Digital Transformation Is a Cultural Problem, Not a Technological One

“I don’t know what we mean when we say we’re ‘pursuing AI.’ Do you?”

“We don’t change to accommodate new technologies, anyway … We just shove them into our current paradigm.”

“I don’t even understand what we’re supposed to be doing right now!”

Twenty officers are seated around a table, mired in the discomfort of an “adaptive leadership” workshop. This framework developed by Ronald Heifetz and colleagues at the Harvard Kennedy School, is designed to help organizations make progress on complex, collective challenges, known as “adaptive” challenges. Unlike “technical” problems, which can be solved with existing know-how, adaptive challenges demand learning and change — adaptation — from the stakeholders themselves.