The Next Next Common Sense
Leaders focus less on controlling decisions and more on creating a shared context that guides autonomous action. None of these tensions can be permanently resolved. They must be continuously navigated. The most successful organizations don't choose one pole over the other—they develop the capability to oscillate between them as circumstances require. HOW THESE TENSIONS PLAY OUT IN PRACTICE To understand how these tensions manifest in organizational life, let's examine a real-world scenario that many companies have faced during digital transformation initiatives. A global manufacturing company decided to implement a digital platform connecting its production facilities, supply chain, and customer interfaces. The initiative immediately surfaced the efficiency-adaptability tension. The operations team emphasized standardization across facili- ties to maximize cost savings and data consistency. Meanwhile, regional leaders argued for customization to accommodate local workflows and regulatory requirements. The initial approach treated this as a problem to be solved through compromise—creating a partially standardized system with limited local customization. This satisfied no one and created a fragmented solution that delivered neither full efficiency nor true adaptability. A more effective approach emerged when leadership reframed the challenge as a tension to be navigated rather than a problem to be solved. They established a modular platform architecture with standardized core components and flexible edge components that could adapt to local needs. They created governance mechanisms that distinguished between de- cisions requiring global standardization (security protocols, data struc- tures) and those benefiting from local customization (workflow configu- rations, user interfaces). This approach didn't eliminate the tension but created a framework for navigating it dynamically as conditions evolved. It required more
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