In our quest to be more inclusive leaders and harness the potential of our teams, we often face challenges in our group governance norms, particularly decision making. Mastering the art of collaborative decision-making is crucial for any leader, as it involves bringing out the best from the group they're leading.
Leaders who facilitate collaboration and foster empowerment allow team members to actively participate in brainstorming, feedback, and decision-making. Striking a balance between achieving consensus and making timely decisions is like walking a tightrope - it's challenging but vital for the team's health. By appreciating the need for balancing consensus and efficiency, facilitative leaders foster environments where informed, inclusive, and prompt decisions take the place of the top-down, closed-door decision making norms.
Harmonizing Consensus & Efficiency
Collaboration and consensus-building are critical to a sound decision-making process. Embracing diverse perspectives and involving team members leads to stronger and more informed decisions. However, an endless quest for consensus can lead to prolonged discussions, delayed decisions, and diluted solutions. This can drain the team's momentum, deter participation, and hinder progress. As such, leaders must constantly adjust to find the sweet spot between consensus building and swift decision-making.
Consensus is achieved when team members unite in agreement on a specific course of action. When stakeholder’s opinions are honestly invited and considered, they are more likely to support the final decision, even if it's different from their initial preference. This sense of ownership and commitment boosts team morale, accountability, and performance. However, the pursuit of complete consensus can lead to stagnation or decision paralysis. Leaders must therefore develop strategies and evolve decision-making tools to quicken the process while enhancing inclusivity.
Trying To Find A Balance
Establish Expectations & Deadlines: A good starting point for balancing consensus and efficiency is defining the process upfront. Clear expectations and deadlines for decision-making (e.g., the decision-making method, timeline, and how stakeholders' input will be incorporated) should be outlined. This maintains urgency and helps team members focus. It also helps participants understand their level of influence throughout the process.
Adopt A Structured Process: While there are many potential meta processes for decision making, they typically include: defining the problem, gathering input from team members, discussing potential solutions, and making a decision based on the information collected. Being explicit about this process and where your team is in the process creates focus, and supports people in healthfully collaborating as they know where they are on the map, as they navigate the ins and outs of the associated terrain.
Practicing Inclusive Decision-making
Welcoming Diverse Perspectives: To make more inclusive decisions, facilitative leaders actively create the safety needed to invite non-normative perspectives. We can accomplish this by imbuing our group processes with multiple intelligence theory, allowing for multiple forms of input and expression throughout the process. By cultivating an environment where diverse opinions are valued and expressed, leaders foster environments of trust and transparency where creative and innovative ideas get co-created.
Deploy Non-binary Voting Processes: They require us to vote for/against or yes/no, when in reality, our informed opinions are more nuanced than a simple "Yes" or "No." Fortunately, we can express our complex thoughts on convoluted challenges more effectively using evolved decision-making processes like gradients of agreement, ranked-choice voting, and dot selection.
The delicate balance between consensus and efficiency is essential for effective collaboration and inclusive decision-making. By defining clear expectations, implementing a structured decision-making process, fostering inclusivity, and using more nuanced decision-making processes, facilitative leaders empower their teams to make informed, collaborative, and timely decisions. This balance ultimately enhances team performance, morale, and impact.
