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Adaptive Leadership
Heifetz draws a line between two kinds of problems. Technical ones are solved with skills you already have. Adaptive ones require a fundamental shift in how you see yourself or the world.
I spent five years applying technical fixes to an adaptive problem. Christmas was when I finally got on the balcony.
clifton strengths
- 3 of 5 in Strategic Thinking. 0 in Executing or Influencing.
- Built for vision and connection. Not for grinding execution or commanding rooms.
- The interest paradox. Three strengths flagged the same warning. Vision without follow through is the shadow side of the profile.
- The fix is system design. Not willpower. Not effort.
- What others should see. Genuine care. The kind that notices what someone needs and adjusts to it.
- What I bring to a team. Vision, ideas, planning, and one on one investment in people.
- What I do not bring. Execution. The strongest version of any team I am on includes someone with Discipline or Achiever.
diversity framework
Chavez describes how a person grows in their understanding of difference across five stages. My example is ADHD. I started with a dismissive view of learning differences and grew into a new lens entirely.
unawareness
Pre-K through 7th grade. Anyone struggling in school was lazy or dumb. I had no other framework. School came easy for me and I assumed if it was hard for someone else, one of those two reasons was why.
dualistic
8th through sophomore year. I saw my own performance breaking down but still operated in a normal versus broken framework. I started quietly placing myself in the broken category without being able to explain why.
questioning
Junior year through Christmas break. The faith conversion changed my conviction but not my behavior. I knew something was off and could not name it. The hardest transition. Denial kept me here for two years.
exploration
Christmas break onward. I started researching. Read everything I could find on inattentive ADHD. Recognized myself on every page. Brought it to my mom. Got tested and diagnosed. The easiest transition once I committed.
integration
Now. Different brains is no longer something I think about. It is the lens I see through. I can spot patterns in people I could not see before. The shame I was carrying has gotten quieter.
hardest and easiest
Hardest was Stage 2 to 3. Denial. I had to stop blaming character and start asking if something structural was wrong. Easiest was 3 to 4. Once I let myself ask the real question, curiosity took over and the research had its own gravity.
relational leadership
Komives argues that leadership is fundamentally relational. These five components evaluate how a leader operates through relationships rather than position or authority.
inclusive
Value all perspectives.
empowering
Share power.
purposeful
Hold a clear goal.
ethical
Lead from values.
process
Care how the group works.
strengths
- Inclusive (seeing). I read where people are coming from before they say it.
- Process. The component I am most comfortable in. I love a well oiled machine.
- Purposeful (small scale). When I can see what I am building, I clarify the why and execute.
weaknesses
- Inclusive (acting). I see other viewpoints clearly. I struggle to let one win when I am invested.
- Empowering. Conditional. I let others lead when I do not care. That is not empowering.
- Purposeful (big picture). I can plan a build. I cannot yet plan a life.
- Ethical. Strong in faith, relationships, kids who need extra care. Weaker when my own success is on the line.
The pattern. I am strong when I care or when it is personal. I am weak when it costs me or when the scale is bigger than me.
action plan
Karsten
My old youth group leader, now in Dallas. Successful Christian who has lived the leadership with purpose I am trying to build. Distance forces structured calls.
Mom
Brutally honest with me, knows the full story. Damaged that relationship in my decline years. Choosing her now is partly the repair work.
Brother
Hired me to help run his new detailing business. I cannot override him. Real environment to practice the skill I am worst at.
theory and instrument
Leader Member Exchange
- Leaders form stronger relationships with some followers than others. Most do not realize they have created an in group and an out group.
- That is me. My Relator strength rewards depth over breadth. Without meaning to, I leave new people on the outside.
- The work is intentional high quality relationships with everyone, not just the inner circle. Especially as I build companies.
CliftonStrengths
- The interest paradox. Vision without follow through is the shadow side of my profile.
- Three strengths predicted my weakness. Same warning across all of them.
- Relator predicted LMX. The report flagged my blind spot before I had a theory for it.
ethics
Respects others
Treat people as ends.
Serves others
Their needs before mine.
Shows justice
Fairness to everyone.
Manifests honesty
No manipulation.
Builds community
Common good.
Serves Others is the principle that exposes my weak spot. I serve well when invested or when the cost is low. Less when my own success is on the line.
just mercy
concepts
- Servant Leadership. Stevenson serves the least powerful at real cost.
- RLM Ethical and Inclusive. Dignity extended even to the guilty.
power
- Coercive, the strip search. Legitimate power used for humiliation.
- Coercive, the false testimony. Sheriff manufactured the case through threats.
mercy
- Real mercy is given to people the world has decided do not deserve it.
- I extend it well to people with less than me. I struggle with intelligent people who fail and sometimes my own parents.
- You cannot lead through influence if your respect is conditional.
AHA moments
The pattern I called laziness has a name.
Three of my CliftonStrengths warned about the same exact thing. Vision without follow through. The fix is not trying harder. It is system design.
Five years using technical fixes for an adaptive problem.
I kept telling myself to try harder when the actual issue was that my brain needed a fundamental shift in how I understood it. Christmas was getting on the balcony.
Mercy is not owed to the sympathetic.
The film showed me real mercy is given to people the world has decided do not deserve it. That made me look at where my own mercy runs out.
speakers that stood out to me
Failure is not a detour from success. Sometimes it is the only path to it.
- His own first lost election set up the win that mattered.
- Daughter bombed the LSAT, transferred to an Ivy from a worse school.
- Real success showed up when he stopped optimizing for the next outcome.
Find what does not feel like work. Build the boring habits that hold it up.
- For a brain like mine, picking a path that runs on interest is strategic, not generic.
- Working out and budgeting compound over decades.
- The law enforcement panelist stood out. Methodical, effortless, thought through.
new mission statement
Right now my purpose is sharp on small projects and fuzzy on the big picture. As I build my career, raise a family, and grow in my faith, I expect that to flip. The next step is the real work.