By Wendy Smith, Marianne Lewis
Harnessing paradoxes for better decision-making
Subject
Themes
Most people approach problems by choosing between seemingly opposing options. Should we focus on short-term profits or long-term sustainability? Maintain tradition or embrace change? Prioritise individual creativity or team collaboration? This either/or mindset, whilst intuitive, often leads to suboptimal outcomes, ongoing conflict, and missed opportunities.
Most people approach problems by choosing between seemingly opposing options. Should we focus on short-term profits or long-term sustainability? Maintain tradition or embrace change? Prioritise individual creativity or team collaboration? This either/or mindset, whilst intuitive, often leads to…
Both/And Thinking arrives at a critical juncture in organisational theory and practice, building upon decades of paradox research whilst addressing contemporary challenges facing leaders and organisations. Published in 2022 by Wendy K. Smith and Marianne W. Lewis, two leading scholars in paradox…
Paradoxes appear throughout human experience in recognisable patterns. Understanding these patterns helps identify tensions before they escalate into destructive conflicts and reveals connections between seemingly unrelated challenges. Four fundamental paradox types emerge across personal,…
The first barrier to effective paradox navigation lies in deeply ingrained assumptions that demand choosing between opposing poles. These mental models, shaped by cultural conditioning, professional training, and personal experience, create rigid either/or frameworks that obscure alternative…
Once assumptions shift toward accepting paradoxes, the practical challenge becomes structuring how opposing forces coexist and interact. Boundaries provide the essential architecture for both/and thinking. Without boundaries, paradoxical tensions devolve into confusion, conflict, or paralysis. With…
Paradox navigation requires more than establishing initial structures and mindsets. Paradoxes remain dynamic, evolving as contexts shift, stakeholders change, and new information emerges. What works today may fail tomorrow. Balancing consistency and change represents a meta-paradox underlying all…
Individual paradox navigation differs fundamentally from collective efforts. Individuals can shift their own assumptions, create personal boundaries, and adjust individual practices with relative autonomy. Collective paradox navigation requires coordinating multiple stakeholders with differing…
Paradoxes represent contradictory yet interdependent elements that exist simultaneously and persist over time. This definition, building from ancient philosophical traditions, distinguishes paradoxes from simple presenting dilemmas. Presenting dilemmas offer alternative options begging for…
Either/or thinking provides short-term relief from uncertainty by enabling clear choices, yet proves limited at best and detrimental at worst. The danger lies in overemphasising one pole whilst neglecting the other. Robert Frost's poem "The Road Not Taken" encourages taking risks, yet what if the…
Whilst vicious cycles trap us in either/or thinking, virtuous cycles emerge through both/and approaches. Two intertwined patterns enable virtuous cycles: mules (creative integration) and tightrope walkers (consistent inconsistency). These patterns offer alternatives to rabbit holes, wrecking balls,…
Mindsets matter profoundly for paradox navigation. The problem is not the problem; the problem is how we think about the problem. Shifting assumptions involves adopting mindsets and beliefs enabling cognitively holding opposing forces simultaneously. Jeremy Hockenstein exemplifies this journey.…
Boundaries represent structures sustaining mindsets, emotions, and behaviours when confronting paradoxes. Learning paradoxes exemplify these tensions, involving competing demands in growing from past to future. Janet Perna felt immense pressure as IBM Data Management Division general manager in…
Emotions represent another tool set helping navigate paradoxes. To open ourselves to tensions, we must engage our heart, using emotions as enabling resources rather than crippling obstacles. Belonging paradoxes exemplify these tensions, involving contradictory yet interdependent elements in our…
Dynamism involves actions spurring learning, enabling adaptation, and encouraging ongoing shifts between competing demands. Dynamic actions prevent getting stuck in ruts whilst taking advantage of creative tensions. By constantly reconsidering alternative sides and relationships between them, we…
Individual paradoxes emerge from competing demands within ourselves, involving tensions between different aspects of our identities, values, roles, and goals. These internal contradictions can feel particularly challenging as they require reconciling opposing forces that all feel authentically ours.…
Organisational paradoxes involve competing demands at collective levels, requiring coordination across multiple stakeholders with differing perspectives, interests, and power positions. Whilst individuals can shift their own assumptions and create personal boundaries with relative autonomy,…
Group paradoxes emerge when multiple stakeholders hold legitimate yet opposing positions, creating tensions that cannot be resolved by simply choosing one side. Unlike individual paradoxes involving internal contradictions or organisational paradoxes requiring systemic coordination, group paradoxes…
By Wendy Smith, Marianne Lewis
Subject
Themes
Most people approach problems by choosing between seemingly opposing options. Should we focus on short-term profits or long-term sustainability? Maintain tradition or embrace change? Prioritise individual creativity or team collaboration? This either/or mindset, whilst intuitive, often leads to suboptimal outcomes, ongoing conflict, and missed opportunities.