Build consensus
There’s a difference between explaining things repeatedly and actually getting people on board. To really build buy-in, you need understanding plus consensus.
Being transparent about your goals and decisions is a good start, but it has to coincide with feedback from employees.
“You definitely have to give people a chance to talk through it and give them the time to air their opinion,” Kupietzky says. “You hopefully have created good relationships so when there is a difference of opinion it’s not personal and it’s really based on different points of view.”
That’s where one-on-ones are useful because they give employees opportunities to ask questions and share opinions. You can show them the same information you see so they can understand the business side of things instead of reacting emotionally.
“When they take the time to understand the issues and see it from all the different points of view, they’ll come to the same conclusion [as you],” