Should a company follow its private interest or society’s common interest?
Should a company make profit in the short term or the long term?
Questions like the above two present things as dilemmas, paradoxes, or opposed poles. They create tension in us, and thus also the immediate desire to relieve such tension. They show up in our lives naturally every day. For specialists in decision-making, this type of phenomenon is called polarity. The best decision-makers recognize when polarities show up in life, and they have learned to navigate, manage, and leverage them optimally.
“Polarities are independent pairs that need each other over time. They live in us and we live in them. They exist in every level of system from the inside of our brains to global issues. They are energy systems that we can leverage. They are unavoidable, unsolvable (in that you can’t choose one pole as a sustainable solution), indestructible, and unstoppable. They are a gift of nature, a natural phenomenon like gravity and sunshine.”
–Barry Johnson, And: Making a Difference by Leveraging Polarity, Paradox or Dilemma. Volume One: Foundations, 2020.
The best way to leverage polarities is to choose a course of action that includes both poles intelligently, where poles help each other to the overall benefit of both the whole and each party in a system. It is not to choose one pole at the expense of the other, as a permanent, definitive position (either black or white).
For example, in a couple, the ideal situation is when each partner devotes enough time and space to things that are in their strict personal interest, and enough to what’s in the strict personal interest of the other partner, and enough to what’s good for both. The combination can vary with circumstances, but a couple who can flow ideally over time in these three stages develops sustainably, that is: becomes a better and better couple, while each partner also becomes better. An even better couple also devotes enough time to others around and to the common societal good, in addition to the three previous options. To me, Jimmy and Roslyn Carter exemplify such a couple. They are known as having been a “power couple”. We can see how an equitable allocation of attention over time to self, spouse, group, and whole, can be win-win-win-win. And please note that equitable does not mean equal. The duration and quality of the allocated attention also varies with circumstances.
Managing polarities well is a crucial skill to possess as a sustainability leader in any organization. Choosing one pole over another, for too long, as an overly fixed position, is always unsustainable. That is why we speak of “the triple bottom line”, people, and planet, and profit, in corporations. All three matter for the good of all involved, including the corporation itself and the entire world. Corporations need only to figure out what is the optimal combination of actions in the three areas, knowing that such combination also changes (and must change) over time.
Many influencers, known for their positions generally considered “good for the planet”, say things like “the common interest is more important than the private interest,” or “long term gains should count more than short-term gains.”
There is no science to support the above affirmations as a general rule. In fact, acting according to these positions in a fixated, polarized way is not good for the planet or for anyone. If we neglect our own health all the time, we will soon become pretty much useless to others or the planet, and die prematurely. Everything counts in sustainable development. But a person or company—or any type of organization—must find how the poles can marry and dance together, in time and space. This is not only possible but also mandatory if the organization really wants to achieve sustainability.
Being sustainable can only be so for itself AND for the world (or it won’t be sustainable).
Mindset specialists speak of having a “both/and” mindset rather than an “either/or” mindset. Leadership development specialists know that possessing such a mindset corresponds to a “more mature” level of leadership, which is rare nowadays according to the results of different types of leadership assessments administered to thousands of leaders in several countries. And we also know that organizations that have leaders capable of leveraging polarities (for the good) typically flourish in all respects, and keep flourishing.
To develop sustainably, as an individual or a business, the word “AND” is key. We must find the behavior that combines private interest AND common interest, AND in the short, AND in the medium, AND in the long term. AND there are more ANDs, in all fields AND contexts of decision-making and life. The secret is to shift intelligently from one pole to another in space and time.
If we fail in the short term, we die prematurely. Ditto if we neglect our own interests.
What polarities are you currently facing, my reader, and how are you leveraging them?
