The Activist Challenge

Calling Attention to a Contradiction in Values

• The first challenge of leadership is to get people to wake up to the fact there
is a problem—that the group is avoiding some aspect of reality, ignoring a
threat, or missing a great opportunity. The leader in such a predicament
faces a development challenge. Groups often avoid facing some aspect of
reality, either because that piece of reality is too threatening to their current
existence, or because they are so focused on what they regard as their main
concerns that they cannot take the time to consider any other issues. To get
the people to wake up and face the problem is an activist challenge. Often
the problem is embedded in people’s values and behavior. The people might
espouse one view but act in ways that are not consistent with that view. The
leadership task in an activist challenge is to call attention to the
contradiction in values and intervene to disrupt the thinking and patterns of
behavior that allow the people to persist in avoiding the reality of their
condition.
 The Nature of an Activist Challenge
• As the leader looks to the people to see whether they are facing an activist
challenge, he or she is assessing whether there is a contradiction in values in the
group or whether the group is refusing to face some hard facts. The group might
espouse one set of values but act in ways that are not consistent with those
values. For example, since the founding of the United States, many Americans
espoused the value of “all men are created equal” but acted in ways that
perpetuated inequalities in the society. The activist challenge of the civil rights
movement was to get Americans to see the contradiction in values, face the
reality of how their laws and cultural practices were discriminatory, and make
adjustments in their habits, practices, and priorities to produce a more
honorable country.
 The key symptoms of an activist challenge for any
group, community, or organization are as follows:
• Some enduring behaviors, values, and/or practices have become corrosive
and dysfunctional—and serve to undermine the long-term integrity and
survival of the group.
• An opportunity presents itself that can lead to great benefit and progress for
the group, but no one is seriously considering it.
• Danger is looming due to an internal or external threat, and the group is not
doing anything about it.
 In diagnosing an activist challenge, the leader
must examine

• the condition of the people

• the barrier that impedes progress
• the promise or aspiration on the other side of the barrier.
 The condition of the people
• In general, the condition of the people facing an
activist challenge is an unwillingness to change
their values or thinking to accommodate some
aspect of reality. The people are in denial,
resistant, ignorant, or, for whatever reason,
simply refuse to budge. They are comfortable
where they are at.
 The barrier that impedes progress
• The barrier to progress is the people’s
resistance. It might be said that a part of the
individual’s thinking is trapped by the prevailing
system or group paradigm. Hence the
leadership work is to engage that part of the
individual’s thinking that is not trapped by the
system or group paradigm and get the people
to steadily entertain the aspect of reality, or the
hard facts, that they are refusing to consider.
 The promise or aspiration on the other side
of the barrier.
• The promise in an activist challenge is that if people can face the problem and seriously
consider the data they have neglected or denied, then a new opportunity for progress can
open up.
• Generally, in an activist challenge, the person seeking to lead does not have the power or
authority to make people listen and command change. Given the limitations of his or her
power, the intervener must think of creative ways to get people’s attention and highlight
the contradiction in values. Essentially, the leader is trying to say to the people, “Some of
your current values and behaviors are irreconcilable with some of your other cherished
practices, beliefs, and traditions. I will show you how irreconcilable they are and stir you to
learn and to change.” Upon getting the people’s attention, the leadership task is then to
move the people to be responsible for their predicament and modify their thinking and
behavior accordingly. Fundamentally, the leader wants to get the people to learn: to learn
about the problem, how their behavior contributes to the problem, and what can be done
to solve the problem. This kind of learning is fundamentally deep learning, in that the
people must burrow down into their underlying assumptions and deeply held beliefs to
ascertain why a problem persists and what can be done about it.
 Intervention for an Activist
Challenge

• INTERVENING TO EVOKE: INSPIRING THE GROUP WITH THE POETRY

OF LEADERSHIP
• INTERVENING TO PROVOKE: CHALLENGING THE GROUP TO FACE
WHAT THEY DO NOT WANT TO FACE
 INTERVENING TO EVOKE: INSPIRING THE
GROUP WITH THE POETRY OF LEADERSHIP
• in Norse myth, one of the greatest powers one could have was the power to
inspire, particularly through poetry. This power could be obtained only through the
possession of a sacred potion known as mead. The mead was an intoxicating drink
that gave the possessor the capacity to charm the masses through poetic verse.
Given the power of the mead, the giants, dwarves, and Odin were constantly
engaging in all manner of subterfuge and trickery to get the mead from the other.
It could be used for good or ill—it could bring out the best in people and orient
them toward a higher purpose, or it could be used for selfish and nefarious aims
and to put a false set of tasks or counterfeit issues before the people, such as
pursuing wasteful and destructive battles.
 INTERVENING TO PROVOKE: CHALLENGING
THE GROUP TO FACE WHAT THEY DO NOT
WANT TO FACE
• In contrast to the use of power to evoke, which knits people together in support of a shared
(and preferably noble) purpose, the power to provoke metaphorically “slaps them in the
face” with an infuriating and jarring challenge to their beliefs, their certainties, and their
prevailing assumptions. It stirs people to action by forcing them to confront what they
cannot see or refuse to see. It addresses the stubbornness of the group. A provocative
intervention might throw the people into a temporary state of disarray, but if properly
orchestrated, it also generates a tremendous opportunity for deep learning. The power to
provoke can be inherently divisive, sometimes setting peaceful people against each other.
Some people may support the provocative leadership intervention, but other people will
decry it as uncivilized, transgressive, and sometimes even criminal, as many men felt in
regard to Alice Paul and her fellow suffragettes.
 Real Leadership for an Activist Challenge

• Know what threat you represent to the people.

