much less conflict.”

Of those whose responses indicated a slight impact, one leader said of the level of

conflict, “[It] has subsided.” [Researcher]: “It would never go away [altogether].” [Leader]:

“It never should.” Another said the level had changed “in some areas yes, in other areas no.”

And another, “I think it’s been decreased.” The leader whose response was categorized as

minimal simply asserted, “I would say probably not.”

Interpretation of impacts on the team: Experience of conflict

While some leaders responses were categorized as showing moderate (4) impacts, the

majority of the responses were either slight (4) or minimal (1). As with this domain for the

individual leaders, how this question was understood may have been different than the

researcher intended. As one leader, whose response was categorized as slight indicated the

conflict never should go away altogether. The leaders might have responded differently if the

researcher had asked about the level of stress experienced by the team had been impacted.

Also, the conflict on the team, even if framed as stress, is undoubtedly multi-factorial and not

simply reduced to polarity-related causes.

Conflict (c): Conflict Management (Interview Question 19)

The researcher was interested in whether the leaders noticed any impacts of polarity

thinking on the conflict management approaches within the team as a group. The responses

showed characteristics of impact at strong (0), moderate (5), slight (3), and minimal (1) (see


180

Table 26).

One leader whose response was characterized by the researcher as moderate

commented that he certainly had observed some impacts.

I hadn’t thought about it. I guess the answer is yes, but I don’t know that definitively.

Once again, the fact that you use the terms now to articulate your point of view or to

take a breather in the argument, to do a time out, if you will, when the argument gets

a little heated, when the argument descends into contradiction, is that changing it?

Maybe. In terms of being relaxed, Polarity Management gives you an opportunity

[say] to the other guy to say, ‘Hey, relax. We understand that this is a polarity.’ That

doesn’t change my point of view or my box. That enables you to make it an argument

about the issues as opposed to essentially being a raw power grab on one person’s

part or an allocation of resources grab on the other.

Table 26

Impacts on Team: Conflict: Approaches to Conflict Management


0 5 3 1

In an exchange with the researcher, another leader made a similar point that impacts

were noticeable in this area:

Oh yeah. I would say [we’re managing conflict] more constructively.

[Researcher]: You have a tendency to be in the middle, to be a both/and

thinker. Are you noticing people who you would have characterized before as being

particularly at the poles are managing conflict differently?


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[Leader]: Yeah. I think that the people I’m thinking of that were at the

poles…I don’t think that they’ve fully migrated to the center. It’s not crowded in here

yet, but I think we’ve made some progress.

Another moderate response came from another leader who said:

I don’t know. My guess is that in some cases, the first stage is to determine if there is

a conflict around a problem or a conflict around a paradox. I think if there’s a conflict

around a problem, we go ahead and negotiate that. If it’s a conflict around a paradox,

then it’s probably not completely intuitive yet, but I think it is being recognized. I’ve

seen polarity maps from people. Is everybody doing it? I don’t know.

[Researcher]: So, in some ways, there is a decision tree, so to speak, that’s

been created. Is this a problem to solve or a polarity to manage?

[Leader]: I will tell you that in our offsite, the first slide … used was the

polarity map that we created in the exercise for the division versus the business units.

We led with that slide. Here’s what [we] understand and what you’re going to hear

and the decisions you’re going to hear about have been taken largely from this map,

understanding that [we’ve] all had input on it.

The theme that came through was one of a change in awareness that impacted

approaches to conflict management in the team:

I think yes, to the extent that we can’t agree or get to a common place, and now as a

group we understand that we have to deal with it differently than if it was a problem

to be fixed. We’ll be in a discussion and someone will raise [the point] that this is a

polarity; this is not a problem we can fix. So, that wasn’t there before.

The final moderate response came from a leader who added why he felt polarity


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thinking was absolutely imperative:

You need to have strong business [unit] leaders to control the P&L [profit and loss],

but if you’re going to create a world-class organization, you have to have strong

[division level] functions. You have to build that technical mastery across many

functions. It has to be a both/and; it’s not either/or. And, I think the mandate [from

the offsite meeting] … was basically a both/and. Now, some people saw it as an

either/or, ‘OK, my life as I know it is over.’ I saw it as both/and. So, I guess it

depends on your perspective.

