Can you balance control and chaos at the same time?

How do you handle emerging problems?

Can you give people enough space in their jobs to work on their own projects?

Do you have a forum for employees to safely express their concerns?

How one responds to these general questions can be the difference between motivating a great employee or completely deflating them.

Come off too firm and you and your company will appear rigid and not open to new ideas or change. Appearing unorganized will make it look like you don’t really know what you are doing or even aloof.

Managing the unknown is easy when you have clear vision and values. It also requires the ability to listen to others even though you may disagree with what they are saying.

Actively managing control and chaos in a group of people requires you to shepherd a conversation and let people create and structure their own solutions. Going too far in one direction versus another is not healthy. You will either be too overbearing and controlling or be completely disorganized. Neither situation is good for the creative process.

It’s about creating tension and giving people space to express themselves. If you can create tension within a group, you will have set the stage for making progress. This often involves playing with opposing ideas and have an objective conversation about each.

Out of these discussions a solution will emerge. This can be a time consuming process, but the result can be a solution that is representative of the entire group of participants.