Explore the transformative power of adaptive thinking in leadership and problem-solving and discuss the distinction between technical and adaptive challenges, emphasizing the importance of applying the right type of solution to each situation. Delve into a four-step process for identifying and addressing these challenges effectively, focusing on the potential of adaptive solutions to drive growth and change. From managing stress and anxiety to improving company culture and employee satisfaction, examine how an adaptive approach can lead to remarkable results. Uncover the key to unlocking your leadership potential and navigating the complexities of today's world.
In this episode, Jason and Steve discuss:
- Adaptive vs. Technical Change in Leadership
- Identifying and Addressing Leadership Challenges
- Unlocking Adaptive Solutions for Success
- Overcoming Stress and Anxiety Adaptively
- Understanding and Solving Adaptive Challenges
Key Takeaways:
- Understand the difference between technical and adaptive challenges, and explore a process for applying adaptive solutions to leadership challenges
- Learn why applying technical solutions to adaptive problems is ineffective
- Recognize the importance of identifying gaps and specifying the nature of challenges
- Gain insights into brainstorming potential technical and adaptive solutions
- Uncover how adaptive approaches to managing stress and anxiety can boost creativity
“If you are a leader dealing with a challenge that you are frustrated with or haven't been able to solve, the four steps on identifying and addressing adaptive and technical challenges may be worth a try. The challenge in front of you likely requires an adaptive solution, and there may be some technical aspects as well. If that's the case, try the four steps and see what happens.”
- Jason Abell
Connect with Jason and Steve:
- LinkedIn: Jason or Steve
- Website Rewire, Inc.: Transformed Thinking
- Email: grow@rewireinc.com
Listen to the podcast here:
Steve and Jason- Are You an Adaptive or Technical Leader?
Hello, and welcome everybody to this episode of LinkedIn Live, and of the Insight Interviews. I'm your host, Jason Abell, and I've got the other host. I don't know, maybe you're the primary host, Steve Scanlon. Dude, welcome to the show.
I don't think I'm the primary guy. I’ve always liked to consider you the primary guy. You're the guy that holds all the power to this fluid.
It's all it's all my responsibility.
And if it goes down, you’re going to hear it.
Fine, fine, fine. Well, here we are, the Friday before Memorial Day 2024, and we're tackling a topic that has come up a lot. I don't know, for the full 10 years we've been in business, Steve, but a lot lately, and we're gonna tackle it today.
Yeah. You know, in a lot of ways it resurfaced Jason, and it resurfaced, specifically, well, I shouldn't say specifically, it keeps resurfacing which is sort of funny. But it resurfaced lately. I was hosting an event with a partner of ours, and one of the leaders had made a comment, Jason, and their comment was, we were working on some cultural stuff and their comment was, they had overheard a few people that week, walking the halls, wherever they were, talking about, thank God, it's Friday.
TGIF.
That's right. And then there was another one about working for the weekend, which when he was telling me that story, I was reminded of that song in the 80s by Loverboy, actually, everybody's working for the weekend, right? And he had brought this up and he had asked us to really talk about how do you play in this game and work for a company and not always be working for the weekend and not thanking God it's Friday? I mean, it's so fascinating. We have an entire restaurant chain dedicated to that idea, bro.
I know, I know.
And so, I think this person really had this idea that they wanted a culture of vibrancy. Again, I understand work is work, but I think when he had heard that he was like, help us. Can we basically figure out a way to have our culture not be a culture that's working for the weekend, or thanking God always that it's Friday, because that was indicative of him not achieving a goal that he had of a company that wasn't like that. And I certainly think it caused him to lose some sleep and lacked some of his own freedom, and you know, some things. And so, that is what launched us back into this concept of adaptive versus technical change. And that's what we're going to talk about.
Yeah, big time. We see leaders that are out there that are really trying to hammer technical solutions to things that require maybe some technicalities and some technical solutions, but moreover, some really adaptive changes. And I know that in my own coaching sessions, when I bring up this topic, once we start to scratch at the surface a little bit the client is typically like yeah, tell me a lot more about that. Like let's dive into that more because that sounds like something that might not only help me lead but might help change some culture.
