What Options Do We Have?

2 January, 2012 By Leave a Comment

People take more ownership in delivering their own ideas than the ideas of others, and successful leaders know this.

Instead of just giving the answer (the solution), they ask their people for what they think the answer should be.  However, how a leader asks for the answer is important in having their people keep the ownership.

Some leaders often ask, “what do you think we should do?” or “what’s the best thing to do?”.   When you only ask for one thing, and you don’t happen to like it, you then need to convince your people to do something different.  Now, the answer is no longer their answer, but yours – the leader’s; and they will have less ownership in your answer than theirs.

The best way to ask “what options do we have?“.   Now, you get to coach your people towards what could be the best answer and they keep the ownership, as the source of the answer was theirs.

 

Filed Under: Blog, Influence, Ownership, Solutions

Get Everyone Involved

29 September, 2011 By Leave a Comment

When you hold meetings, do the people who do all the talking have the best ideas?  Also, could the people who stay quiet in the meetings have some good ideas too?  The best leaders know that the ideas for good solutions is always in the room, and their job is to have a process to get it out of their people’s heads and discussed.

Most meetings are consumed with 80% of the time getting the ideas out, and only 20% of the time in discussing the ideas.  Successful leaders drive their meetings in the exact opposite way.  They focus 20% of the meeting in getting the ideas out, and that leaves 80% of the meeting to discuss the ideas, and work them into some good solutions.

These successful leaders either ask for input from everyone prior to the meeting, or use post it notes (if a face-to-face meeting) to get the ideas out very quickly in the beginning of the meeting.  Remember, the ideas are always there…the only problem is getting the ideas out of the people’s head quickly so that you can get to discussing them much faster.

Lastly, getting everyone’s input has another benefit.  People who feel they contributed to a solution (however small that contribution) will always have more ownership for the solution too.

Filed Under: Blog, Ownership, Solutions, Teamwork