Three of the leaders had observations that were less strong and were characterized by

the researcher as polarity thinking having slight impact on conflict management approaches.

One leader’s comments were very descriptive of the reality involved:

Yes. We can talk about the pros and cons of doing things.

[Researcher]: So people are saying stop we have something going on right

now. Let’s deal with it?

[Leader]: We still have a way to go.

[Researcher]: There’s definitely a learning curve on that one.

[Leader]: We’re going up the curve of trust, but we’re not there yet.

Another leader commented:

Again, the team’s not doing anything transparently or what have you to deal with that

specific issue. It’s just a number of things, polarity just one being held up, that help

people better understand the conflicts, but the team has not said we need to address

conflict.

[Researcher]: So, it’s not something where someone says, ‘Time out, let’s talk


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about what’s going on here?’

[Leader]: No.

The final response in the slight category returned to the influence of incentives on any

attempt to change standard procedures.

In small ways. It’s not been a major shift in thinking or approach, but I think there are

a few of us who at least use the buzz words periodically and so it’s slowly infiltrating

the group but it’s not having a dramatic impact to this point.

[Researcher]: What would be the major levers? Is this incentive thing so big?

[Leader]: That is a huge factor. I think more forceful leadership at the top [is

needed]….Probably, he [the division president] just needs to come down a little

harder.

[Researcher]: ‘You will do this!’

[Leader]: Yes. The other [thing] is that whenever you try to bring about, this

really is driving toward a culture change and my read on that topic and most people

are of the opinion that it takes really a generation to bring about a cultural change in

an organization or in a society and that’s probably true, with some exceptions. And

that’s probably what we’re dealing with here. I think as we go through the next

decade, so long as we keep thinking the way we are, then those changes will come

about. Right now, it’s too new. The current system of incentivizing the business units

is just a couple of years old and so people are still adapting to that system and to try

to superimpose another system that dramatically changes the culture is probably

unlikely in the short-term. But, I think it’s part of the time trend.

The leader whose response was characterized as minimal, when asked if he had


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noticed any impacts, simply stated: “I don’t think necessarily, no. I haven’t observed that it

has; I haven’t observed that it hasn’t.”

Interpretation of impacts on the team: Approaches to conflict management

The general trend in the responses was that polarity thinking had an impact on

conflict management approaches within the team. It might be best summarized to observe

that the Polarity Management model, while a tool to help map and flesh out the upsides and

downsides of the poles of a contentious polarity and provide a tool for action planning that

honors both poles, also in itself provides a conflict management tool. The responses of many

of the leaders seemed to indicate that simply referencing Polarity Management tended to

redirect conflicts that occurred on the team.

Interpretation of team conflict domain

The researcher concluded that the impacts on team conflict generally were less than

on the leader’s as individuals. The supposition is that the history and culture of the

corporation and the division were still too pronounced to have been substantially transformed

in the time between the introduction of Polarity Management in April 2003 and the

interviews in January and February 2004. The team was actively wrestling, however, and

needed to wrestle, with the most significant polarity: business unit/division (part/whole). It

might even be predicted that the level of conflict might increase as structural changes,

including incentives, and processes were discussed, implemented, and assessed.

Organizational Working Relationships (Interview Questions 22 and 23)

The researcher wanted to know whether the leaders perceived differences in the

team’s interactions with other parts of the organization as a result of learning and using


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polarity thinking. The researcher supposed that if impact had been realized on the team level,

it would not necessarily translate to interactions with other parts of the corporation,

especially other divisions or business units that might be competing for resources and the

attention of senior corporate management. The responses appeared to indicate that the leaders

perceived little impact to date. It must be said that some of the leaders were clear that their

contacts, in general and at the team level, with other functions and divisions throughout the

corporation were minimal anyway.

Question 22 specifically asked whether the team’s working relationships with other

departments or functions had been affected. The nine responses were characterized as strong

(0), moderate (1), slight (3), and minimal or none (5) (see Table 27). This clearly showed

perceptions of very limited impact on organizational working relationships.

Table 27

Impacts on Team: Organizational Working Relationships


0 1 3 5

The one leader’s response characterized as moderate was, nonetheless, a fairly weak

indication of impact.

