January 9, 2008	Volume 8, Issue 2
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Towards More Gracious Disagreement

by Rick Brenner

We spend a sizable chunk of time correcting each other. Some believe that we win points by being right, or lose points by being wrong, but nobody seems to know who keeps the official score. Here are some thoughts to help you kick the habit.

omeone recently corrected my pronunciation of schism. I had said shism, and I was corrected to skism, which I accepted without retort. Looking at a dictionary the next day, I learned that both are acceptable in U.S. English, but both are less acceptable than sizm. (See Bartleby.com.) I also learned from this exercise that my corrector didn't actually know what he was talking about.

That was a minor incident, but it reminded me that correcting the words or meaning of another can be a perilous proposition. Here are some of the risks of correcting others.

• Too much alacrity suggests an agenda beyond simple correction. It suggests anger, insecurity, revenge, or something even darker.
• Too much confidence puts you at risk of appearing arrogant.
• A mistaken correction risks making you look foolish — if not immediately, later.
• Even if you're right, you risk offending the person you corrected, or offending others, which can create or exacerbate tension in the group.
• Correcting something irrelevant to the conversation can deflect the group from its intended focus.

Probably you can think of half a dozen more risks if you spend an hour at it.

And there are oodles of ways to offer your views abrasively. When you hear someone use one of these, take cover, because something bad could be about to happen:

• You're wrong (mistaken, misinformed, …)
• The right answer is X
• That's not so; that's old information
• I used to think so, too (before I achieved my current state of enlightenment)

Sometimes, the urge to correct can be overwhelming. And sometimes, correction is actually called for. Here are some tips for offering your own views in ways that limit the risks.

Check for necessity and effectiveness

Is correction really necessary? Will correction advance the conversation in a material way? Generally, unless you're responding to a prior request, it doesn't pay to correct others' grammar, diction, pronunciation, tact, or manners.

Acknowledge your own fallibility

Acknowledge that you could be mistaken. For instance, "I remember that a little differently — I thought it went this way, …."

Make details optional

Ask yourself, "Is correction
really necessary? Will correction
advance the conversation
in a material way?"

For even more safety, give the person or the group a choice: "I remember that discussion a bit differently — if that would be helpful."

Acknowledge your own subjectivity

"I disagree," is mostly a statement about your own thoughts; "You're wrong," is mostly a judgment about what the other has said, or what you believe the other said. The former is a little safer because it's information about yourself.

Most important, when you offer an alternative view, or a correction, in whatever form, look first for potholes. Leading the group in the wrong direction can be hazardous to all, especially to the one who led them there.  Top    Next Issue

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Do you spend your days scurrying from meeting to meeting? Do you ever wonder if all these meetings are really necessary? (They aren't) Or whether there isn't some better way to get this work done? (There is) Read 101 Tips for Effective Meetings to learn how to make meetings much more productive and less stressful — and a lot more rare. Order Now!

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More articles on Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness:

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Dramatic changes in policy or procedure are often challenging, especially when they have some boneheaded components. But by accepting them, by anticipating what you can, and by applying Pareto's principle, you can usually find a safe path that suits you.

Become a Tugboat Captain

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No Surprises

If you tell people "I want no surprises," prepare for disappointment. For the kind of work that most of us do, surprises are inevitable. Still, there's some core of useful meaning in "I want no surprises," and if we think about it carefully, we can get what we really need.

See also Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness, Effective Meetings and Effective Communication at Work for more related articles.

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Person-to-Person Communication for Project Managers

When we talk, listen, send or read emails, read or write memos, or when we leave or listen to voice mail messages, we're communicating person-to-person. And whenever we communicate person-to-person, we risk being misunderstood, offending others, feeling hurt, and being confused. There are so many ways for things to go wrong that we could never learn how to fix all the problems. A more effective approach avoids problems altogether, or at least minimizes their occurrence. In this very interactive program you'll learn a model of inter-personal communications that can help you stay out of the ditch. In those moments of intense involvement, when we're most likely to slip, you'll have a new tool to use to keep things constructive. Read more about this program. Here are some upcoming dates for this program:

• Des Moines, IA: February 16, Breakfast Meeting, Central Iowa Chapter of The Project Management Institute.
   
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The Race to the South Pole: The Power of Agile Development

On 14 December 1911, four men led by Roald Amundsen reached the South Pole. Thirty-five days later, Robert F. Scott and four others followed. Amundsen had won the race to the pole. Amundsen's party returned to base on 26 January 1912. Scott's party perished. As historical drama, why this happened is interesting enough. Lessons abound. Among the more important lessons are those that demonstrate the power of the agile approach to project management and product development. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:

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Human-Centered Risk Management

Most of us can assess technological risks, but risks related to human behavior tend to resist our best efforts. This session provides a framework for evaluating risks related to the behavior of individuals, teams, organizations and people generally. Human-centered risk differs from technological or market risk, because objective evaluation requires acknowledging personal and organizational limitations and failures. Since some of those limitations and failures might apply to the people assessing the risks, or to their superiors, there's a tendency to deny them or to explain them away. Our approach examines capability, organization, context, risk mitigation, and workplace politics. It has tools for guiding the assessment and management of human-centered risk, and we show how to extend these tools to suit your situation. You'll learn how to identify sources of risk in human behavior; recognize systemic and individual barriers to acknowledging risk; assess the effects of organizational turbulence; determine the risk associated with inappropriate internal risk transfer; estimate the effects of team dysfunction, toxic conflict and turnover; and measure the impact of workplace politics. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:

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The Race to the South Pole: Ten Lessons for Project Managers

On 14 December 1911, four men led by Roald Amundsen reached the South Pole. Thirty-five days later, Robert F. Scott and four others followed. Amundsen had won the race to the pole. Amundsen's party returned to base on 26 January 1912. Scott's party perished. As historical drama, why this happened is interesting enough, but to project managers, the story is fascinating. Lessons abound. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:

• Columbia, Missouri: May 17, Full-Day Workshop, Mid Missouri Chapter of the Project Management Institute.
   

Project Management in Fluid Environments

Most people now work in environments that can best be characterized as fluid, because they're subject to continual change. We never know what's coming next. In such environments, managing — teams, projects, groups, departments, or the enterprise — often entails moving from surprise to surprise while somehow staying almost on track. It's a nerve-wracking existence. This program provides numerous tools that help project managers who work in fluid environments. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:

• Columbia, Missouri: May 17, Monthly Meeting, Mid Missouri Chapter of the Project Management Institute.
   

The Politics of Meetings for People Who Hate Politics

There's a lot more to running an effective meeting than having the right room, the right equipment, and the right people. With meetings, the whole really is more than the sum of its parts. How the parts interact with each other and with external elements is as important as the parts themselves. And those interactions are the essence of politics for meetings. This program explores techniques for leading meetings that are based on understanding political interactions, and using that knowledge effectively to meet organizational goals. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:

• Rochester, New York: May 24, Professional Development Day, Rochester Chapter of the Project Management Institute.