We’re paralyzed by infinite possibilities. Give yourself some intentional restrictions in life and you’ll finally get inspired to act. Restrictions will set you free.  ~Derek Sivers

Leaders tend to think that a blank canvas will spark creativity. If we remove enough barriers employees will suddenly become inspired and innovation will flourish in every corner of our organizations.

Could the exact opposite be true?

Derek Sivers is a musician and the creator of CDBaby.com, which became the largest online seller of independent music. Derek provides this example.

I say to you “Write me a piece of music. Anything at all. Go.” “Umm…anything?” you say. “What kind of mood are you looking for? What genre?”

There are too many possibilities. The blank page problem. How do you begin with infinity?

Now imagine I say, “Write me a piece of music, using only a xylophone, a flute, and a shoe box. You can only use four notes: B, C, E, F, and only two notes at a time. It has to be in ¾ time, start quiet, get loud, then get quiet by the end. Make it sound like a ladybug dancing with an acorn. Go.”

Ah…your imagination has already begun writing the music as soon as it hears the limitations. This is easy!

I’ve seen leaders think this way frequently and I’ve done it myself. Give people lots of freedom and they’ll be creative. Instead, they become paralyzed. They return to their offices and keep doing what they’ve been doing. Nothing innovative, new, or different materializes.

Restrictions aid creative thought.

Research has shown that restrictions actually aid creative thought. An art guild in Colorado took that finding literally. They created an entire show based on restrictions. Each artist was limited to a 1’ x 1’ canvas. They believed that if they put certain limits on things, it would force artists to see things in different ways and stretch their abilities.

Disney believes that when you have unlimited resources, you can afford to be sloppy with your designs. Restrictions introduce a set of rules that you cannot change so you are forced to be creative in order to come up with a solution.

Think about something you have wanted to accomplish in your organization but it’s stalled. It’s not moving forward. Identify specific restrictions, work within those restrictions, and then watch your creativity and innovation soar.

Leaders, your restrictions will set you free!

The desire to treat other people with honor and respect doesn’t automatically mean our behavior comes across as dignifying and kind. There are various adaptations necessary in order to ensure people experience respect and honor from us. ~David Livermore (Leading with Cultural Intelligence: The New Secret to Success)

Several years ago I spent a significant amount of time facilitating training for leaders at a manufacturing plant in rural Kentucky. One day during a break, one of the participants handed me a sheet of paper listing Kentucky vernacular with the “translation.” This was done in jest because he, himself, was a transplant to Kentucky. One of the things I remember from the list was the use of “y’all.” I learned that “y’all” is singular and “all y’all” is plural.

Even if this was done in jest, I still appreciated it. I also found myself saying “y’all” and “all y’all” having spent so much time experiencing a culture quite different from urban Chicago.

This example is minor in comparison to many of the cultural differences we face today. However, it still reflects the steps to increase CQ (Cultural Quotient) and interact more effectively with different cultures.

The term cultural intelligence (and “CQ”) was developed by Soon Ang and Linn Van Dyne as a research-based way of measuring and predicting intercultural performance. Others like David Livermore have added to their work in recent years.

Here are the four capabilities of CQ for leaders.

CQ-Drive (some call this motivation) is a person’s interest and confidence in functioning effectively in culturally diverse settings.

CQ-Knowledge is a person’s knowledge about how cultures are similar and how cultures are different.

CQ-Strategy is how a person makes sense of culturally diverse experiences. It occurs when people make judgments about their own thought processes and those of others.

• Awareness – knowing about one’s existing cultural knowledge;
• Planning – strategizing before a culturally diverse encounter;
• Checking – checking assumptions and adjusting mental maps when actual experiences differ from expectations.

CQ-Action (some call this behavior) is a person’s capability to adapt verbal and nonverbal behavior to make it appropriate to diverse cultures. It involves having a flexible repertoire of behavioral responses that suit a variety of situations.

After reviewing those four capabilities, I want to highlight what is likely obvious but it’s a reality we all must face.

Increasing our individual and organizational CQ requires deliberate ongoing effort.

A one-day diversity training isn’t going to result in significant change. CQ requires a new way of being. It requires leaders to be curious and empathetic. To be uncomfortable. To be listeners and learners while putting their assumptions aside. Leaders need to be behavior adapters to suit a variety of situations.  As Livermore said, “to ensure that people experience respect and honor from us.”

Leaders assume that good results are the consequence of good performance. When they are successful they don’t ask why. ~Rasmus Ankersen

In the nonprofit world, sustainability is frequently used as the “marker” for success. I, personally, don’t care for that word. To me, sustainable means something like “we’re still hanging in there,” and maybe not much more than that. In the for-profit world the mantra I hear frequently is “we’re either growing or we’re dying.” I don’t particularly care for that imagery either. Growth, without careful consideration of the consequences and the landscape, does not assure success.

So now you may be asking, what should leaders be striving for if not sustainability or growth? I think that Rasmus Ankersen’s answer hits the nail on the head for both nonprofit and for-profit organizations – relevancy.

Ankersen says, “Leaders need to treat success with the same skepticism as failure to stay relevant.”

Ankersen’s background is in athletics, primarily football (soccer for those of us in the U.S.). Using game stats, Ankersen outlines a very persuasive statistical analysis that supports an “outcome bias,” meaning, “success turns luck into genius.” Yes, that’s right. Sometimes, teams (and organizations) win simply because of luck.

One of the organizations that Ankersen uses as an example is Nokia. They captured 50% of the mobile phone market. That share dropped rapidly to 3% in three years. Nokia very quickly lost their relevancy. They didn’t treat their success with the same skepticism as failure.

How can leaders help keep their organizations relevant?