Yeah, I think so. Not in a dramatic way, but there are subtle, small differences that are

occurring. We tend to, as a team, take less of a hard-line position. ‘This is how we

need to do things!’ That was a conflict we often would get into and now there’s a

whole lot greater tendency to get compromise positions, which both sides can sense.

The leaders’ responses characterized as slight showed perception of movement, albeit


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incremental. The exchange with one leader was one such example.

I don’t think so. We discuss the concept and it’s been referenced from time to time

that people understand that maybe it’s a polarity, not a problem, but I don’t think

anyone from the team or sub-team will use the formal polarity. More because we

really haven’t had the time to roll it out.

[Researcher]: As I understood it senior management was very intrigued with

[Johnson’s Polarity Management] model. Have you been aware of them watching or

asking, ‘How is it going?’

[Leader]: No, but it has become a part of peoples’ vocabulary and so it’s not

like they’re formally asking, ‘Well are you using Polarity Management?’ But, there’s

an overall acknowledgement about polarities: why they exist, how they exist, and

how to deal with them. So, I think it has become part of the business jargon for

managers. So the awareness is there, but I haven’t had anyone ask me recently how I

used Polarity Management.

Another leader added:

I think this is interesting because there is definitely there is some discussion starting

to open up between our division and the other [division in a similar business]. I think

there needs to be more of that and I’m not sure why that has occurred, but there needs

to be more of that.

The final slight response indicated the increased awareness of polarity thinking,

specifically through the Polarity Management model.

I can think of two functions. One is the financial function. Our CFO of the division is

now an evangelist in this area so he uses this tool quite effectively and has used it in


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his job family. Our HR person used it with the president of the company in a

discussion on the short-term incentive bonuses right after we had the April meeting.

Most of the responses characterized as minimal or none were very brief and to the

point. “I can’t answer that. The division people would be able to tell you that.” Another, “I

don’t know.” And another,” Not that I’ve noticed, no.” And, “I can’t say….There’s an awful

lot … in the informal network and the casual relationships and the body language and

whatnot. I’m not there for that.” The final response pointed toward the future:

I think they’ve been affected. I don’t know if it’s necessarily this. It more has to do

with organization structure and again, during the offsite, by [the division president]

making this declaration that the [division] strategy is supreme and all business unit

strategies must align with this and we are going to act as an enterprise versus a loose

collection of business units. That changed the thinking. By [the division president]

articulating why we’re doing that and why it makes so much sense and that it’s

beyond [the division], it’s broader to some of the other business units in the

corporation that we have some close opportunities to work with. That changed the

thinking. And again, I think to the extent now that we can change the incentives

program to incent [sic] people to collaborate with other business units outside and

inside the division, that that will improve that all the more. And one of the outcomes

of that meeting was for us to look at the incentive alignment.

The researcher also asked whether the leaders had received any feedback from people

in other parts of the corporation, outside of their division, that they had noticed the team

using polarity thinking or interacting with them differently. The general response was no.

The couple of leader responses that indicated that some feedback had been received were


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very telling.

No, but people who work with us have gone through it, you know the platform

leaders of some of the other platforms we work with. They’ve been through polarity,

they know what polarities we’re struggling with so they’re able to speak to it as well

and understand it. But I haven’t heard or been in the position where other parts of the

corporation have said, ‘Boy, you guys really changed the way you’re doing things.’

Other parts of the corporation are talking about this. I don’t know if Barry [Johnson]

has worked with these other groups. Plus our organizational effectiveness group now

is starting to diffuse the concepts and construct of Polarity Management. So, it’s

getting broader around the corporation.

The other response was the only that directly indicated that someone outside the

division had noticed something different:

A couple of folks have come up to me and said, ‘It seems as though the [members of

the leadership team] were,’ I think the words were, ‘getting along better than

previously.’ Which is kind of that trust and enrolling element that I was talking about

before. But, there aren’t enough people who are trained, even though we exposed it to

the entire organization. The whole idea of Polarity Management, again, they saw it

for fifteen minutes on a set of slides. And, I have a couple of people who work for me

who have been trained in it and are going through [corporate] leadership training

programs and it’s in there. Now that I think of it, I haven’t seen them use it either, at

least not consciously.

