WFED 880 – Dare to Disagree Blog Post – Lynda Commale

WOW!!  This was an incredible Ted Talk! I was completely moved by Margaret Heffernan’s gift of storytelling and by the important message and encouragement of disagreeing. This topic is very relevant in my workplace right now as I recently led a group workshop on Conflict Resolution. I was quite surprised to hear from so many of the participants that they often fall into the “avoidance” behavior and tend to shy away from work conflict and disagreeing. There were a lot of examples of trying to please the other person, solely to avoid the potential for a disagreement. I was shocked by this reaction from so many as we are often encouraged and expected to be “candid” in our roles. In fact, it is a part of our Performance Management Standard. I also appreciated that Heffernan spotlighted the important to gather multiple view points, thought leadership and ensuring differing styles at the table. The enrichment, the debate, the impact, can be so much greater when we “dare to disagree.” It is way easier to find that “echo chamber” to satisfy the ego or fear of debate.

Many years ago, I presented a plan to senior leadership for a dashboard transformation in a sales division I was supporting. It was a dramatic shift, very much “out of the box” thinking, but I felt it was necessary to rock the boat a bit, use the voices of the crew as my source and go in hoping for gold, but ready to accept silver. It was a two hour session, and the debate was fierce. It got loud and I often had to re-direct and re-center the team. To say their were disagreements, is an understatement.  Throughout the entire session, I thought I was failing BIG TIME. When we ended, no decisions made, but with a promise that a decision would be made after a few days of continued thought, I felt like I might cry. As we were getting up to leave the session, one of the Principal’s said out loud, “That was awesome Lynda! So well done! Outstanding!” I was stunned! And I was honest. I asked him why and shared with him that all that disagreeing and loud debate worried me greatly. He then shared a wonderful insight that I will carry with me forever. “Be wary of a quiet room. If it is quiet, your work likely fell flat and the group is not engaged. When you have debate, discussion and people challenging each other, creativity, problem solving and better work is often the outcome.” A very powerful moment in my career for me.

As a devil’s advocate to Heffernan’s message, I would challenge her and others on the perception of a woman daring to disagree. In the Conflict Resolution session I shared above, all 26 participants were women. Why? Why did no men sign up for this session? Why are women internally struggling more with the disagreement? How can we overcome this fear? How can men better support that woman may more personally internalize the debate or disagreement? Some insightful questions that I am trying to uncover in my workplace.  And I plan to share this video with the group as well. I think it will resonate with them.