This post is the fifth in a series about ways to foster synergy during major transformational initiatives, using a four-phase model that includes Interacting, Appreciative Understanding, Integrating, and Implementing.

Phase III: Integrating

Effective communication (Phase I) and valuing others’ perspectives (Phase II) are important elements of developing synergistic outcomes, but they’re not enough. Synergy is the result of communicating, valuing, and merging diverse viewpoints. As with the other two phases, accomplishing this integration is extremely difficult because many organizational cultures don’t teach and reward the skills needed to do so.

There are four basic conditions necessary for the Integrating Phase.

Tolerate ambiguity and persist in the struggle for new possibilities.

Because the synergy process is so difficult to accomplish, it is essential to emphasize two critical behaviors people need to demonstrate toward each other—embracing uncertainty and showing determination.

Assimilating different perspectives during major change is usually not possible without a considerable investment of time, effort, and patience. The necessity of this investment surfaces yet another problem that hampers the synergistic process—the tendency people have to look for rapid solutions when faced with convoluted, ambiguous situations.

For those who are comfortable only in clearly defined situations conducive to rapid, rational remedies, this phase may pose a considerable challenge. H.L. Mencken said it best: “For every complex problem in the world, there exists a simple solution that is always wrong.” Resolution of problems faced when implementing change is not always clear cut. Sometimes people have to muddle their way through contradictory, inaccurate, misleading, and/or vague information. Often, this is not the result of sloppy data collection. It is because reality can be, at times, overwhelming in its complexity. Change-related problem solving is typically a process of living in and even valuing the ambiguity of the circumstances until order can be brought to the chaos.

Modify any views, beliefs, and behavior necessary to support others.

A common problem that exists in increasing synergy is the lack of openness to being influenced by others. Sponsors and agents are particularly vulnerable to this problem because there is often a tendency for them to view targets as unsophisticated, uninformed, or unconcerned about the organizational issues related to the change. This causes sponsors and agents to be unwilling at times to negotiate modifications in the implementation plan with targets.

Such behavior is contrary to building synergistic working relationships. Synergy occurs when key players involved in the transition modify their views to accept and integrate the perspectives of others.

Generate creative ways of merging diverse perspectives into new, mutually supported alternatives.

When key players attempt to integrate their diverse perspectives into mutually supported action plans, creative thinking is an absolute necessity. There are occasions when the various divergent input from sponsors, agents, and targets seems to fit together logically. At other times, it is important to break out of established analytical thought patterns and look at the diverse input in new ways. This is a shift from judgment-based to imagination-based thought, or what de Bono referred to as moving from vertical to lateral thinking.[1]

Logic is the tool used to dig holes deeper and bigger to make them better holes. If the hole is in the wrong place, however, no amount of digging is going to put it in the right place. This may seem obvious, but for many people caught up in the excavation process, it is easier to go on digging in the same place than to start all over again in a new place. Vertical thinking can be compared to digging the same hole deeper; lateral thinking means trying again elsewhere.

Successfully merging the different viewpoints and options of key people involved in major change requires, at times, a great deal of lateral thinking. Creative problem solving is not always taught or rewarded in organizational cultures; therefore, many change-related collaborators are at a disadvantage.

Identify the issues and concepts that cannot or should not be integrated.

It is important at this point to call attention to the fact that synergistic implementation is not a panacea for all organizational change efforts. Divergent frames of reference from sponsors, agents, and targets cannot always be merged, even after applying the steps previously described. Nor can practitioners and their clients always integrate their viewpoints. It is not inevitable that it is in the parties’ best interests to merge certain mindsets or ideas  (e.g., it is too costly; values will be violated if integration takes place).

Step III-D in the table above represents “caution” in the synergy process. This condition is a balancing factor to the importance placed earlier on tolerating ambiguity and being persistent (III-A). Too much emphasis on the need to continue struggling for integration, when it looks hopeless, is dangerous. Deciding too early that integration cannot or should not be pursued is equally dangerous. Synergy occurs when people have balanced their tenacity for creative reconciliation with their unwillingness to waste time and effort if integration is not feasible.

Next: Ways to direct “synergy energy” toward realizing goals

Go to the beginning of the series.

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[1] Edward de Bono (1971). Lateral Thinking for Management, American Management Association.

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