Interpretation on impacts on the team: Organizational working relationships

The researcher concluded that the impacts on team organizational working


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relationships was primarily faint at best. The primary reason would seem to be that most of

the leaders had limited interactions with the corporation outside of their particular division

and where those contacts did occur, they tended to be as individual leaders, representing their

particular function (divisional) or enterprise (business unit. and not perceived as a team.

Unit 2: Summary and Interpretation

The researcher again followed the previously established threshold of 2/3 of the

responses (6 of 9) in the strong and moderate categories as indicative of significance to

answer the research questions in the affirmative (see Table 28).

In addition to using the data from the interviews to make determinations about the

research questions, the researcher also used data gathered by Barry Johnson and the

leadership team or the corporate effectiveness staff person from February through June 2003.

The data from the Controlled Self-Assessment of February 2003 and the polarity maps and

assessment ratings of April 2003 and June 2003 were interesting, especially in helping to

frame the context of the leadership group’s interactions. However, the data did not directly

tie in with the questions asked in the one-on-one interviews. The researcher could only point

to the shifts that occurred in the quadrant averages and composite scores for the different

polarity maps discussed above. Additionally, the very great, great, moderate, and slight scale

used for rating the “extent” of the characteristics identified in each of the four quadrants of

the polarity maps of Johnson’s Polarity Management model was not deemed comparable to

the strong, moderate, slight, and minimal or none scale used to categorize the impacts of

learning and using polarity thinking captured in the interviews with the leaders. The

researched added commentary in the following summary for the domains where this

additional data seemed relevant.


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Did polarity thinking impact team’s sense of self? The researcher’s categorization of

the responses into the four levels of apparent impact indicated that the responses of six of

nine leaders at the moderate level sufficiently indicated significant impact. The researcher

felt this was sufficient to determine that polarity thinking had positively impacted the team’s

sense of self. Added to this were the polarity mapping and assessment rating data from the

April and June 2003 workshops. Perhaps most telling were the data generated by the team

related to the Business Unit/Division polarity. The data generated by the team at the first and

second workshops indicated to the researcher that a positive shift had occurred in how the

team understood itself and the challenges it faced.

Table 28

Impacts on Team: Unit 2 Summary


Sense of team self 0 6 2 1








Did polarity thinking impact team problem identification, labeling and analysis?

Only four of nine leaders’ responses were characterized by the researcher at the strong (0)


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and moderate (4) levels of impact for this domain. The majority of responses were

characterized as being slight (3) and minimal (2). The polarity mapping data from the April

and June 2003 workshops indicated an ability to differentiate the nuances of the polarities

examined. The researcher assumed this was significant within this domain. However, the

responses of the nine leaders as a collective did not reach the required threshold number to

affirmatively assert impact. The researcher supposed that the inertia of existing problem

identification, labeling, and analysis was stronger than the impact of the newer, for many

untested, polarity thinking approach.

Did polarity thinking impact team problem solving and taking action? Similar to the

previous domain and probably related to it as well, four of nine responses were characterized

by the researcher as strong (2) or moderate (2) and of insufficient number to determine that

polarity thinking had a significant impact in this domain. The researcher presented the data

above on the green flag activities for the Candor/Diplomacy polarity and not for Business

Unit/Division polarity. This and comments in the interviews indicated that increased

awareness did occur. The researcher did not have follow-up specific data on progress and

outcomes related those polarities. The conclusion of the researcher was that the existing

either/or problem solving culture was still too pervasive for polarity thinking to have made

deeper inroads.

Did polarity thinking impact team communication? The learning and using of polarity

thinking was determined to have had significant impact with six of nine leaders’ responses in

the strong (2) and moderate (4) categories. The researcher posited that the increased

awareness born of the Polarity Management workshops and other subsequent discussions

within the team was substantial and facilitated the ability of the team to be less veiled behind


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a diplomatic interactional style and become more candid with each other around

perspectives, needs and goals.

Did polarity thinking impact team conflict? The strongest impact of learning and

using polarity thinking was found in the understanding sub-domain. Six leaders responses

indicated moderate impact. Again, the researcher concluded that increased awareness of the

roots of positions different from theirs changed most of the leaders’ perspectives of what was

occurring in the midst of the leadership team conflicts.

