Creating and Sustaining Positive Organizations

By Robert E. Quinn

Positive organizing often involves integrating concepts that seem mutually exclusive.  This integration of opposites results in a creative tension that lifts the system.  Today I would like to consider one of the most important.

I once interviewed a man who had just taken a senior position in the auto industry.  I asked him to describe his organization.   His response was insightful:

“They claim that this place is high on people because there is no conflict.  In fact this is a terrible place to work.  The politeness is a plague. The politeness covers layers and layers of hidden conflict.  It is a totally political organization.  Nothing that needs to happen gets executed.  There is no energy.  The organization is not growing and the people are dying on their jobs.  When organizations are high on people, they are the opposite of this.  There is creative confrontation.  No issue is sacred.  Everyone is free to challenge and the challenging is done with respect.  As result the organization climbs to higher and higher levels of performance.”

Based on thirty years of experience as an organizational change agent, I agree with this man.  Creative confrontation is a motor for moving to higher and higher levels of performance.

The people in such organizations are very high on task and very high on people.  They engage each other, challenging every assumption, yet they do it without getting upset.  They remain productive because they are deeply respectful of each other.  While confrontation and respect may seem like opposites, the integration of the two is what gives rise to a culture of creative confrontation.

Yet, a culture of creative confrontation is something that we seldom see in organizations.   Few leaders know how to bring it about.  In a forth coming book, Good Boss, Bad Boss: How to Be the Best and Learn from the Worst, Professor Robert I. Sutton discusses many keys to organizational success [1].  One of his offerings is a list called, How to Lead a Good Fight.  I see it as a great recipe for creating a culture of creative conflict.  I encourage you to evaluate your current work situation as you read each item.

How to Lead a Good Fight

Robert I. Sutton

1. Don’t begin the fight until everyone understands the challenge or problem at hand.
2. Don’t argue while generating ideas or solutions – make it safe for people to suggest crazy or controversial ideas.  After you have some ideas, then invite people to tear them apart.
3. If people turn nasty, take a time-out and ask them to turn off the venom.  Pay special attention to comedians who deliver devastating insults via jokes or teasing.
4. Encourage everyone to argue.  Gently silence people who talk too much and invite those who are silent to jump into the fray.
5. Don’t listen to people’s words; watch their nonverbal behavior.  Are they smiling?  Really listening?  Glaring, smirking, or rolling their eyes?  Model constructive nonverbal behavior and coach people who (perhaps unwittingly) interject negative expressions.
6. Take special care to invite people who are shy, new, or at the bottom of the pecking order to express opinion – and defend them vigorously against personal attacks.
7. Learn people’s quirks.  Some have remarkably thick skins; nastiness doesn’t faze them.  Others are so think-skinned that even gentle critiques send then into a rage or a funk.
8. Once the argument is resolved, make sure the conflict and criticism ceases.  It is time to develop and implement the agreed-upon ideas.   Forbid people from rehashing complaints that “my great idea” was killed and/well-worn criticisms of “winning” ideas.
9. After the fight is over, do some backstage work.  Sooth those who feel personally attacked and whose ideas were shot down.  Give warnings and coaching to those who make personal attacks.
10. Despite mentoring and skilled facilitation, some people may prove to be too nasty or hypersensitive to criticism.  You may need to exclude them from future battles, as foibles make it impossible for others to engage in constructive conflict.

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Reference

[1] (2010) Sutton, Robert I., “Good Boss, Bad Boss: How to be the Best and Learn from the Worst,” NY, NY,  Hachette Book Group, 237 Park Ave.

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