Reflective Essay: The Rituals Of An Adaptive Leader

A spiritual reminder is something a person views every day like a picture, keepsake, or inspirational book. A ritual is a practice repeated that becomes part of the cultural DNA like opening church meetings with prayer. The third practice is to negotiate your purpose which means that an adaptive leader must be willing to compromise when their purpose differs from the members of the context so that multiple purposes do not cancel each other out. The fourth practice is that the adaptive leader should integrate their ambitions and aspirations because it is possible to have both as well as actively serve both. The key to doing so is to not allow one to overpower the other. I believe it is easy to become overzealous in this arena when a person feels

The first constraint is a loyalty to people who may not believe you are doing the right thing. I still replay the negative comments from so called friends and family when I announced I was returning to school to pursue a doctorate degree in my sixties. Another constraint is fear of incompetence and for me, fear of failure. Heifetz says that the way the adaptive leader attacks this fear is to find structured and challenging learning opportunities, plus reframe truths as assumptions that can be tested. The next constraint discussed was uncertainty about taking the right path. It is important when taking on an adaptive challenge to fall in love with making tough decisions which are inevitable. The fourth fear is fear of loss. An adaptive leader will handle this fear if they admit to themselves that with most challenges there is always the risk of failure. Another way to deal with the fear of loss is to state, “it worked / it didn’t work”, “we are trying something new here” or “we are conducting a small experiment”. The fifth and final constraint discussed is not having the stomach for the hardest parts of the journey. It is often a fact that as we age our health sometimes declines. Therefore, if a person is going to endure the journey which at times may be stressful, it is extremely important to maintain good health because adaptive change will test the limits of one’s