CHALLENGING INDIRECTLY

We can’t always create an environment in which upward feedback or input is readily accepted. Sometimes a leader feels threatened by direct confrontation or doesn’t value participatory processes. We may need to find ways that engage rather than alarm the leader when we want to challenge questionable ideas or behaviors. The problem is often the leader’s fixation on one idea, solution, or viewpoint. These are the blinders that have undone leaders throughout history.

A courageous follower chooses the right tool to help a leader examine options and their potential consequences. It is important to expand our toolkit so that we have the ability to indirectly challenge ideas and behaviors if that elicits dialogue rather than defensiveness. Anything that gets the leader to step a little to the side in viewing something is helpful. It begins a questioning process that can reveal flaws in the plan, unearth ways of proofing it against failure, enhance its potential, or lead to better alternatives. Simple questions we may ask to shift perspective include:

“Is there another plausible interpretation of what has occurred?”

“Is there another way we can look at this situation?”

“Does anyone have a slightly different take on this?”

Another indirect approach is to pose questions that others might ask the leader about his policy or behavior. Rather than directly challenging the leader, we are preparing him for challenges others may make in the less supportive arena outside the inner circle. A follower should become adept at asking “questions we might expect” such as:

“How would we respond to the concern that __________ ?”

“Could that appear to conflict with our values on __________ ?”

“How might ______ interpret that?”

“How would we answer charges that __________ ?”

“What alternatives might our stakeholders want us to consider?”

“What would we say if asked about other options we considered and why they were discarded?”

Once a dialogue is opened, the leader’s and followers’ underlying concerns can surface, options can be explored, pros and cons weighed, possible outcomes tested. Even leaders who are open to creative challenge will find “questions we might expect” helpful in clarifying their positions.