Yeah, well, let's dive in because you know, sooner rather than later, you and I put our own spin on it because we've been coaching for so long with the work that we do, and hopefully we're going to be able to add a little color or flavor to this whole concept. But generally speaking, we're bringing forth this concept of being an adaptive leader or a technical leader. In my own words, I would just say, and I'd love to hear yours as well, but technical changes, right? That was pointed out. By the way, this concept, we got to give credit to where this concept came from. This was from the book Immunity to Change written by Dr. Robert Keegan and Lisa Leahy, both Harvard research scientists that did this work and came up with this concept that any challenge that you have, you have basically two kinds of challenges. One's a technical challenge, one's an adaptive challenge. We're going to talk about what those are. But if you take an adaptive challenge, and try to solve it with technical things, I don't know that the world's gonna fall apart, but what we've seen in coaching is that it's really ineffective. And then people keep trying to solve the same problem over and over and over. So, if you're a leader listening today, and you're like, you know what? That's been a problem I've tried to solve multiple times, pay attention, because I think this concept of really getting your arms and mind around, wait a minute. Is it possible that I took an adaptive problem and tried to create technical solution, right? So just really quickly, adaptive problems, Jason, are rather than technical, which is do this, do this, do this, here's some things that we can go and do, that's technical. Do this. Call this. Make these calls, make that change. Bring that software, do, do, do, do, do.
There are some examples, as you kind of talk through this a little bit.
Perfect, perfect, perfect. There's a body of knowledge. We all know what to do, right? Go make more calls. And you'll solve this. That as a technical way to solve sales problem.
Right on.
Right? By the way, the problems are always there to be solved, and to get the solutions. The solutions are out there. Adaptive solutions are in here.
Yes.
Right? And there's no recipe. It's not a prescription, right? Hey, we're having problems hitting our sales goals. You can imagine there's some people like I know what to do, go do this, and this and this, and this and this. But they've tried those things. There are really smart people in business. And so, I think the reason this becomes super important is because I think when people finally go, wow, that's possibly an adaptive challenge that requires an adaptive solution.
One of the one of the ways that I've been able to really simplify this, at least for myself, and I've had clients that have appreciated this boiling down is, you know the Nike ad, just do it? And I'll say on the outset, I'm actually a pretty big fan of that. I am. I often, I like technical solutions. They sometimes give me a baseline from which to start from, you know? Just go run, or just go work out or just do it, you know, type of thing. There are times often in our leadership journey, and in life, where you wake up in the morning, and you just don't feel like doing it, right? And there's a thing that happens there where you know, what to go do technical, and you just need to do it. Technical. But you might not feel like it or you didn't get enough sleep, or you got in a fight with your partner the evening before. Or you're scared about that sales call. Well, when the JUST DO IT piece breaks down, then what? And that's where you point to adaptive.
You know, you're bringing up new content, which we can't do here, because in my brain, as you said that, it was so interesting to hear the just do it. Just do it. That's the ultimate in technical solutions, right?
That's right.
If you ask someone, hey, why didn't you do that? You know, what I've heard sometimes? I just didn't. I just didn't. Isn’t that fascinating? You and I should pen a book called “Just”. How about that? And it's either just do it or just don't. But the whole point being when just do it doesn't work, might point us to something different? And I think Robert Keegan and Lisa Layhe nailed this in the Immunity to Change book. And they pointed to adaptive challenges. There are some obvious challenges that I have with adaptive challenges is number one, like you said, technical ones are just easier. They sound nicer, they sell better, right? How many books and you know, workshops and stuff where someone's out there, go and just do these three things, and you'll make a million dollars in half the time or whatever. Technical, technical, technical. And it's not that some of the technical things aren't right, but they often undervalue some of the deeper work that we have to do adaptively. And so that's what we're talking about, is looking in, not out and saying, how do we have to adapt? Hence the reason why they call it adaptive.
Yeah.
