Recently, I shared that the most common types of advice I’m asked to provide tend to focus on people frustrations. And that the root cause, and therefore any solutions, center around Communication and Compassion.
The first challenge was focused on email, and I offered the “1-2-Meet” approach to improving response rates and engagement.
The next challenge is about reconciling differences of opinion. What can we do when we’re convinced of the right way forward, or the right answer, and someone else is convinced otherwise?
Find the AND
Let’s start from the premise that we all want to wake up every day, knowing we add value to an organization or effort.
To know we add value, we have to understand our role and its relationship to the mission of the team, organization or company.
In our attempts to find, realize, or maximize our value, sometimes we may forget that everyone around us is doing the same thing. Each of us can get so caught up in “me” that the potential awesomeness of “we” is lost.
[Tweet “Each of us can get so caught up in ME that the potential awesomeness of WE is lost.”]
Recently, one of my managers – I’ll call him Bob – sent out an email regarding something his team was working on. Another manager – Joe – reached out to me, indicating that he was confused. The effort appeared to overlap with his team’s responsibilities and he wondered what that meant.
Did I really need to get in the middle of two people to translate? Not unless I wanted to own the outcome. Since I didn’t, I asked them to meet and work it out.
A few days later, I get the word that Bob and Joe could not resolve their difference of opinion. They were each dug into their understanding of individual accountabilities, teams, and objectives, unable to reconcile their positions.
The question I got back was “which one of us is right?”
I reached out to both and asked them forget for a moment that either Bob OR Joe could be right. Instead, I asked them to find the solution where Bob AND Joe are both right.
By shifting the focus from “me” to “we,” the result was a better understanding of one another’s teams and objectives. They could each view the other from a place of compassion, rather than possible resentment.
The AND solution ultimately highlighted the synergies between the teams. They realized that by working together, they created a better solution for our customers than they could alone.
OR solutions are polarized, siloed, and divided. AND solutions are partnerships, synergies, and aligned. It is only through AND that individuals and teams can find common ground and the best blend of multiple ideas or positions.
The next time we’re faced with which solution or answer is the “right” one, let’s look past “me” to the awesomeness of “we.”
What is the best advice you have received to reconcile differences of opinion? Is there another technique you would recommend? I would love if you could add your thoughts to the comments and keep the conversation going.
4 Responses
I thought it curious that this was being presented as a good way to address things. I fully support the “we” vs. “me” approach. My disagreement with what the author presented is based on my understanding of the situation described. I presume the author is in the next level of management above the two managers who had the disagreement. The author told them to try to work the disagreement on their own. The result was, “They were each dug into their understanding of individual accountabilities, teams, and objectives, unable to reconcile their positions. The question I got back was ‘which one of us is right?’”
I see a real concern there. A difference in their understanding of “…individual accountabilities, teams, and objectives…” is not something for them to work out on their own. This is for the manager to address. The leadership aspect of your position requires that you clearly communicate what are the individual accountabilities, how the teams are to operate, and what the objectives are. The organization will hopefully have a strategic plan in place. The teams should have already established what their objectives are etc. The manager should be working with the two to help them come to a common understanding of these issues.
I understand the author’s intent in this article, as she articulated it quite well in her statement, “OR solutions are polarized, siloed, and divided. AND solutions are partnerships, synergies, and aligned.” I don’t believe an irreconcilable understanding of the “…individual accountabilities, teams, and objectives,…” falls into the OR/AND approach nor is it something that falls into the “work it out between yourselves” category.
To my way of thinking, the fact that a situation cropped up where two managers have a fundamental difference in their understanding of “…individual accountabilities, teams, and objectives,…” tells me there is a much larger issue going on in the organization. Something as basic as accountability, teams, and objectives, should have been established by senior management.
I hope this is simply my poor understanding of what the author is trying to communicate or is a more complex issue that did not easily translate into such a short article. Otherwise, I think the author really missed the mark on this one.
Kevin,
First, thank you for taking the time to read the article and present such a well articulated response. You really made me stop and go back through the story to reconsider the way it was outlined.
Second, you are absolutely correct. Given what I presented, I agree with your points.
In our case, we have several teams that each have adjacent or complimentary objectives and skills within their teams. Talking to each manager, they are very clear in what their individual teams own. Where the confusion comes in is when they hear about skills or activities within other teams that seem to overlap. Even with a larger strategy, mission and objectives for the organization, and what looks like a group of people that get along and can talk with one another, I find I’m the easy answer to responding to such questions.
I’m the process of documenting the phases of team growth. I believe this is a natural progression to the next stage of our team’s maturity. Also natural are the “OR” questions I receive. My feedback to them is to work together to see if there is another answer that falls into an “AND” solution. Not because it’s not my job to make sure everyone is aligned to the greater strategy. But because our team is not that large, and it is growing rapidly. Silos will form before we know it if I’m directing engagements, vs encouraging them to work with one another to figure out ways to prevent them.
I hope this addresses your concerns. I absolutely agree that if there was a lack of understanding within the teams of their individual accountabilities, that is my job to address. I could have been more clear in the example – where we are in our development and that it was more adjacent responsibilities that spawned the question.
Again, I thank you for taking the time to respond and for such a thoughtful articulation of your feedback.
Kristin
Kristin,
Thanks for the response and clarification. I know it is very difficult to all of the background to a situation that your readers know nothing about, and to do it in a format that is brief enough to keep people’s interest. Keep up with your posts.
Kevin