Cultivating a Collective Paradox Mindset: Design Principles for Learning Interventions

Abstract

A paradox mindset has been deemed critical to successfully engage the ongoing opposing demands that organizations increasingly confront. However, research has been emphasizing the mindsets of individual leaders, rather than how mindset may be shared within a collective, and treats a paradox mindset in a more stable way, rather than understanding how it can be learned. Against this background, we explore how collectives develop a paradox mindset. We conceptualize a collective paradox mindset (CPM) as a collective’s shared capacity to engage with its tensions. Continuous interrelating of actions and activities is key to developing this capacity. To further theorize how a CPM may be cultivated, we draw on the 4I framework of organizational learning. We detail the different learning processes connecting the individual, group, and organizational levels, and outline design principles for learning interventions aimed at fostering a CPM. We contribute to the paradox literature by emphasizing the role of collective action in developing a shared understanding and by helping to explain how organizations can learn to navigate paradoxes. We illustrate our framework using insights from a leadership development program aimed at the 400 top executives of a financial institution.