And once we can get that I, we, you and I, because we're effectively an adaptive based coaching company. We certainly by the way, in that book, and I know you point this out to your clients, too, they point out that if you can solve something with a technical modality, do it that way. Just do it . It’s faster. Better. But like, again, I'm just wondering some of those problems that challenge us like, hey, everybody's working for the weekend. Well, I don't know. Jason, I challenge you. Everybody's just in this company working for the weekends. I didn't mean to put you on the spot. But what's a technical solution to technical to everybody's, you know, thanking God, it's just Friday in this company?
Well, that this is the problem. We're not all robots, we're all human beings with different experiences, backgrounds, personality profiles, rest level, relationship EQ, you know? And so, there isn't a technical answer to that question. And so that's where we come to adaptive, which is more malleable. It's not always the same. It depends on the age level of your team and your vendors and your clients and experience level and what mood they're in and what stage of life they’re in, right? And so, it's this recipe of adaptive solutions. And so, I think we've got one of the things that we promised in our lead up to this was, we actually have as much as you can systematize, adaptive solutions, we've tried to do that. And we've tried to at least simplify it a little bit. Want to dive into those?
Because in the work that we've been doing, like, we get into our coaching calls, and we're able to work with people and get them in a thing like this, we would love to get this out in mass, because we've seen the benefit on one-on-one coaching. The problem with doing something like this is we can talk about it, it's kind of this thing, and so we want people to walk out of this and go, I can go do that.
That's right.
As opposed to like, we don't want you scratching your head going, wait, wait, what's adaptive, what's technical and all that stuff? And a lot of people have done that. Because again, you'll note that technical solutions are the norm, which is why Nike is what Nike is, right? Because that's the norm. Adaptive solutions, I think they wrote the book, and we bring it up, because it's not the norm and it requires a little bit of thoughtfulness to go, hey, if there's something that's been challenging you as a leader, corporately, with your people with your relationships, maybe we can look at it from a different lens. And so, I'm happy to bring up this little process, Jason, and we can just dive right in.
So, if you are a leader, and you're dealing with a challenge right now that you just frustrated, where there's something that you just haven't been able to crack the code with, the four steps that we're about to go into, it may be worth a try, it may be worth a try. Because what you're frustrated by or the challenge that's in front of you, likely will have an adaptive type of solution. Maybe there's some technical in there as well. And if that's the case, my gosh, try these four steps and see what happens.
Yeah. Well, let's dive in. Step one is, and you can see it here. Identify. So, you know, you just said it, Jason. If you've got a challenge or a problem, well, one of the things that we notice is that we think it's a big deal, just identifying what that problem is. We call it the gap. Identifying the gap. We've noted also that coaching exists because of gaps. Either you don't have something that you want to get, or you do have something that you'd like to leave.
That's right.
You either have something you don't want or want something you don't have. First of all, I think human growth. if you don't have something you want or don't have something you do want or whatever, well that's what a growth mindset is all about. But interestingly, we still have to take the time to identify the gap.
Yep.
What is the thing? In this particular case, the gap was, I would like a vibrant culture where people maybe appreciated and actually found enough fulfillment in their work where they didn't beg for it to end every week. That's a gap.
It's exactly right. Identify. And boy, this first step is important just like any momentum shift, identifying and having awareness around, not just like, I'm frustrated, why aren’t they agreeing with me? Or why can't wait until Friday around here? But literally putting words to it, maybe even writing it down, like Steve said, like, identify, put words to what exactly is the challenge right now. So, identify. That’s number one.
For the record, and we know this from coaching, its pretty remarkable sometimes just getting people clear on that.
Big deal. Yeah.
It's just what specifically, what is the gap? And then, interestingly, we go into specify, right? So, in this specify thing, what we're asking you to specify about the gap, now that we've got this rudimentary explanation, again, if you want to go read Immunity to Change, please pick it up. We'd love that. But this explanation of what is adaptive, and what is technical. So, everybody's working for the weekend. Are there some technical things that we can do about it? Hey, we ought to have a culture meeting on Monday, or here's a technical thing you could do. You know, have a culture meeting on Monday. What might be adaptive? Well, when we went through this process, Jason, this guy was surrounded by a group of people that we explained technical and adaptive, they started to brainstorm solutions. Both technical, and adaptive. And you and I were talking before the show started, you know, here, you and I are, I can hear myself really celebrating adaptive changes, right? And celebrating this concept, because we're an adaptive based coaching company. We're not just do this, do this, do this. The truth of the matter is, it's usually some combination of both, right? It's usually a combination of both. Might you need to have a meeting? Sure. It's just that there might be more than that. And so, they started identifying what it was, and they started to get really specific around what was adaptive, and what was stuck.
