242 Chapter 7 4 and 6 show how specific actions enabled Sanquin to embrace the opportunities and mitigate the threats of the pandemic at that time (hence “accepting” the situation at hand, the first element within coping), allowing them to become proactive and adaptive (“develop and implement solutions,” the second element of coping 48). Overall, these chapters describe how the organization readily accepted the situation and implemented solutions, supported by Sanquin’s knowledge base and buffered by (social) resources. This fulfilled the criteria of “coping” in the framework perfectly. But to take it a step further, what was discovered during that time was how such a phenomenon occurred. How is it that a “traditional” organization could cope so well during this time? They, of course, had the pre-defined elements to cope, but how did these elements come together? We discovered that the underlying mechanism with which Sanquin could make the most of the opportunity window and embrace the mitigating measures were linked to complexity leadership theory (CLT). Complexity leadership theory Complexity leadership theory (CLT) is an integrative meta-framework of leadership for organizational adaptability. It is based on complexity theory that the world is comprised of complex adaptive systems, systems that are much more than the sum of its components. Summarized simply, complexity is about “rich interconnectivity,” meaning that “when things interact, they change one another in unexpected and irreversible ways” (Uhl-Bien and Arena, 2017, p. 9).49 Within this existing complexity, leaders and their organizations need to have an adaptive approach to the challenges they face by using the power of networked interactions.50 Thus, “leadership does not start with the leader in a top-down fashion, but emerges from the complex interplay of people, leaders, followers, and other stakeholders—and the rich contexts in which said interplay occurs” (Riggio and Newstead, 2023, p. 210).51 CLT describes the adaptive process in organizations, which begins when there are internal or external pressures that puts a system into disequilibrium and forces it to change or enter a state of novelty. Two main components come into play: 1) entrepreneurial, focused on exploration, novelty, and innovation, and 2) operational, focused on order, productivity, and efficiency. These components create a tension dynamic that must be resolved through ‘conflicting’ and ‘connecting’ within adaptive spaces (see Figure 7.1). These spaces are structures or processes, sometimes temporary in nature, that produce novel solutions or adaptive responses that can be integrated into the organization (emergence). This emergence is the ability to get the ideation into the operational system. The adaptive process requires different types of leadership (see Figure 7.1), with enabling leadership as a critical uniting factor that engages the entrepreneurial and operational leadership within
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