• Be strategic in where and how you intervene.
• When putting yourself at risk, make sure the cameras are rolling.
• When the group stalls you on one front, open up another.
• Find good partners to support you and keep you alive.
Know what threat you represent to the people

• As a first step in exercising leadership for an activist challenge, a leader

needs to know what threat he or she represents to others. This will help the
leader ascertain who is going to stand in the way and who wants to see the
leader fail.
 Be strategic in where and how you intervene.

• In a hectic world where so many issues and concerns associated with day-to-
day living vie for the peoples’ attention, the leader should have an array of
interventions that can expose the contradiction in values that exists in the
system and get people to face the problem. Getting the people’s attention is
never easy, and this is why good strategy, creative design, and the right
timing are essential to success
 When putting yourself at risk, make sure the
cameras are rolling
• An element of being strategic in where and how you intervene is in ensuring you
get the maximum attention on the issue—particularly if you put yourself at risk.
Being a provocateur puts oneself in a precarious position. As pointed out in this
chapter, you might be ignored, denigrated, or even killed. It therefore requires
enormous courage to persist in the face of a vehement opposition that are
determined on avoiding the hard facts and examining how their behavior
contributes to the problem. But it also requires shrewd strategy if you are to
succeed in staying alive. Part of that strategy necessitates only putting yourself at
risk when the cameras are rolling and you have an audience or witnesses.
Otherwise, it is too easy for your opponents to kill you off, figuratively or literally.
 When the group stalls you on one front, open
up another
• In troubling problems where people blatantly refuse to shift their attitudes and
actions, and persist in avoiding responsibility for their role in the mess, sometimes
intervening from directly in the system (the group, organization, or nation) is just
too dangerous. Sometimes a system is so belligerent or dysfunctional that it is
virtually impossible to accomplish anything worthwhile from within, given the
hostility and opposition. When such is the case, the leadership work is to open up
another front, even if that means going outside the system and building forces that
can collectively employ their resources and power to intervene and produce the
internal shifts needed to get enough people to examine the contradiction in values
and responsibly face the problem.
 Find good partners to support you and keep
you alive
• Given the risks inherent in leadership for an activist challenge, it is foolhardy for a
person to take on an activist challenge alone. The leader must find partners to
support them, give advice, provide protection, and ensure that the issues remain in
the public eye. Good partners can bring a renewed sense of energy and creative
expression to the work. They help carry the load and reduce the burden of having
one person be alone in the spotlight. They also can bring balance and perspective,
highlight blind spots, and keep the leader from doing imprudent things that
jeopardize the work.
• In looking for partners, you should look for people who can broaden your
perspective and intervention approach. You want people to tell you when you are
acting in a foolhardy manner, missing an important opportunity, being excessively
stubborn, or endangering the integrity of the work in some manner.
 Conclusion

• As we see with an activist challenge, real leadership at times can be a bold and
precarious activity, as one is challenging the status quo and getting people to face
difficult issues that they would prefer to avoid. Therefore, an activist challenge
should not be taken on lightly, as one puts at risk not only oneself but also one’s
team. Nevertheless, when we see deceit, hypocrisy, and the avoidance of hard
truths in whatever form, someone must find the courage to exercise leadership to
get people to face reality. With sensitivity to the context and appreciation for how
to evoke through the power of inspiration or provoke through the power of tough
questions and symbolic interventions, steadily change can and will occur. As this
chapter illustrates, it is not easy, but it can be done.
 …
• The other five leadership challenges, though distinct from the activist challenge, all
require activist leadership at certain times to get people dealing realistically with
issues. Often, people need to be provoked and noble ideals need to be evoked. As
illustrated in the opening case of the human resource executive, even companies
need activist leadership to generate the needed shifts in attitudes and behavior to
mobilize people to face their most pressing concerns and do the right thing. It is
not enough simply to raise a concern, as Enron’s Sherron Watkins did with her boss,
Kenneth Lay, in regard to deceitful accounting practices, but one must be creative
and strategic in where and how to intervene to ensure that the hard facts get
entertained, conflicts in values are forthrightly addressed, and the right choices are
made that can truly give the team or the organization its best shot at sustainable
success. If the group cannot face hard truths, then progress will remain elusive.