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Resolving Leadership Dilemmas
Resolving complex issues quickly and effectively is a critical skill for today's business leaders. However, not every issue has a right answer or a best solution. For example, how should a leader decide between short-term profitability and long-term growth? Between quality versus cost? Or global alignment versus local fit? Each of these examples represents a dilemma - a situation or decision with two opposing forces, each with distinct advantages and disadvantages. The emerging leaders role is to develop strategies that consistently tap the maximum value of both forces over time while minimizing the disadvantages of both.This program helps participants learn how to identify, analyze, and skillfully manage the critical dilemmas they face on the job. It breaks managers out of either-or thinking. It also frees them from the waste and poor decisions that come from trying to define every issue as a problem to be solved as opposed to a dilemma that must be assessed and managed over time.
Key Content
Dilemma Management consists of three key content areas: identifying, analyzing, and managing leadership dilemmas:
- Identify: As a first step, leaders must be able to distinguish between a problem, which can be solved with a single, discrete solution, and a dilemma, which has no one best solution and must be managed over time. A clear definition and set of criteria that help participants identify their own leadership dilemmas are provided and discussed.
- Analyze: Once a dilemma has been identified, it is important for the leader to clarify its opposing forces or polarities, and to pinpoint the upside potential and downside risks of each. Participants learn how to use a simple but effective tool to uncover and capture this information as they analyze their dilemmas.
- Manage: After a dilemma has been thoroughly assessed, the leaders task is to develop specific strategies that will achieve the best of both sides of the dilemma over time. Participants follow a set of guidelines to help them craft these strategies and plan how they will execute them back in their businesses.
Target AudienceWorking with horses means mastering dilemmas - lead with too much direction and the horse will shift into flight mode, lead with too little and the horse will wander off to eat grass. The balance of leadership with horses is a fluid and dynamic one - there is no one right answer - just as there is no one way to resolve any dilemma. As participants experience providing *both* direction and empowerment and the resultant "join up" that occurs they gain a new perspective on both/and thinking.
Resolving Leadership Dilemmas is suited for managers at all levels who need to develop systems thinking, seasoned judgment, or complexity-management leadership skills. Any manager who must wrestle with critical trade-offs in leading his or her division or team in complex, ever-changing business settings will benefit from this leadership development session.
Outcomes
Participative Designs has over 10 years of experience providing Dilemma Management training. This program is based on the work of Barry Johnson www.polaritymanagement.com.By the end of the Resolving Leadership Dilemmas session, participants will be able to:
- Rapidly identify critical dilemmas throughout their business context
- Craft and apply strategies to maximize the greatest potential of both sides over time
- Display agility, clear judgment, and incisive action in the face of important business challenge
We offer "Managing Leadership Diliemmas" as a one day program for groups of eight to twenty participants at our Horse Sense Leadership Training center or as a one to three day in house program for groups of any size.
The program is suited for integration into a larger, customized leadership development system.
For More Information on any of our Leadership Development programs:
Please contact one of PDI's senior consultants or submit your information request here.
