Polarity Wisdom for Leadership Maturity

• In Event: Polarity Thinking: An Essential Leadership Capability in a Rapid, Uncertain, Paradoxical, and Turbulent World

Short Description

Introducing the idea of polarities and helping leaders navigate stage-related polarities can be one of the most powerful ways of facilitating vertical development. This presenter will introduce the concept, focusing on some core polarities characterizing each stage of development and exploring how the journey of the evolving leader can be supported through polarity wisdom.

Detailed Abstract

The current times demand our radical attention to the most comprehensive and illuminating sense making tools available. This presentation is an attempt to describe two such frameworks and how they can be joined in service of Leadership Maturity. They are Vertical Development and Polarity Wisdom. Vertical development is based on ego development theory and describes how leaders advance through levels of maturity as they learn and gain greater meaning-making capacity. Polarity Wisdom is an approach to working with the polarities that show up at different stages of leader maturity, in service of stage transitions.

About Vertical Development:
This presentation will begin with making the basic distinction between horizontal and vertical development, a concept critical to understand the kind of leadership development necessary to navigate the RUPT world. Vertical Development is based on constructivist-developmental theory in general, and I will focus on ego development theory in particular as the source theory.

The depth, complexity and scope of our perspectives, of what we know and are aware of can evolve throughout life. Ego-development theory charts this path of changing self-representations or self-stories. It distinguishes nine different stages of adult development, each a discrete level of self-identification. Each stage of development makes meaning in unique ways that are qualitatively different from the stage before. Each later stage constitutes a transformation of the previous perspective, that is, it includes and transcends the earlier view. Each stage is a more integrated and comprehensive way of seeing the world.

About Polarities:
Polarities are interdependent pairs that are both needed for us to navigate life, work, and our complex world. This presentation assumes a basic understanding of polarities and the dynamics of interdependent pairs.

Polarities are everywhere and we can group them into different kinds. They can be situational (e.g. setting norms ∞ being flexible related to a project), contextual (e.g. conditional support ∞ unconditional support in the context of parenting), structural (e.g. department ∞ organization), definitional (e.g. night ∞ day). generic (part ∞ whole) among others.

We will focus on what we call ‘stage-related’ polarities. Stage-related polarities show up when we privilege one pole over its interdependent pair because that preference is embedded in our world-view and ego-stage. At each stage of development, we interpret our experiences based on our preferred values and are subject to the tensions we generate with our preferences. And how tightly we hold on to them, how we judge others’ preferences, how strongly we invest in either-or perspectives and how attached we are to one pole or the other– these can also be indicators of our stage.

Polarity Wisdom: How working with stage-related polarities can be a high-leverage pathway to greater Leadership Maturity.

Based on our experience in working with leaders at different stages of development, we see these particular ‘stage-related’ polarities at play. These can also be evidenced in the stated or implicit preferences in the responses to the Maturity Assessment for Professionals (MAP) instrument that we use to assess Leadership Maturity.

In this presentation I will provide an overview, focusing on some core polarities that each stage of development is characterized by. I will discuss how the journey of the evolving leader can be supported through Polarity Wisdom, a granular and practical approach to developing the capacity for interdependent, integrative and paradoxical thinking needed to navigate the complexity of our times.

Polarity Wisdom is based on the set of realities and tools developed by Dr. Barry Johnson, and situates its approach in the context of Vertical Development.

Introducing the idea of polarities and helping leaders navigate stage-related polarities can be one of the most powerful ways of facilitating vertical development. By embracing the other (pole), by integrating the disowned (pole), we can release developmental momentum and enable stage transitions. Later stages bring greater depth of understanding, more choices, and more congruence with reality. Later stages are more adequate to the task of responding to the RUPT universe that is erupting around us today. Hence the prime responsibility of leadership development initiatives today is to target stage development in powerful and effective ways. I believe Polarity Wisdom is one such high-leverage approach.

Participant

• Beena Sharma, Center for Leadership Maturity