And just as an example, so, there's a new spreadsheet, and the spreadsheet has a kink in it - doesn't work, right, well, we need a technical solution to put the fix in the spreadsheet, so it’ll work, right. That's technical. We specified that's a technical challenge, likely solutioned with a technical solution. But then to get everybody to use the new spreadsheet when they don't feel like it, and they want to use the old one, that starts to be adaptive. And that's where this step comes into play, where we're really talking about, man, is this something that can be solved mostly adaptively, or mostly, technically? Sometimes, like Steve said, it's combination of the two. But really honing in on is this best served from a technical solution standpoint, or adaptive solution standpoint? That's what this step is hugely important to.
That is such a great example, Jason. In the book, they give countless case studies, but one of them, here's a great technical solution. Landing an airplane with a broken nose gear. That is a technical problem.
"We're not going to sit with the pilot go, what do you think and feel? No. We have to get this thing on the ground. Heart surgery. Right? You better know what you're doing and whatever. If the heart surgeon needs to work on bed side manner, that becomes an adaptive parameter."
That's right.
Right? But, the surgery itself is technical. So yeah, once we specify, then we move to the next one, Jason, which is, we called it because we kept going for our this is just us kind of being funny and cute, but “listify.” You've got to GAAP, you've identified. There's some technical and adaptive. Once you've identified technical how do we make a list of those things?
Yeah.
And I keep bringing this up, and I've said it again, but you know, if there are some really good technical things, by all means, do it. If we need to fix the spreadsheet, do it. But where the work really starts to get interesting is, how many adaptive solutions can you list of things you can put down that are possible? And this is where you see people's brains really get like, okay, wait a minute. What are some of the adaptive ways that we need to do?
And this is the this is the brainstorming part of the program, right? And I love that Steph on our team use this particular photo because it is literally putting pen to paper. This is the step where you need to go okay, if this problem were to be solved with technical solutions, what would they be? And list all those out. And then when you get to if this problem could be solved with adaptive solutions, that's real brainstorming. Like, that is others unique creativity, and this isn't like, well, we're gonna judge if that solution is viable or not. No, no. You're just listing. You’re listing as much as you possibly can during this step, because likely, there's fruit in that list somewhere. Not every single thing that you write down needs to be fruitful. It's more about taking the steps and kind of trusting the process and working into the process.
And we'll get to the last one, because we always have to pay attention to time. I'm going to adlib for 40 seconds. I just thought of one. Stress and anxiety. How pervasive are stress and anxiety and worry and fear in our world and in business today? Right?
Sure.
We have dealt with that a ton. So much of our content and curriculum is dealing with cortisol and helping people's brains remain calm so that they can be creative. And the manner in which we go about teaching metacognition, or all these other things that we do is very adaptive based. I thought about it, and so many times if someone around you in your organization is stressed, how often do people walk up and go, I've got the solution. You ready? Don't stress about that. Right? And that's such a technical thing to tell someone. Just don't stress. Imagine Nikes thing to that. Now, it's not that that's wrong, but how helpful is that?
Not very.
Yeah. I mean, in the history of history, have you ever told someone not to stress and have them pause they're stressing and thank you for telling them that? Yeah, I was gonna keep stressing until you said that, and because you said that to me, I'm just gonna stop now. That was so gracious and kind.
"So, anxiety and stress are very much an adaptive issue. And when we can work on that adaptively, and people do begin to release and free and project forward positively, creativity, generative thinking, and man do a lot of people need that today. So that's just an example of, just don't stress. That's so technical."
