I was wrong

As I reflect on my 40+ career, with over half of it in leadership roles, I think about things that I did that made me different and potentially more effective than most leaders. 

One thing that stood out is related to my reflective nature.

If you’ve ever worked with or for me, you’ll know that it’s quite common for me to have a strong initial reaction or opinion to something. Imagine that.

Then, upon ongoing reflection…

I’ll come in the next day and say—

You know, I thought about your idea more

And you know what, I was wrong. I want to support your approach (idea, strategy).

The notion that I’m not stuck on my ideas I think opens up the creative process for folks. It creates safety and the knowledge that (over time) I can be open-minded 😉

I experienced that this level of vulnerability, my willingness to admit I was wrong, opened up my culture.

The key message here is for leaders. When was the last time you said to your teams, your peers, your boss, or yourself—

I was wrong, you have my full support, let’s do it your way?

Stay agile, my friends,

Bob.

BTW: It’s not always easy to say it, so I need to practice in the mirror each morning.

Disagree and Commit

There is something to be said about the notion of Disagreeing and then Committing that resonates with me as a valid approach for today’s organizational cultures making decisions. I’ve heard the expression for many years, so I became curious about its origins and did a little research that I’d like to share with you.

Here’s a wonderful video by Meirav Owen to start things off –

https://ecorner.stanford.edu/clips/learning-to-disagree-and-commit/

I believe Andy Grove was the first to reference it in his role at Intel –

https://hackernoon.com/disagree-and-commit-the-importance-of-disagreement-in-decision-making-b31d1b5f1bdc

Jeff Bezos famously leveraged the idea at Amazon –

https://www.inc.com/jeff-haden/jeff-bezos-uses-disagree-commit-rule-to-overcome-an-uncomfortable-truth-about-teamwork.html

SuperPower of the Disagree & Commit Culture –

https://medium.com/blablacar/the-superpower-of-the-disagree-and-commit-culture-c7085956bde0

Another take by Aaron Lynn –

https://aaronlynn.com/business/people-teams/disagree-and-commit/

Gustavo Razzetti helps deepen D&C by creating a 5-step playbook of sorts –

https://gustavorazzetti.substack.com/p/disagree-and-commit-a-5-step-playbook

Kim Scott and the Get Sh*t Done Wheel seem to be a similar approach –

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-use-get-sht-done-wheel-reinforce-collaborative-respectful-scott/

Wrapping Up

I hope you found the articles around Disagree & Commit to be a useful exploration. I also hope it heightens your cultural decision-making evolution.

I often refer to decisions as having a “stickiness” factor, and D&C helps focus on increasing their stickiness.

One final reference is to the Core Protocols, which Jim and Michele McCarthy introduced in their book Software for Your Head and Richard Kasperowski in his work at https://thecoreprotocols.org/

The McCarthy’s work doesn’t receive nearly the attention it deserves. I recommend you take a deeper dive into the Core Protocols – https://mccarthyshow.com/the-core-html-version/

Whether you agree or disagree with me, I hope you can commit to weaving this model into your decision-making culture.

Stay agile my friends,

Bob.

Leadership’s 4% Blind Spot

I saw post on LinkedIn from Corporate Rebels that highlighted the information gap between top executives and frontline employees.  

I’ve heard this many times before. However, it resonated strongly with me this time, and I wanted to share it more broadly.

The big message here is that senior leaders, leaders, and managers often think they understand the situation (problems, challenges, situational awareness, etc.) but don’t. The higher you go in the organization chart, the less you truly understand.

The big problem, though, is that they think they understand. I.e., there is a self-awareness gap, which creates a huge blind spot.

How do we begin to mitigate this gap? I’d suggest more leaders—

• Develop and activate their humility,

• Sharpen their questioning & listening skills,

• Trust what their teams say, ask for help, and take action based on team feedback.

And did I mention staying humble?

This is one blind spot that can be easily reduced…

Stay agile my friends,

Bob.