Articles
The Dance of Mastery and Adaptation:
Continuous Growth thru Cycles of Renewal
Dean Robb, Ph.D.
There is a clash between the assumptions and expectations of Wall
Street and many of our business leaders, and the actual reality
of the process of growth. Wall Street, as well as many of today's
business leaders, grew up during a time when the dominant paradigm
that shaped thought and action was mechanistic. The underlying belief
system behind both science and business was that the world is primarily
mechanical, static, rationally-knowable, predictable, and (most
importantly) controllable. This paradigm
gave rise to a mythology that still drives much of the scientific
and business worlds — the myth of Linear Progress.
The Myth of Linear Progress is a deeply held (but largely subconscious)
belief that through just the right combination of competencies and
actions, continuously upward-trending linear growth can be achieved,
or more precisely, engineered. If you harbor doubts about
this, ask yourself: why does any deviation from perfect
income and growth projections generally result in an immediate downward
hit in stock price on Wall Street? Isn't it because (on some level)
we believe — even demand — that upward, linear
growth projections should be met, with no excuses, each and every
quarter? We believe that such demands are reasonable because we
believe — on some level — that they are achievable.
So what's wrong with that? Our whole economy is based on it, after
all! Here's what's wrong with it: It's not real, and it's not achievable.
It's a remnant of a paradigm that's been thrown on the scrap heap.
It's an artifact of the scientific revolution of the 17th and 18th
centuries and the "scientific management" revolution of the early
20th century, which fostered the belief that the world is a giant
machine, and that progress amounts to a gigantic mechanical design
and engineering project.
For a time this belief system worked, and worked well: but only
during a period when American business possessed largely unquestioned
global hegemony. This unrivaled power gave us a measure of stability
and predictability — the fundamental prerequisite for the
mechanical paradigm to work. But American business no longer commands
a position of unquestioned dominance. What's left is a business
environment increasingly characterized by ceaseless, turbulent change
— in customer needs, markets, technology, social change, and
every other kind of change you can think of. And the unnerving volatility
of the stock market, as well as the growing number of revolving
doors installed at the entrance to the C-suite, reflect it.
The old mechanical paradigm has been supplanted by a growing awareness
of the immense complexity of the world. The new paradigm acknowledges
that the world is dynamic, unpredictable, creative, and evolutionary
in nature; it is not fully knowable, and not fully controllable.
The new paradigm is all about the dynamics of living, evolving,
complex systems. Coupled with this is a growing understanding that
living systems — like the biological, social, and business
worlds — do not evolve and grow along straight lines, but
through a continuous — and considerably bumpier — dance
between periods of mastery and periods of adaptation.
Let's look into this "dance between mastery and adaptation" a little
closer.
In business terms, mastery is a period when both strategy and execution
are tightly aligned with customer expectations. Mastery is characterized
by excellence in execution and also, as one might expect, with excellent
financial performance and growth.
Adaptation is a period defined by lack of alignment between
the company and its environment. Adaptation is a period when the
current success formula begins to break down, and a new success
formula needs to be created. Depending on the degree of misalignment,
this might mean anything from product improvements to disruptive
product innovations; perhaps even a complete reinvention of the
company, from the business model on up.
Managing the ongoing dance between mastery and adaptation requires
recognition that each phase demands very different competencies,
coupled with the wisdom to recognize when each phase is occurring.
The graphic below illustrates some of them.
The competencies for mastery and adaptation can be grouped into
complementary pairs. Some examples: Whereas mastery of repetitive
tasks is supported by the capacity to focus on concrete details,
changing the task structure is facilitated by the capacity to back
up, so to speak, and to look at the basic structure and patterns
of interpersonal competition, while moving effectively through deep
change is fostered by a strong dose of social cohesion, interpersonal
support, emotional competence, and community. Business mastery is
tied to a strong focus on financials, while significant change is
facilitated by the capacity to reconnect with the original purpose
and meaning of the company.
The competencies for mastery support disciplined execution of a
fixed strategy. Also, they are all associated with being "on top
and in control": goal achievement, task mastery, autonomy, power,
action, persuasion, defense, rationality, intellect, logic, analysis,
science, structure, planning and control. It scarcely requires mentioning
that collectively, we love all of these. In fact, it may not be
far off to say that we are addicted to them. And why shouldn't we?
All of these feel good. It feels good to be strong, powerful and
in control. It strokes the ego and fills the wallet.
The competencies for adaptation support creative renewal. Adaptation
involves an entirely different, complementary, yet equally important
spectrum of competencies: intuition, imagination, vision, creativity,
play, humility, reflection, the capacity to learn, introspection,
emotional competence, building relationships, authenticity, listening,
connection with purpose and meaning, the capacity to let go and
to let things develop and emerge, and spirituality. All of these
support deep, creative change — the capacity to undergo metamorphosis:
i.e. to let an old identity and success strategy die, and to generate
new ones.