Rethink your potential. You can do this with a simple exercise—make the world bigger and make yourself smaller. You might be operating from a perspective that you are a big fish in a small pond. Jump into a bigger pond, change the landscape, force yourself to rethink your potential.

Examples.

LEGO for decades operated from the point of view of being in the toy industry. In recent years, they’ve altered that perspective to be in the children’s room industry. That means Apple is now a competitor. With that new mindset, they rethink their potential. They have a reinvigorated sense of urgency to be relevant in a new industry.

Borders operated as if they were in the brick and mortar bookstore industry. They stayed with that mindset as Amazon lived up to their name and quickly grabbed the e-book and online market ahead of one of the largest booksellers. Borders didn’t make the world bigger. They didn’t treat their success with the same skepticism as failure. They didn’t stay relevant. We all know how that story ended.

Leaders: Ask why when you fail and when you succeed. Rethink your potential. Make the world bigger and yourself smaller. Stay relevant.

The most common leadership failure stems from trying to apply technical solutions to adaptive challenges. ~Ronald A. Heifetz

The simplest definition of an adaptive leadership challenge is one that requires people to change their ways. We try to apply solutions that have worked in the past in similar situations. However, we don’t adequately account for the human complexity in the situation. The challenge itself cannot be separated from the people who are part of the challenge or scenario. Different people means different human complexity.

Human Complexity

Ronald Heifetz points out a few of the human dimensions that change requires: “pace of adjustment, tolerances for conflict, uncertainty, risks and losses, the resilience of the culture, the network of authority, and lateral relationships.”

I recently sat down with a CEO who wants to change his organization’s culture. He believes it’s lacking healthy accountability. When I asked how significant this change would be for his employees, he said very significant. That certainly sounds like an adaptive challenge because it will require people to change their ways. His hope was to instill a cultural shift to heightened accountability in a one-day inspirational off-site event. That sounds like a technical solution. After more conversation he concluded that this adaptive challenge is going to require much more time and effort than a one-day off site because of its human complexity.

How to Recognize an Adaptive Challenge

Heifetz says “one way you know that there is an adaptive challenge facing your organization is that the problem persists even after a series of attempted technical fixes.”

Another example, I recall a client who implemented an EMR (electronic medical records) system. The focus was on the technical implementation. But this technical solution created an adaptive challenge. When the first software solution wasn’t well-accepted by users, they scrapped it and moved to the second attempt. After they were well into the second attempt they began to realize the problem wasn’t technical, it was adaptive. More technical solutions weren’t going to solve their adaptive challenges. They were up against human complexity, not technical expertise.

Small Adaptive Moves

Here’s another way to think about this. Edgar Schein (organizational culture expert) would call this the difference between a diagnosis followed by a treatment plan versus a series of small adaptive moves. It’s very difficult to come up with a treatment plan that accurately assumes the outcome of each step. How people will emotionally respond is extremely difficult to predict. Hence, the need to make a small adaptive move, see where you are, and then continue to make small adaptive moves.

This idea of adaptive challenges and making adaptive moves is difficult for leaders who are used to creating technical strategic plans. In recent history, leadership has leaned more heavily (I think) toward the technical side of leading. I believe we are now in the midst of an era that requires a heavy dose of adaptive leadership. It’s not one or the other, it’s both/and, technical and adaptive.

Introverted leaders create a virtuous circle of proactivity. ~Susan Cain

My last two blog posts about introversion struck or chord, or maybe even a nerve. Hence, I’m going to continue with the introverted leader topic one more week. Susan Cain, an introvert, collaborates with management researcher, Adam Grant, I’m guessing an extrovert. Here’s what Grant’s research uncovered about introverted leaders as described by Cain.

“Introverted leaders are uniquely good at leading initiative-takers.”

“Because of their inclination to listen to others and lack of interest in dominating social situations, introverts are more likely to hear and implement suggestions. Having benefited from the talents of their followers, they are then likely to motivate them to be even more proactive. Introverted leaders create a virtuous circle of proactivity.  [In Grant’s research study] team members reported perceiving the introverted leaders as more open and receptive to their ideas, which motivated them to work harder.”

In Grant’s own words from an interview with David Brancaccio on NPR: “When you have proactive employees who take initiative to bring new ideas, to make suggestions, to come up with better ways of getting work done. Under those circumstances, we actually found that introverts brought in 14 percent higher profits. The logic is pretty simple, which is extroverts love to be in the center of attention. They like to command the room, and they often felt threatened when their proactive employees were bringing ideas to the table. And they tend to shut them down, which meant that those people were less motivated, and also they got fewer good ideas. Whereas the introverted leaders were very open; they were willing to listen. They took better suggestions, and they left their people feeling more valued. So there is such a thing as an introverted leadership advantage.”

Implications for a Fast-Paced Environment

Cain reports that “Grant is especially excited about the implications of these findings because proactive employees who take advantage of opportunities in a fast-moving 24/7 business environment, without waiting for a leader to tell them what to do, are increasingly vital to organizational success. To understand how to maximize these employees’ contributions is an important tool for all leaders.”

Interesting isn’t it, even paradoxical. In a fast-paced environment with proactive employees, introverts are the better leaders.

Listening, not dominating, and implementing suggestions are all effective motivators that come naturally to introverts.

I recall an example when I was a board chair. At the end of the year I asked the board members to evaluate the past year. At the next meeting I adjusted the agenda, meeting priorities, etc. based upon the collective board members’ input. I still remember what one board member said (an extrovert): “You actually implemented what we suggested.” He was both surprised and pleased. To me, it only seemed logical; why else would I have asked?

Introverts reading this: Do what you do best—create virtuous circles of proactivity!