Adaptive Leadership

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Adaptive Leadership American College of
Cardiology Washington, DC January 2013 Ronald
Heifetz Harvard Kennedy School
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• Distinguish
• Technical and Adaptive Work

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The Classic Error Diagnosing and treating
adaptive challenges as if they were technical
problems
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• Essential Questions of Adaptive Work
• What cultural DNA do we keep?
• What cultural DNA do we discard?
• What innovative DNA will enable us to thrive in
  the new and challenging environment?

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Technical and Adaptive Work
PRODUCTIVE RANGE OF DISTRESS
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• Properties of Authority
• A service contract
• Formal or informal
• Power entrusted for service
• Key components of the contract
• Power
• Trust
• Service

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• Services of Authority
• Direction
• Protection
• Order
• Orientation to roles
• Control of conflict
• Norm Maintenance

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• Trust
• Predictability
• Values
• Competence

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• A Strategy of Leadership
• Mobilizing Adaptive Work
• Get on the Balcony
• Think Politically
• Regulate Disequilibrium
• Distribute Leadership and Responsibility
• Infuse the Work with Meaning

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Leading and Staying Alive

1. Get on the balcony
2. Seek confidants
3. Distinguish role from self
4. Listen
5. Manage ones hungers
6. Anchor oneself
7. Purposes beyond measure