A highly inspiring, rich, and practically useful book with a fresh perspective. It both offers interventions and tools for leaders, and it concretely demonstrates how we can all contribute to reducing polarisation by looking at a deeper level at what drives and connects us.

With this book, Ivo Brughmans makes a valuable contribution to better managing polarisation in society and in organizations. He concretely demonstrates how, from the trenches of irreconcilable positions, we can once again create an open space where ideas can productively clash and enrich each other.

In these times when tensions are clearly visible in organizations and politics, this is a hopeful book that can help us all transform tensions into positive energy. Using a both-and approach - listening and speaking out, empathy and setting boundaries - and by seeking shared values, Ivo Brughmans demonstrates in elaborated conversational formats how we can deal with polarisation.

Ivo Brughmans succeeds in not reducing polarisation to conflict, but rather approaching it as an invitation to delve deeper into the underlying motivations and paradoxes of our time. His paradoxical approach aligns seamlessly with my own conviction: that living together is only possible when we don't avoid the tension between difference and connection, but dare to embrace it.

Those who seek polarisation solely outside themselves actually fuel it. Brughmans invites you to something rare: self-reflection in times of moral outrage.