Neither of the other two sub-domains for team conflict displayed the same level of

impact. The sub-domain of team experience of conflict showed the minority in the moderate

(4) category and insufficient to assert significant impact. The remaining responses fell into

the slight (4) and minimal (1) categories. As discussed in Unit 1, the researcher surmised that

this question may have been meant to mean stress and there appeared to be too much on-

going, in-process as yet undefined transition occurring. A question related to experience of

interpersonal conflict might have yielded more substance.

The sub-domain of approaches to conflict management showed a majority of the

responses in the moderate (5) category, and the remaining in the slight (3) and minimal (1)

categories. Where polarity mapping might have been regularly used as a conflict

understanding and conflict management too, the process was still largely conceptual for the

leaders rather than integrated.

Overall for the domain of conflict, the researcher determined that the learning and

using polarity had not had significant impact as established at the 2/3 of responses level.

Nonetheless, the researcher found sufficient support to assert that the potential for that

impact is substantial if cultural structures are changed and the use of polarity thinking, most


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likely through the Polarity Management model, is encouraged and supported by senior

corporate management.

Did polarity thinking impact team organizational working relationships? With the

responses characterized by the researcher at slight (3) and minimal (5) levels of impact, there

is no support for an assertion that team organizational working relationships were

significantly impacted. As with Unit 1, most of the leaders have only limited interactions

with the broader corporate community.

In summary, with only three of eight of the domains or sub-domains showing

significant impact, the researcher found insufficient support for the theory that the leadership

team, as a collective, was overall significantly impacted in a positive manner by learning and

using polarity thinking. The researcher posited that group cultural characteristics are more

resistant to change than individual characteristics.

Comparison of findings from Unit 1 and Unit 2

The researcher compared the findings for Units 1 and 2. Table 29 displays the

side-by-side ratings by rating category for each of the domains for Unit 1 (leader impacts)

and Unit 2 (team impacts). The only domain without a comparison rating from the other unit

was theory of leadership, which was omitted in the Unit 2 interviews as not directly germane.

Further compression of the ratings into side-by-side comparisons of the ratings into

categories of strong or moderate and slight or minimal allowed a ready scan of which

domains showed significance as established by the researcher for Unit 1 and Unit 2 (see

Table 30).

Three domains showed ratings of significance at the 2/3 at strong or moderate level:

leader sense of self and team sense of self; leader communication and team communication;


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and leader understanding of conflict and team understanding of conflict. The researcher, in

retrospect, interpreted these domains as particularly related.

Table 29

Side-by Side Comparison of Units 1 & 2, by Domain and Response Rating Category

Impact response ratings (individual and team)


Sense of self 5 0 2 6 2 2 0 1

Theory of leadership 4 – 3 – 2 – 0 –

Problem identification 6 0 2 4 1 3 0 2

Problem solving 3 2 3 2 3 3 0 2

Communication 2 2 4 4 3 1 0 2

Conflict: Understanding 7 0 2 6 0 2 0 1

Conflict: Experience 0 0 5 4 1 4 3 1

Conflict: Management 4 0 3 5 2 3 0 1

Working relationships 2 0 4 1 1 3 2 5

The research appeared to demonstrate that learning and using polarity thinking

significantly impacted the leaders in eight of nine domains and therefore was judged to have

demonstrated overall impact for the leaders. By contrast, the team results showed that

learning and using polarity thinking significantly impacted the leaders in only three of eight

domains and was judged not to have demonstrated significant across the board impact.


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Despite the lack of significance in the findings of Unit 2, it was clear that the leadership team

found introduction, use, and future diffusion of polarity thinking, specifically through the

Polarity Management model, useful and valuable.

Table 30

Side-by Side Comparison of Units 1 & 2, by Domain and Level of Significance

Impact response ratings (individual and team)

Domain Strong/Moderate Slight/Minimal

Sense of self 7 6 2 3

Theory of leadership 7 – 2 –









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CHAPTER 5

CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

Purpose of the study

The researcher sought to examine through this positivistic study, whether learning

and using polarity thinking would impact the members of a corporate leadership team. As a

positivistic study, the researcher posited the theory that the leadership team members would

be significantly and positively impacted as individual leaders and as a collective leadership

team. As stated in the methods section, it was believed that this study represents the

beginning of a new stream of research inquiry.

