Broaden the Vision and Narrow the Focus

by James R Lucas (Praeger 2006)

After “management by objectives”, “management by paradox” is a welcome relief. The idea that management is simple has been dominant for too long, ignoring Mark Twain’s famous dictum, “to every difficult problem there is a solution that is simple, easy and wrong”. James Lucas’ book challenges the formulaic approach to management, with choices driven by numbers and simplistic concepts of market share, in order to synthesise radical and sustainable choices which are more effective and competitive.

“Managing in a world of paradox” is the subtitle of this book, which seeks to demonstrate that paradox is the key to better management decisions. In the words of Søren Kierkegaard: “The thinker without a paradox is like a lover without feeling: a paltry mediocrity”. James Lucas sees paradox as the trigger for creative thinking, not to choose one side of the paradox but to synthesise it to a higher level of meaning. “Mastering paradox is not only crucial for achieving high performance, it is the main ingredient.” Mastering paradox enables a leader to make decisions across the paradox – to “have his cake and eat it” – and avoid the false choice invited by the unexplored paradox.

The book covers twenty “of the most powerful paradoxes”, which fall into four major areas of concern to leaders:-

• Culture Paradoxes – We examine how great leaders balance the big picture and current objectives, keep one eye on now and the other on later, create value-add communication, distribute power, and unleash passion throughout their organisations.

• Talent Paradoxes – We explore how great leaders high-grade their teams, instigate freedom that is effective, manage tension, let loose directed creativity, and build harmony devoid of unhealthy consensus.

• Strategy Paradoxes – These paradoxes get to the heart of process and execution. We look into how great leaders manage customers, relate to competitors and “best practices,” allocate resources, balance speed and deliberateness, and use a changeless core to drive constant change in everything else.

James Lucas outlines five steps towards synthesising effective action out of a paradox:-

• Embrace – determine to fully accept and “live” both sides of the paradox

• Eliminate – rid ourselves of bad ideas and actions on each side of the paradox

• Enhance – develop the good ideas and actions on each side of the paradox

• Engage – merge the two sides into a cohesive “whole” consciously and systematically

• Explore – work to discover what grows out of the merger of the two sides

In order to integrate paradoxes to a higher level James Lucas emphasises the importance of vision. Broadening the vision of the organisation is the essential first step to creating a motivating context for strategic decisions. This requires a high-powered, cross functional expansion team, in order to force attention away from the “urgent” to the “important”. Scenario thinking is of value in exploring multiple futures, wrestling with paradoxes and developing options for strategy. The process must be enabling, not prescriptive at the thinking stage. Only when the context has been set and alternatives explored is it time to move to “narrow the focus”.

“Narrowing the focus is about what we choose to keep”. This process is best driven by key questions:-

1. Strategy – What should we do in the near term to advance the vision? How will we deliver results?

2. Structure – How should we organize ourselves to optimize our ability to deliver the strategy? How can we adapt to change that is certain to come?

3. Process – Given our organisation’s structure, which of the systems, tools and procedures that might possibly work should we adopt to maximize our chances of delivering on our strategy? What tactics will allow us to make our strategy viable?

4. Execution – How will we ensure consistent discipline and clear accountability? What measurements will tell us both how to win and whether we’re winning?

The purpose of narrowing the focus is to concentrate forces on strategies essential to realise the vision, while remaining alert to the need to respond to change.

“Broaden the Vision and Narrow the Focus” is a new approach to leadership – thought leadership. James Lucas sees leadership as the driver of the “thinking organisation” – a higher level of synthesis from the “executing organisation” or the “learning organisation” (? Another paradox). The main purpose of the book seems to be to motivate leaders to reinvent competition to create a market space in which they can excel sustainably. To do so is a major intellectual challenge and requires outstanding leadership to change the minds and behaviours of their organisation, not by force but by personal conviction. It is a measure of the pioneering thesis of the book that there are no success stories and few exemplars of leadership. Many have attempted parts of the challenge; it seems that total success is unrecorded.

James Lucas has produces a book which overturns most management formulae and forces us back to the drawing board. The concept of leadership has been changed yet again and thought has been given priority over action. Strategic thinking is paramount, all-embracing in scope and penetration in order to clear the way for forceful and focussed action to achieve sustainable success.

Adrian Davies 16th August 2006