Someone recently typed three words into Perplexity AI: “explain HPtE to me.“ Perplexity is an AI search engine. It reads the web, synthesises what it finds, and produces a structured answer with sources. What came back was surprisingly accurate. It was also, in important ways, incomplete. I want to walk through the conversation that followed…
Over the past few weeks, I’ve been exploring a single idea from three different angles — and what it reveals about the conflict tax across the organisation is something every leadership team needs to see. The idea is the Conflict Tax — the compounding cost of avoidance. Not the cost of conflict itself, but the…
Finance professionals see the Conflict Tax in overtime spend, project overruns, and KPI contradictions. HR and IR Directors see it in grievance patterns and repeat disputes. But there’s a third perspective that neither fully captures — and it’s where the conflict tax in operations hits hardest. Operations. Operational leaders live with the Conflict Tax every…
HR and IR Directors are the most conflict-experienced people in any organisation. You understand conflict better than any other function — and the conflict tax in HR is costing more than anyone has measured. You’ve sat in more grievance hearings, mediation sessions, and collective disputes than anyone else in the building. And yet — most…
Every finance professional I’ve worked with knows their cost base inside out. They can tell you the variance on any line item, the trend on any cost centre, the forecast for any quarter. But there’s a cost most of them have never measured — and it’s costing finance teams more than they realise. I call…
Dr. Kelvyn Youngman recently shared a passage from Taiichi Ohno that stopped me in my tracks. It articulates something I’ve witnessed hundreds of times in facilitation work but had never seen expressed so clearly. Ohno wrote in 1982: “The debate can become endless. Or, each side tries to be more outspoken than the others and…
Since completing my Theory of Constraints certification in 2005 (the equivalent of today’s Black Belt in Thinking), I’ve been fascinated by how Dr. Efrat Goldratt-Ashlag and her father Eli Goldratt have shaped my understanding of human potential. The Theory of Constraints isn’t just about manufacturing bottlenecks or project management—it’s about something much deeper. Here’s what…
In our journey so far, we’ve explored Gregory Bateson’s double bind theory, how NLP translated these insights into practical techniques, and Tony Robbins’ Six Human Needs framework which reveals why we experience internal conflicts. Today, we arrive at a powerful methodology for resolving these conflicts: Eliyahu Goldratt’s Evaporating Cloud. The Problem with Compromise When faced…
In our journey so far, we’ve explored Gregory Bateson’s foundational work on double binds and systems thinking. We also examined how Bandler and Grinder developed practical NLP techniques based on these insights. Today, we’ll examine Tony Robbins’ Six Human Needs framework. It is a powerful model that explains why we do what we do. It…
In my previous post, I introduced Gregory Bateson’s foundational work on double binds and systems thinking. Today, we’ll explore how Richard Bandler and John Grinder built upon Bateson’s theoretical framework. They created Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). NLP is a set of practical techniques for personal change and communication excellence. The Birth of NLP: A Chance Connection…
Few thinkers have laid as profound a foundation as Gregory Bateson.
There is a conference room on top of a mountain in Huntley, New Zealand. It’s not really a mountain. It’s more like a big hill. It’s isolated. That is part of its beauty. It’s the kind of place you go to when you don’t want to be distracted. It’s the kind of place you go…
Interest Based Problem Solving (IBPS) is more than just a conflict resolution tool—it’s the core methodology driving successful High Performance through Engagement (HPtE) Strategy® implementations. By focusing on underlying interests rather than positions, IBPS enables organisations to harness tension between competing priorities and transform potential conflicts into opportunities for innovation and growth. The Challenge: Balancing…
This post is a summary of all the articles in this category. Subscribe to get the next post in your email.
In today’s rapidly changing world, maintaining harmonious labour relations is more crucial than ever. This is especially true in industries like maritime, where smooth operations rely on the cohesive cooperation between management and unions. Recently, the Port of Auckland has demonstrated that what was once a fractious relationship can evolve into a thriving partnership, serving…
Imagine a world where workplace conflicts dissolve like clouds on a sunny day, where HR practitioners possess the secret key to unlocking organizational success. The Evaporating Cloud Method is that key, and it’s transforming the way HR professionals approach problem-solving and decision-making in today’s complex business landscape. Introduction In today’s complex and ever-changing business landscape,…
In 2013, Air New Zealand faced a problem that plagues organisations worldwide: decades of adversarial union-management relationships that drained resources, stifled innovation, and created a culture of mutual distrust. CEO Christopher Luxon called it the “Punch and Judy Show” — a theatrical performance where management and unions played predictable roles, fighting the same battles repeatedly…
What can we do to integrate different cultural perspectives into effective team problem-solving? Effective team problem-solving demands more than just technical expertise or individual brilliance. It requires an understanding of different cultural perspectives and an ability to integrate these into a cohesive, functional whole. New Zealand, with its unique blend of cultures, has an opportunity…
“My client is suffering from a great deal of conflict between people, lots of silo based behaviour and wasted time and money. Their primary interests are a return on investment, meeting social and environmental needs, creating a great place to work, delivering quality services and being first to market. What options do they have to…
Of all the leadership strategies that the Theory of Constraints offers, the guiding principle of Inherent Dignity stands tall. But what exactly is inherent dignity, and how does it fit into the modern workplace? Understanding Inherent Dignity In The Choice, by Eliyahu Goldratt and his daughter Efrat Goldratt-Ashlag, Efrat notes: “The third obstacle we need…