Overview of significant findings and revision of researcher theory

The leaders were clear in their appreciation and support for polarity thinking, as

experienced through Johnson’s Polarity Management model. They identified the barriers to

its regular inclusion in day-to-day operation, most specifically the structural barriers

including the corporate incentivization approaches. The researcher would predict that most

attempts to manage polarities would generally identify barriers related to combinations of

people, technologies, and resources. They also noted the need for broad training in polarity

thinking, most specifically through Johnson’s model and supported diffusion of the mindset

throughout the organization.

The results of the study supported the theory that the leaders, as individuals, would be

significantly impacted in learning and actively using polarity thinking. Strong and moderate

impact was found in the domains of sense of self; operating theory of leadership; problem

identification, labeling and analysis; problem solving and taking action; communication;

understanding conflict; approaches to conflict management; and organizational working


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relationships. Insufficient support was found only in the domain of personal experience of

conflict. The theory was supported for Unit 1 of the study.

By comparison, the study supported the theory that the leadership team, as a

collective, would also be significantly impacted only in the domains of team sense of self,

team communication, and team understanding of conflict. Insufficient support for claims of

significant impact was found for the domains of problem identification, labeling and

analysis; problem solving and taking action; team experience of conflict; approaches to

conflict management; and organizational working relationships. The researcher determined

that theory was not supported for Unit 2 of the study. However, despite the lack of support

for the researcher’s theory, with the threshold criterion of two-thirds at strong or moderate,

the researcher posits that the theory was not disproved.

The researcher considered possible explanations for the considerable gap in finding

on impacts for individual leaders and the team as a collective. This gap may have been the

most surprising and most interesting finding to emerge in the unit analyses.

Arguably, the leaders reported greater impacts of learning and using polarity thinking,

as individuals, because as the senior person in each of their individual realms, business unit

or divisional function, they were the ultimate authorities with the power to direct and shape

the culture and agenda within their own specific realm. The range of control in the domains

of the study for the leaders, as individuals, was fairly broad.

Conversely, as members of the leadership team, as a collective of relative peers

within the team, that range of control was narrowed considerably and the established culture

of engagement harder to dislodge. The risks were reasonably great, without significantly

increased corporate expectations, relevant history and structural supports, especially financial


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incentives. It seemed unclear whether polarity thinking, as Polarity Management, was a wave

of the future for the corporation or merely another “flavor of the month” management

technique.

The researcher could not be entirely sure of why the gap in findings was so

considerable. Perhaps an insight may be found in comments made by the researcher earlier in

this dissertation:

To break from the collective Persona that includes assumptions and beliefs, and well-

established interpersonal and operational structures, puts an individual or minority of

group members at risk for being marginalized by the majority or for missing out on

the rewards based on the existing organization/functional area/team culture.

Individual confrontation with and integration of the Shadow, while very challenging,

may pale in comparison to the courage needed for an individual pushing for

fundamental changes in a organization or team culture’s assumptions, protocols, and

reward structures.

While the individual leaders seem to have embraced polarity thinking in the various

domains examined in the study, the researcher posited that the same sort of significant

impacts would not likely be realized without the full, explicit support, or even mandate, of

senior corporate management and general diffusion throughout the organization.

Additionally, the incentive structure would need to be altered as part of crafting a modified

corporate Persona. This new Persona would provide cover for most of the leaders to take the

risks within the stressful and oftentimes competitive team environment.

In summary, the researcher concluded that the theory was supported in significant

part and not in total. Sufficient support existed to justify additional expanded research on this


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question. The researcher made no attempt to test a theory with generalizable results. The

structure of the study, the nature of the questions, and the small number of respondents

precluded such lofty goals. The researcher was pleased to contribute to the body of

knowledge of a relatively new stream of organizational inquiry.

Comparison to existing research studies

No relevant and related research was found in the literature that focused on the

impacts of learning and using polarity thinking. Therefore, there was no comparison research

for the findings of this study. The findings of this study provide the seed for further

investigation in this area.

Implications for theory

No data from any source indicated negative impact of learning and using polarity

thinking. The current study adds support for the researcher’s theory related to the impacts of

polarity thinking for leaders and not for teams. Although not supported relative to teams, the

theory was not disproved. The theory remains a hypothesis without sufficient and varied data

to claim that the theory was proven.

Lack of support for theory

As one leader pointed out, even if the leaders specifically identified impacts of

learning and using polarity thinking, direct correlations between polarity thinking and

identified impacts in either Unit 1 or Unit 2 could not be identified.