We face a deep problem in connection with this dance. Our culture
gives lip service to adaptation, but tends to reward only mastery.
We call it "winning." In fact, we sometimes don't even classify
adaptation competencies as competencies, because we associate the
very word "competence" with mastery and winning — with being
"on top and in control." And people who have all those adaptation
competencies — we often view them as somehow "un-masculine."
And in the business world, we often view people and organizations
that are undergoing periods of adaptation with suspicion and classify
them as being "weak" or even "losers."
The challenge we must face is that significant adaptation cannot
happen without going through a small "death" — a period of
unclear direction; of seeming chaos and formlessness. In general,
our culture tends to regard this process as a sign of weakness because
for a period of time, we may not exactly know where we are going
or what the next right move is, and our current skills and capabilities
may be irrelevant to what is needed to move forward. The problem
is that the creative process IS the process of adaptation; and engaging
deeply with the creative process requires moving into, and living
in, a space of experimentation, which can look and feel like chaos
or formlessness.
So how do we manage both mastery and adaptation? First, by accepting
adaptation as a natural part of life and embracing it. Embracing
adaptation means actively building systemic capability for creativity
and play, intuition, imaginative visioning, reflection and probing
inquiry, maintaining connection with deep purpose, learning, and
constructively harnessing internal differences as fuel for innovation
and growth. Doing this means we must pay people —
and promote them — for building these competencies.
During periods of mastery, execute strategy with intense, disciplined
focus; however, stop defending periods of mastery so fiercely. And
then, paradoxically, during periods of mastery, while financial
performance is excellent, deliberately engage in adaptation
by actively experimenting to create new forms of value to replace
those driving the current period of mastery. Don't wait to be forced
into periods of adaptation; instead, proactively create the future.
Use current economic success to prepay the burial of old business
models, products and services, and to give birth to new ones.
One of the best current examples we have of this kind of strategy
can be found in the mobile (cell) phone market, where new kinds
of phones and capabilities are tumbling onto the market so fast
we can barely keep up with them. Another area with a similar dynamic
is the broader field of "personal electronics" in general —
personal/portable audio players (MP3 and other formats), portable
DVD players, portable electronic game players, handhelds, digital
cameras, etc. Sometimes it seems like the shelf life of any of these
products is about 3 or 4 months! These examples, while perhaps a
bit on the extreme side, perfectly illustrate the idea of not
holding on to a product to the bitter end, but rather using the
revenue from early adopters to fund development of that same product's
replacement!
To adopt this way of doing business, we need to embed the identity
of our organizations in something larger and deeper than the particular
products and services they currently provide, because they are ephemeral.
We need to center the identity of our companies in the type of value
or contribution that those products and services are intended to
make to society, because contribution is the stable thread
that will run through all products and services generated over time.
An interesting case to analyze in connection with this idea is
Blockbuster, Inc. The mission statement on their web site reads:
"to help people transform ordinary nights into BLOCKBUSTER nights
by being their complete source for movies and games." But deeper
in the 'bowels' of their web site, in their International Operations
area, is this statement: "Blockbuster is recognized as a world leader
in rentable home entertainment."
Oddly, the second statement, connected with their international
operations, is actually a more effective statement of corporate
identity in terms of the criteria just discussed, because it succinctly
describes the specific value that Blockbuster provides:
rentable home entertainment. The mission statement is "hung up"
on the specific media through which value is delivered; because
of this, it could inadvertently constrain the range of innovation
options that Blockbuster might consider in creating future value
propositions. The concept of "rentable home entertainment," however,
is totally unconstrained by the constantly changing panoply of media
and/or delivery channels (and content, for that matter); thus, it
could serve as a deeper, more powerful center of identity and wellspring
for continuous innovation.
Leading a company in this way involves looking at business models,
value propositions, products and services as members of an ongoing
family. New members of the family continue to be born, grow up,
mature, decline and die; however, the family itself goes on.
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About Dean Robb, Ph.D.
Dr. Dean Robb is Founder and Executive Director of the Center for
Corporate Renewal (www.ctrforcorporaterenewal).
Since 1994, he has helped numerous domestic and foreign business
leaders build high-performing, innovative, entrepreneurial enterprises.
His expertise combines 26 years of practical, real-world experience
in corporate America with in-depth research in human and organizational
systems.
The Center for Corporate Renewal helps senior executives build
the capability for:
- Strategic Focus: Make sense of a changing
environment and gain focus on the next right strategic move
- Disciplined Execution: Align and mobilize
the entire organization behind this new strategic focus
- Creative Renewal: Renew the entrepreneurial
spirit by repeating these two actions over and over again.
For information on how Dr. Dean Robb can work with your organization
to instill a spirit and ethic of renewable corporate entrepreneurship,
email him at drobb@ctrforcorporaterenewal.com
or call him at 908-757-4721.
Permission to reproduce this article is hereby granted, given that
the contact information is kept intact with the article.
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