About ten years ago, the organization that I work for adopted a policy for leaders of Constructive Dissent. The policy basically said that when discussion decisions, policies or direction for the teams, it is an expectation of leaders that if they do not agree, the dissent constructively. Just saying that you feel and idea is wrong, bad or for some reason just not right for the group is not enough. If you want to disagree, it must be constructive, including reasons why, alternative suggestions and positive intent for the teams. After the discussion, the expectation is that all leaders rally around the final agreed upon solution. This is our internal conduct theory.
Conduct theories are those that focus on the behavior of individuals and the decision-making process that lead up to the behavior. There is a subset of conduct theories called consequence (teleological) theories that focus on the outcomes of the decision making process. Will people be harmed or helped? Will the benefits outweigh the costs? Duty (deontological) theories are another subset of conduct theories that focus on a person’s meeting one’s obligations (PSU WC, L.14, p. 6).
This theory has produced some excellent results for those that have embraced it. One example would be a significant change to our quality program several years ago. As the organization grew, layers of leadership were added and decision-making moved away from the front line leaders to those several layers away, years removed from the front line. Policies and strategies for the work group were being made by individuals that had either never done the job or had not done it in several years.
So when a significant change to the process or measuring quality was proposed, several leaders were very vocal in exercising constructive dissent. They outlined possible challenges to the process, the impact to the employees and the ultimate impact to the customers because of the behaviors the new policy would drive. The feedback was received well but the ultimate decision was made to move forward and the expectation was that all leaders would now rally behind the agreed upon direction.
Several leaders did not feel that the ends would justify the means, they felt hey had a duty to not give up in this issue and continue to strive for it’s modification. They were looking to set the stage for trust and a strong long-term moral reputation (PSU WC, L.14, p. 6). Their approach was to micromanage the new process form day one and compile evidence quickly so they could halt the progress of the rollout before all employees had been impacted.
They were successful in their efforts, getting the new policy modified to one that encouraged the correct behaviors and helped improve the over all quality of the department. The other impact they had was to create a decision making board made up of frontline leaders to aide in evaluating all new policies and procedures. This not only gave the front line leaders a voice in the process, but it gave senior leaders advocates to help gain the buy in of all front line leaders with many new changes.
Works Cited
Pennsylvania State University World Campus (2014). PSYCH 484 Lessons 14: Ethics and Leadership. Retrieved from https://courses.worldcampus.psu.edu/sp14/psych485/002/content/14_lesson/06_page.html