Peter Koestenbaum raises an interesting comparison below which gives a another perspective to leadership and change.
“Paradoxical thinking is the key to enhanced systemic thinking. If you can think in terms of opposites, you can see trends in systems. Many people are familiar with koans, the provoking questions of the East. “What is the sound of one hand clapping?” is a familiar example. They are meant to provoke innovative thinking, to instigate change in how we see a problem, a radical transformation of who we are as leaders and how we approach our work.

The koans are part of a general creativity tool. Paradoxical thinking stretches the mind. … Progress in vision occurs at the paradox interface. Learn how to distend the mind, and then let it integrate, as in dreams and alternation (such as recreation and sleep), and be sensitively attuned to collect the results. Many scientific breakthroughs and technological inventions arise in precisely this way. The idea is to present you with an ambiguous stimulus, one that makes no prima facie sense, and then “hypnotize” you, or strongly suggest to you, that there is an answer, that a solution exists, but you just don’t see it. You can push your own mind in this way to transformation, to see things you did not see before, to contact a logic that usually appears to you only in the penumbra before sleep and the haze of a dream. This is how originality in art can be generated. It is that part of vision that we harness for change and innovation in business”.

What are you hearing but not listening to, what are you sensing but not acknowledging, and how can you see that, which in the first place seems impossible, if you opened to the four ways of seeing: intuition, perception, insight, and vision. Intuition is the source that sparks external seeing (perception); internal viewing (insight): and holistic seeing (vision).

These times call for a leader to see in different ways. The courage to take bold steps, to walk where others may hold back and wait for others to take the first step. We see this playing out on the world stage, especially after Copenhagen. Future-thinking businesses are taking the initiative. Concerned people are making their voices heard.

The process of paradoxical thinking is a way to initiate what is possible. How are you as a leader initiating what is possible? How are you shaping the way your people ’see’?

‘Be focused on outcome but not attached to outcome’ - this infers knowing where you want to go, and realising the way may not be a straight line. There will no doubt be diversions on the path towards the outcome. The key will be to have the capacitants within yourself and within your organisation to make the choice that will best serve you, the organisation and the greater society at large.

Robert Fritz states, that having a clear vision is essential, and a deep understanding of current reality if one is to create what one truly wants. And the ability to manage the structural tension between the two, as you deal with the unknown is a skill that needs to be developed in leaders throughout the organisation.

What is evident when you read the papers, is that many people are being challenged with their structural thinking. The issue of sustainability, both financially and environmentally are often a result of creative tension, between personal values and ethical decisions and expectations of stakeholders. Leaders especially have expectations placed on them both explicitly and implicitly. Only you can decide what to do ultimately. But what is the history you want to leave behind. Vision-makers have wise choice-making strategies.