One of the concepts we have to get our thinking right on is “managing apparent paradoxes”. Collins and Porras addressed this in their book “Built To Last” when they described the “Genius of AND vs. the Tyranny of OR”. This is what I mean by the fact that systems can be linear AND simultaneous not just linear OR simultaneous.
Jack Welch has also addressed this many times. One great metaphor is the age old questions of whether to manage for the short term or for the long term. The answer of course is BOTH. He describes it as squeezing and dreaming all at the same time. Squeezing profit out or our current operations while dreaming of the future and not jeopardizing your future by your current actions.
This is a difficult balance. Too much squeezing for short term profit inevitably results in running a business straight into the ground. Too much dreaming about the future leads to never getting anything actually started.
Stephen Covey describes maintaining this delicate balance as the P/PC balance. We need to take care of ourselves, our organizations and our families by balancing getting results from our current production while at the same time always investing some time to up-skill and renew so that we are ever increasing our future productive capacity.
How do you manage the apparent paradoxes in your life?
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