Undisruptable by Aidan McCullen

Author:Aidan McCullen [McCullen, Aidan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781119817093
Publisher: Wiley
Published: 2021-04-26T00:00:00+00:00

The Tension of Opposites

Seventy-five percent of organisational transformation programmes and eighty percent of new year's resolutions fail for a variety of reasons, but an understanding of the dynamic of opposites is helpful when we encounter the blockers. We can expect pushback; if we don't, well then, maybe we are not pushing the boundaries quite far enough.

In the metamorphosis of the butterfly, there was tension between the emergent imaginal cells and the existing legacy cells of the caterpillar. When two counterforces meet they create energy, like the force created when polar opposites of a magnet repel each other. Physics tells us that, when two objects collide each exerts a force on the other, and these forces transfer energy between them. When you reframe resistance this way, you see that resistance is a natural part of any transformation.

According to Swiss physicist Heinrich Rohrer, ‘Science means constantly walking a tightrope between blind faith and curiosity; between expertise and creativity; between bias and openness; between experience and epiphany; between ambition and passion; and between arrogance and conviction – in short, between an old today and a new tomorrow’.

Rohrer's quote encapsulates the tension of opposites. While he refers to science, this tension exists in every aspect of life: life and death, spring and summer, male and female, yin and yang. Rohrer's tightrope provides a useful metaphor. Imagine a tightrope between two buildings. If the rope was slack, you would not want to walk across it. We need tension between the opposing ends of the tightrope to make it effective. When we embark on any change initiative, we walk such a tightrope.

Another useful mental model is that of a bow and arrow. When the string of the bow is taut, it provides enough tension to propel an arrow. Without that tension the arrow will not travel very far. By understanding this tension, we can harness the tense energy to thrust our vision into reality. In transformation we require a tension between old and new, certain and uncertain, order and chaos. Reinvention lives at the intersection of these tensions. All transformation requires this counterforce to drive effective change. This is the tension that exists within the infinity curve. There is an ongoing tension within the curve that serves as a dynamo that powers perpetual becoming.

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