But it might make the list and in in the process of step four, where you're just listing things out, heck, maybe that's there. I know, I already said this, but I can't stress it enough. Like, this is the part where you're just listing as much as you possibly can to get to get to the meat.
Lastly, you know, actify. I love this slide. Thank you, Steph. We got to go. Right? We got to take that step. We gotta go. Isn't it interesting, Jason, that even though we are an adaptive based coaching company, because we're all trained in the neuro Leadership Institute, we love this neuroscience, we want to help people think differently. We got our iceberg model that talks about thoughts and feelings, and but at the end of the day coaching, and human growth should be about actions and results.
Right on.
And I'm a little concerned that people read the Immunity to Change book, and people get it. Man, that's super cool, and then they don't act.
Yep. You got to take step four. Because if you stop at step three, it might be a little helpful, but likely won't solve the challenge that you're looking to solve. Action needs to be taken. I had a coaching session this morning, in fact, and there was a ton of awareness around a particular solution. We went from being unaware to aware. Huge win. But we both decided kind of at the same time, you know, we're going to have to act on this now, right? Like, that's where the rubber met the road. Like, we're going to actually need to do something now. So yeah, the step four brings it all home, like let's take action.
There's a lot of people these days again, I thought of this one, too. This is new to the show, Jason. So, I'm sorry. We're ad libbing too much. There's a lot of people these days using a program for health called Noom.
Sure.
Noom has taken off and it's exploded and I don't use it. I've got some clients to do that swear by it , and that’s good, but you know, what I find interesting about it is it's an app like anything else. And it's very adaptive, right? Because Noom starts getting into, hey, when you think about eating food, how are you thinking? Like they're asking as opposed to don't eat carbs and drink more water and do this with all these technical stuffs. I think there's some people really cluing into, hey, how are you thinking about that? And so, we have brought that into our work, and I think if you're a leader listening or if you know someone that could benefit from this, by the way, doing adaptive changes alone can be pretty challenging. I think if you're in your tower as leader and you're doing the like I, I would venture to tell you that one of the ways that coaching I think is super powerful is because it helps people, especially when you get to listify and actfy, acting on adaptive challenges just requires some brainstorming with people. It's been a little bit of a challenge just having people like, oh, I totally get it. Next thing they built out an immunity map with all these crazy actions on adaptive thinking. Work with somebody.
If we happen to be the people that you'd like to work with, we've got a way to do that. And that is putting up your phone right now, going the QR code and chat with us. Let's talk about your particular challenge that you've got. We can further the discussion on technical versus adaptive solutions. We can get some coaching for you. We can do some live events for your team. But this graphic right here is how you get in touch with us. And obviously, we'll have all of this and more in our show notes on how to get in touch with us. But Steve, just as we, as we kind of wrap in summary here, there are all kinds of solutions to challenges. We've identified two main buckets that we see solutions fall into, and that's adaptive versus technical. And if you run into some frustration with a particular challenge that you have, taking these four steps, identify the gap, specify, the more specific that you can be the better, listify, list out as many technical solutions as you can as many adaptive solutions as you can, and then by all means, please take that first step and, and take action. So, Steve, any anything else in summary that come to mind? Or that you want to say before we wrap?
I'm super excited to get this work out, because that’s why you and I aren't Robert Keegan, and Lisa Leahy and Harvard scientists, but I think they did a really good job of getting specific about what this challenge is really all about. And one of the reasons we're bringing it to the table is because we've been utilizing it. As people get into understanding adaptive challenges and working on adaptive solutions for those challenges, we've seen some amazing results. Just absolutely amazing results in things like culture and things like relational results. I mean, if you're having relationship issues and stuff, I gotta tell you, that that alone wants me to be asking some adaptive based questions as opposed to, we'll just go have a meeting, and just go do that. That's what you taught me today is like, anytime I'm adjusting somebody, I'm probably offering technical solution.
Yeah. Where adaptive may be more useful. Well, for everybody watching or listening out there, thank you. We don't take it for granted that you spent some time with us. And if there's any way that we can help you, please let us know. And until next time, Steve. Great LinkedIn Live session, great Insight Interview session, and we'll see you next time.
Good to be with you, all.
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