Jakarta, 9 November 2022 — Learning how to push and how to partner.

Story

It happened last week. We are looking at three different stories this time, all starting with the letter C and all taking place at the same time. First, confrontation happened after Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter. Walking into the headquarters with a sink in his hands, his message was to let his takeover sink in. Many staff were unceremoniously fired. We have seen how Musk pushes change, using the power of confrontation (Twitter), technical advances (SpaceX and Tesla), and radical ideas (tweets on how to end and avoid wars). He expects his company staff and the users of his technologies to follow his direction.

Meanwhile, collaboration happened as China’s and Germany’s leaders met physically for the first time since the pandemic, to discuss their economic relationship. The two countries have collaborated intensively over many years to boost trade and advanced technologies through relationships that were built with mutual trust and respect. While at the height of the pandemic China kept its borders closed to foreigners, they made exceptions for German engineers. Last week, the leaders reconfirmed their commitment to keep working together in times of change.

During the same week, co-creation happened as teams of high-school leaders from Indonesia, the Philippines, and Cambodia completed a six-week international practicum to grow their leadership skills and build community projects to bridge social divides, such as the misinformation and conflicts that have spread from social media into their schools. The Global Peacebuilders Practicum challenged them to stretch their vision and their talents to find new solutions together for their projects. With enthusiasm on a high, they co-created projects to make positive changes happen.

Challenge

For leaders who are interested, there is always much to learn from what we observe happening in the world around us, and last week was no exception. In my coaching work, we discover that leaders can use seven ways to engage with the world. Three of these seven ways can be characterized as pushing, and four as partnering. When we push for change, we expect people to follow our lead and conform to us. On the other hand, when we choose to partner for change, we follow and conform to what the others are doing in order to collaborate.

As to whether it’s more effective for leaders to push or partner for change, the research offers no clear view. Rather, it seems that each of the seven ways can work well depending on the people you work with and the circumstances you are in. The magic of good leadership lies in choosing the right way for the right situation. To acquire that ability, leaders invest in developing their knowledge, skills, and their self and situational awareness. In the absence of such development, they run the risk of being seen as a ‘one-trick pony’ who continuously applies one style to all situations. Looking around us, we can see that happen all too often, with disastrous results.

The challenge, therefore, is for leaders to avoid the one-trick pony trap and learn to master all seven ways of influencing change, allowing them to push and partner in ways that fit each of the particular situations they will find themselves in. That, precisely, is what we learn and practice together in our leadership coaching work. Perhaps Mr. Musk, or Mr. Xi, is a role model for you. If not, who is? Thinking about it, why not learn to lead with a variety of styles, inspired by your role models of choice? 

Question

My question for you this week is what your favorite style of leadership is, and what you will do to avoid being seen as a one-trick pony leader. Another way of describing this trap is the leader who carries only a hammer as a tool and then sees every problem as a nail to use his hammer on. That is the opposite of effective leadership. What, then, are you learning from the styles of leaders you observe around you, both in your workplace and in the world at large? 

Surely, the key is to keep learning and investing in your leadership development and to co-create solutions with others. Sometimes a situation calls for you to push, while other times you find that you are better off with a partnering approach. I included the story of the young peacebuilders to highlight their mindset, which was so inspiring to us facilitators, as they learned like sponges, and so quickly. It is easy to forget that leaders at any age can decide to show up with that mindset.

Taking benefit from the Asian wisdom traditions, we see that the distinction between pushing and partnering is not new. It has been around for a very long time and was first described by Chinese philosophers as Yin and Yang, the two kinds of energy that are alternating continuously. Exploring those two energies in more detail, as we do in the Work In All Colors course, you discover that there are three ways to push, and four ways to partner, for a total of seven leadership styles. If you want to learn how to apply these seven syles, set up a Free Strategy Call so that we can discuss where you want to take your leadership.