When you would like steering teams and employees to make decisions that are in line with the vision of the organization, make sure they know the vision!
I had a short discussion with a colleague last week about if we should leave a decision over to a team or should come with a proposal our selves. I had to make a compromise with him in the end. You read my arguments to leave the decision to the team in this blog.
I believe in self steering teams and empowering the knowledge of your employees. Assuming you have qualified people in your project, you should do everything to use their knowledge and experience. You as, manager or as management team have limited knowledge because you are alone or just with a small group of people. The more people think about an issue, the better the solution. You could make a decision or a proposal for an improvement and discuss this improvement with your employees to get feedback. However, it will be your decision or proposal, it will never be completely owned by the employees.
I believe you should be as transparent as possible in your vision or goals of your organization. When the employees know your vision or goal, they will come up with proposals to reach this vision or goal. Additionally, they will feel owner of the improvement and will do almost everything that is in their power to realize the improvement. If they disagree with the vision or goal, they could decide to leave the organization. However, I think you prevent this if possible because this could be waste of knowledge.
When you are not transparent in your goal, it is almost impossible for your employees to come up with proposals for improvement. You can’t empower people when you have a secret or hidden agenda.
It is the partially same as with children. When they do something that is not allowed, for example playing with fireworks. You tell them they are not allowed to play with fireworks, but also why it is not allowed. Even better is to explain why they are not allowed to do something before they would do it.
Please leave your comments…
Hello Ralph,
good post, in general I totally agree to you.
There´s one disadvantage I see: The more people are involved in a decision finding process, the longer it will take to come to a decision, imho this shouldn´t be underestimated.
And for children: I´ve made the experience, to forbid to do something, will make it even more attractive to do something. Especially for exciting things like fireworks. 😉
Regards,
Christian
Thanks for your comments.
Indeed, that could be a risk. However, when you also indicate there is a deadline, the team will respect the deadline.
Haha, some children are indeed attracted to something that is forbidden. Better could be to allow them to play with fireworks and also make sure they aware of the risks.
But, sometimes things have to be because mother-says-so… I think children below ten should never be allowed to play with fireworks. They will not understand the risks. In that case, you have to forbid playing with firework. Arguments won't work in that case. The same could happen with your development team. If you have knowledge that a certain approach is to dangerous, and the team is not able to understand. You could inter vent. However, when the fails, or make a mistake, they will learn also…