The Problem
Triggered by the external disruption caused by the COVID pandemic, Pfizer’s CEO Albert Bourla set a bold, purposeful goal: to develop and globally distribute effective vaccine in a record time and in the middle of health crisis. Under normal circumstances, the development of a vaccination takes years. Pfizer’s promise, made in early 2020, was to develop and distribute several million of vaccination doses by the end of 2020. They ended up developing and distributing 1 billion doses, double the quantity produced in the past 10 years.
The Solution
Pfizer purposefully harnessed paradoxes to achieve this ambitious goal. While they needed to continue their usual operations, they also needed at the same time to mobilise resources to work on the vaccine. Instead of considering this tension as a challenge to be resolved, Pfizer approached the situation with a paradox mindset, seeing it as an opportunity to do both.
Bourla swiftly adjusted Pfizer’s organisational structure, establishing part of the organisation as responsible for development of the vaccination, and to be run like a project. The project had a team entirely dedicated to work on the new vaccine and the CEO (Bourla) acted as a ‘project manager’. The new project-based approach replaced a tall hierarchical structure with a fast-moving agile project team; silos were knocked down to quickly move things forward and management layers reduced to speed up decision making.
Another problem that Pfizer experienced concerned the safe shipment of the vaccination to countries across the world. On the one hand Pfizer needed to ensure safety of the production and shipment, while at the same time they needed to expedite the production and the distribution process to ensure the swift availability of the vaccine to a global population. Rather than viewing this tension as conflicting, Pfizer proactively embraced the paradox. A range of strategic decisions underpinned by a both/and mindset, were made to ensure that both elements of the tension are met. One the one hand, Pfizer leveraged existing relationships with suppliers and established new collaborations with biopharma and shipping firms to get access to raw materials for production, and to work out best logistic solutions for shipment of the vaccination. On the other hand, Pfizer developed solutions in house to make sure they were not fully depended on the external suppliers. They established a new plant to start producing new synthetic lipids (the key ingredient for the vaccine, which was short in demand), something that Pfizer had never done before. They also developed a new packaging solution that stored vaccines in low temperature of minus 70 degree Celsius to enable its safe shipment to countries across the world. Packages were fitted with tracking devices to capture data on the temperature (using thermometer), location of the package (using GPS), and light (using sensors) to make sure that the vaccinations were safely stored, and vaccine quality was not compromised.
Pfizer embraced a both/and mindset when approaching the task of producing vaccine in a record time. The visionary CEO helped foster that mindset. He encouraged his team to focus discussions on opportunities and benefits, before exploring challenges and what could be done to overcome those. He promoted an attitude that “failure is not an option” and set the team to achieve the ambitious goal of developing the vaccine in unprecedented time. Tensions surfaced between business-as-usual priorities and the need to innovate, and between a focus on quality and the need for speed. By harnessing the potential arising from paradoxes and adopting a both/and mindset, a range of unexpected improvements and innovations were created. This included: a more agile organisational structure, development of new strategic relationships with the supply chain and innovative packaging solutions.
Seizing Opportunities from Paradoxes
As demonstrated in the case of Pfizer, organisations, rather than passively reacting to tensions as they arise, can proactively seek them out. This can be done by intentionally seeking to disrupt through adopting a ‘both/and mindset’ that replaces less-effective ‘either/or’ approaches.
Paradoxes often manifest in the face of disruption. Disruptions can be initiated intentionally, or they can be triggered by an organisation’s internal or external environment. Intentional disruptions can arise by a leader creating a bold, purposeful goal. Disruptions triggered by the external environment may push an organisation to seek new solutions that involve embracing contradictions, as in the Pfizer example. Climate change is an example of a disruption that forces leaders to think outside the box and explore new approaches that involve embracing contradictions such as between a short and long-term orientation, between stability and change, between creating profit and simultaneously protecting the environment. By adopting a paradox mindset and considering these disruptions as opportunities for innovation, sustainability and competitive advantage, organisations and leaders can better harness opportunities arising from paradox.
By adopting a paradox mindset in this way, creative leaders and their organisations can harness the energy of opposites, and create new models geared to an ever-changing world.
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