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In today’s complex organisations, conflicts can arise around polarising issues, such as the debate around home working vs office working. General counsel and in-house legal leaders are often well positioned to spot some of these ‘paradoxes,’ and lead the business in finding practical solutions.

In this bite-sized video, , Director of International Delivery at Harvard Business Publishing, explains the thinking behind the ‘Paradox Mindset’ and how it can help General Counsel address the challenges of becoming a more strategic business leader.

A framework for adopting a ‘Paradox Mindset’

Dr Paul Hughes explains that in thinking about in-house leaders as business leaders, we wanted to provide these leaders with a methodology that would help them bring clarity focus to these polarising debates.

The Polarities Management Framework does just that; it uses a simple five step process of seeing, mapping, assessing and learning, and leveraging polarities. These practical steps also provide the mechanism for engaging other stakeholders in this process.

In the context of an organisation, Dr Paul Hughes highlights, the key is to focus on what the organisation actually wants to do. So, for example, in the context of home working vs office working, where does this actually fit within the organisation’s wider overarching purpose?

This means focusing on what is called the ‘success in common’ i.e. what all the stakeholders are working towards. This is then repeated to define the ‘failure in common’ i.e. what all the stakeholders are all trying to avoid. In the context of a business, ‘success in common’ could be winning against the competition, whereas ‘failure on common’ could mean losing to the competition.

Read: ‘Lawyer or leader? In-house paradox in action’ to find out how to use this framework in practice

What makes a good in-house leader?

A lot has been written about leadership. And a lot has been written about the role of the General Counsel. But very little has been written that combines both leadership and General Counsel.

This is why ½Û×ÓÊÓƵ commissioned the Center for Creative Leadership to explore the question of legal leadership in more depth. The aim was to independent research founded in real-world experience that would speak to General Counsel leaders, and enable them to step back and be strategic in how they think, act and influence across an organisation.

One top tip on how to be an in-house leader

When it comes to in-house leadership, Dr Paul Hughes’ strongest advice for in-house lawyers is to focus on what they are doing today – what this says about what you’re doing, and figure out what need to be doing more or less of tomorrow

Leadership often seen as something that’s known. Actually, it’s something that’s done. This can be a provocation on what you can do to be a more effective, strategic leader today.

Read: ‘Becoming a strategic in-house legal leader’ to understand how you can increase your impact for yourself, your legal team and your business

Practical support for in-house leaders

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