Episode 153 - Building a Consensus
If you are very good at your work, you know and see things that others miss. For example, maybe your job is to iron out the kinks in an assembly line and you know what changes to make. But when you impose your wisdom on the production manager, she and her junior managers resist you. What can you do?
I lead a seminar with engineers in a $4 billion dollar a year beverage manufacturing company and asked for their smartest ideas for building team consensus for developing action steps. The consensus was that it’s smart to get input from everyone on the team on how to handle a situation. People who feel they have a hand in shaping a decision are less likely to fight it and more likely to put extra effort into making the plan a reality.
How to get a team to come up with a plan? Here’s a plan that works for developing a plan. Focus on the outcomes you want by getting the group to answer these 4 simple questions:
1. What do we want?
2. Why do we want it?
3. How can we get it?
4. When do we want it by?
By staying focused on these four questions you can channel the thinking power of the team. And by developing your answers together, you are most likely to reach a consensus that will hold up when the new plan is implemented. That’s smart business.
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