About Peter Coen

Peter Coen graduated in Management Sciences at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology and became a lecturer in marketing research and international business. He founded The European Business School in London with partners in Paris and Frankfurt. Initially based at The City University, he established EBS in Regent’s Park as a founding institute of Regent’s College which later became Regent’s University. He lived and worked in Brussels and Rome and joined the United Nations where he initiated a UN-wide project to create a fresh blueprint for management development and cultural change. Increasingly convinced that there was a need for fundamental change, he established The Delphi Project to explore fresh thinking and new approaches to individual and organisational growth. He is married with three children.

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2 Manor House, Lower Street,
Salisbury, United Kingdom
info@delphisystems.co.uk
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Constructing the Grid

The Polarity Grid is a kind of map – perhaps a fragment of a map – and, like any map, it has its lines of latitude and longitude to help us find where we are.

It can be used as an instrument for assessing the relative state or condition of a person, a small group or large population, or
even a formal organisation such as a company.

In one sense, the Polarity Grid is a map of human consciousness, and it can help us understand the hierarchy of consciousness of which we are part.

What does the Grid look like?

Power and Polarity exist on a grid with the vertical axis representing positive and negative polarity and the horizontal axis representing power. The plus and minus signs indicate that on the vertical axis, as we move above the midpoint positivity increases, and as we move below the midpoint, negativity increases. The horizontal axis shows that as we move to the right power increases; as we move to the left, power decreases.

For most people the idea of positive power is easy to understand when applied, for example, to a car or electric light. But ‘negative’ power in the Grid needs clarification. In human terms, we can see it as a diffusion of energy or loss of focus resulting in diminishing effectiveness or a lack of impact. We can clarify this idea in the Grid by stating that on the horizontal axis, power increases as you move to the right of the midpoint, and weakness increases as you move to the left of the midpoint. With this particular meaning in mind we find that the Polarity Grid allows us to explore fundamental questions such as Where am I in life? Where do I want to be? How can I move? How can I change things which need changing?

The Four Quadrants

This gives four quadrants in the grid which are labelled Q1 Strong Negativity, Q2 Weak Negativity, Q3 Weak Positivity and Q4 Strong Positivity

In our daily life we may find ourselves stuck, for example, in strong negativity, in Quadrant 1, but we would like to get to Quadrant 3 or 4 and live a more powerful and positive life. We can use the Grid like a map to find out where we are at a given moment and how we might get from one place to another. So far, however, this ‘map’ is clearly incomplete. As it stands the two axes could stretch to infinity, so if this structure is to be useful we need to give it a border.

We animate the Grid
with our own story, with hopes and aspirations, people and events, victories and defeats.

Our fixed attitudes and opinions and habitual behaviours mean that we tend to live our lives in a uniquely familiar landscape. But we can move in the Grid. We can envisage a different world for ourselves and others. We can also move beyond our grid and gain a higher degree of freedom. Then we really begin to change.

You can see the trace of your life in the Grid