Exploring Leaders’ Mindfulness in Navigating Organizational Paradoxical Tensions

This study focuses on the role of mindfulness in organizational leaders’ responses to paradoxical tensions. We arrive at this focus by interpreting the organizational paradox literature as suggesting two primary ways that leaders mindfully engage paradoxical tensions, which work in tandem. There is an absorbed mode implied in embracing tensions and finding energy in them and a more deliberative mode in weighing tensional poles to formulate more adaptive responses. Although not designed for paradox study per se, Kudesia’s (2019) metacognitive mindfulness practice skillfully captures both absorbed and deliberative aspects, offering a way to understand the role of mindfulness in responding to paradoxical tensions. In this qualitative study, we explore how leaders with and without a regular mindfulness practice deploy these dual approaches in their sensemaking accounts of paradoxical tensions. Findings suggest that leaders who do not practice mindfulness relied heavily on deliberative engagement and pivoted less often between absorbed and deliberative modes. Leaders who practice mindfulness focused on absorbed engagement and pivoted more often between modes. Our analysis suggests that absorbed and deliberative practices together provide mindfulness trained leaders with just enough structure to cope with paradoxical tensions by turning them into focused learners with flexible processing, expanded repertoires, and holistic engagement.