Limitations of the study

The researcher recognized the limitations of the study. The researcher acknowledged

from the outset that generalizability was not a goal of this study. Rather, the goal was to

gather from the leaders whether and in what ways they were impacted as individuals and as a


200

collective by learning and using polarity thinking.

The limited access to the leaders, as individuals, and the team, as a collective,

required restricted data collection approaches in a truncated time frame. The access of the

researcher to the leaders was limited by their busy schedules. Additionally, the researcher

originally wished to do a longitudinal study of impacts over time. Because of the corporate

realities and other limitations this was not to be.

This meant one interview only of less than one hour. The researcher did not have the

desired time with the leaders as individuals to more fully explore their answers. As

mentioned in the findings section, the researcher wondered whether distribution to the

leaders of the interview questions before the interviews for possible reflection might have

yielded more in-depth, nuanced responses.

Additional data collection methods were considered to strengthen triangulation.

Surveys were decided to likely be perceived as burdensome and redundant, and possibly

would have yielded a low return rate from the already small pool of ten leaders. A strength of

a survey would have been the leaders’ direct ratings of impact for the various domains to the

strong, moderate, slight, and minimal or none categories. If followed up with an interview, a

survey might have provided additional validity to the findings. The survey results might have

provided more solid quantitative data to be analyzed using statistical analysis. As designed in

this study, the quantitative measures generated did not lend themselves to statistical analysis.

It was a judgment call that the researcher determined in retrospect was made appropriately.

The assignment of the interview responses to the strong, moderate, slight, and

minimal or none limited reliability. The researcher could not say that the responses clearly

fell into discrete categories and whether others categorizing those responses would have


201

assigned them in the same way.

Observations of the leaders as individuals working within their own areas of

responsibility and together as a collective leadership team would have provided behavioral

data for the study. The researcher, for instance, collected no observation data of the

leadership team’s interactions within the group setting. The most significant barriers would

have been a lack of available time of the researcher to observe the full team in more than a

single setting or circumstance and the sensitivity of the proprietary content of meetings and

activities that would have been observed.

Recommendations for further research

The researcher considered this a baseline study of the impacts of learning and using

polarity thinking in a range of domains at both the individual leader and leadership team

levels. The study could only produce relatively surface results.

One recommendation for further research would be to select a specific domain or pair

of related domains for study as the focus for an entire study, such as leader communication

or leader problem analysis and problem solving. This would allow a researcher to

operationalize questions and measures with greater depth and specificity and greatly increase

the validity and reliability of the studies’ findings. Further research would also be valuable

from both positivist models, including possible statistical analyses, and interpretivist frames.

Finally, since organizations, especially business organizations, want to see specific outcome

measures that support a theory, the inclusion of business measures correlated within the

domain under study would be valuable.

Implications for organization development practice

The researcher remains convinced of the importance of polarity thinking, whether


202

through Johnson’s Polarity Management model or some other model. The researcher,

through professional experience, academic study and practice, review of the literature for this

study, and listening to the leaders in our interviews, repeatedly encountered evidence that

most leaders or organization development practitioners do not seem to have a general

mindset that recognizes the difference between what Johnson (1996) labels problems to solve

and polarities to manage. And, beyond that, tools are few for identifying the dynamic

characteristics of polarities and for translating those characteristics into measurable actions

that can be tracked over time.

Polarity thinking should be an essential skill taught in all management and

organization development programs. The presence and impacts of polarities on

organizational culture and operations, while ubiquitous, appeared to be inadequately

recognized, researched and managed. As discussed in the literature review, some authors

have written about the realities of polarity in organizations, most notably Johnson (1996) and

Pascale (1990). However, when polarity or paradox was mentioned, it was primarily in what

appeared to be an aside and not the direct focus of inquiry. This dissertation project sought to

directly contribute to or initiate more in-depth study of the impacts and implications of

polarities. The significant impacts of learning and using polarity thinking suggested in the

findings for the individual leaders and potentials for impacts on the team provide material for

a new research stream in organization development that is in keeping with the researcher’s

and, reasonably stated, the organization development field’s commitment to help people and

organizations function in more effective and affirming ways as they seek to realize their

higher potentials.


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