Case 11.2: Taming Bacchus
Case synopsis and analysis
Kyle Barrett, a serious ultimate disc player, was disheartened because his college ultimate disc
team did not take the sport seriously. Together with his teammate, Harrison, Kyle worked to
turn the group from a “partying” team to a competitive one.
When Kyle and Harrison became co-captains of the team, they hired a stellar professional athlete
to work on skills and strategies with the players. This enhanced the players’ skills. Kyle and
Harrison also enhanced the players’ motivation by openly asking each member to candidly
Learning objectives:
• Students should be able to recognize adaptive leadership in a given case study.
• Students should be able to analyze whether a leader’s behavior comports with effective
Answers to questions in the text:
1. What changes were Kyle and Harrison trying to make? How did these changes effect the
beliefs, attitudes, or values of the players?
2. Were the challenges the team faced technical, technical and adaptive, or adaptive? What
examples can you give to explain your answer?
The team faced technical and adaptive challenges. Adaptive challenges are problems that are not
clear-cut and cannot be solved by the leader’s authority or through the normal ways of doing
things in the organization. Adaptive challenges require that leaders encourage others, with their
3. Citing examples, explain how the captains engaged in each of these adaptive leader behaviors:
1) get on the balcony, 2) identify adaptive challenges, 3) regulate distress, 4) maintain
disciplined attention, 5) give the work back to people, and 6) protect leadership voices from
below
– Get on the balcony: Kyle considered the problem from the balcony and saw that he needed
assistance, collaboration, and a safe holding space to create a change in culture. He stepped
4. Describe the holding environment that the co-captains created for the team. Do you think it
was successful? Why or why not?
Creating a holding environment refers to establishing an atmosphere in which people can feel
safe tackling difficult problems, but not so much so that they can avoid the problem. A holding
Potential teaching approaches:
Below is a way to structure a class based on skill theory and case study 11.2:
• Hold a lecture on adaptive leadership.
Exercises for this case study:
1) Many students in your class will have worked on a play/production or been a member of
a team similar to the disc team. In small groups, students should discuss similar
challenges that they may have faced and analyze their leader’s behavior. Was their
leader able to maneuver through adaptive change? Students should analyze how their
2) Kyle and Harrison have now graduated and wanted to create a leadership development
program based on their experiences. What should that program look like? Students