Consensus Building Can Be Too Much of a Good Thing
Consensus Building Can Be Too Much of a Good Thing
It reminds me of a lesson I learned early in my career. I wanted to know what everyone thought about pretty much everything most of the time. I liked ideas swirling around. I liked to think about them and generate more thoughts from more people in the process. Everyone bonded as a result, which I also enjoyed. But my boss at the time, who was phenomenal, aptly reminded me, “Donna, we are not a not-for-profit.” She was right. I’ll never forget those words. Somewhere along the line, somehow, someone needed to advance the ball.
And now years later, I see companies making similar mistakes. In the name of building a “team culture,” they try to involve employees in decisions – sometimes as many as possible - and end up getting nowhere instead. So to avoid wasting precious time and in turn maximize the input from others…
1) Know where to draw the line and don’t involve so many people that the process of moving forward becomes bogged down and cumbersome.
2) Manage the different points of view and direct them toward making a decision.
3) Keep from going round and round in circles that is ultimately preventing a decision from being made.
4) Don’t force one way of thinking in the name of “agreement.”
Beyond that, my advice would be to have a plan…
1) Make a strategic decision about who needs to pipe in and diversify the people, so that it’s not a homogenous group.
2) Appoint someone to be in charge of managing time and closing the discussion, when it’s time for a decision to be made.
Consensus Building Can Be Too Much of a Good Thing - To learn more about this author, visit Donna Flagg's Website.
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Granted, there are a lot of upsides to building consensus in organizations, and generally, it tends to be very good for company culture and morale. However, it does have its downside too in that it also increases the chances that nothing will get done. Now, I’m all for enlisting the opinions of others, and happen to personally enjoy weighing multiple perspectives against one another in order to learn something new or see something in a way I hadn’t seen it before. But sometimes instead of helping, the exercise of pursuing “agreement,” does more to hold things back. Why? Because it’s not very often that everyone agrees, especially as the size of a group increases. So while “consensus” is “in” and considered politically correct, it can also be equally as unrealistic a goal if it is not exploited properly.
It reminds me of a lesson I learned early in my career. I wanted to know what everyone thought about pretty much everything most of the time. I liked ideas swirling around. I liked to think about them and generate more thoughts from more people in the process. Everyone bonded as a result, which I also enjoyed. But my boss at the time, who was phenomenal, aptly reminded me, “Donna, we are not a not-for-profit.” She was right. I’ll never forget those words. Somewhere along the line, somehow, someone needed to advance the ball.
And now years later, I see companies making similar mistakes. In the name of building a “team culture,” they try to involve employees in decisions – sometimes as many as possible - and end up getting nowhere instead. So to avoid wasting precious time and in turn maximize the input from others…
1) Know where to draw the line and don’t involve so many people that the process of moving forward becomes bogged down and cumbersome.
2) Manage the different points of view and direct them toward making a decision.
3) Keep from going round and round in circles that is ultimately preventing a decision from being made.
4) Don’t force one way of thinking in the name of “agreement.”
Beyond that, my advice would be to have a plan…
1) Make a strategic decision about who needs to pipe in and diversify the people, so that it’s not a homogenous group.
2) Appoint someone to be in charge of managing time and closing the discussion, when it’s time for a decision to be made.
Consensus Building Can Be Too Much of a Good Thing - To learn more about this author, visit Donna Flagg's Website.
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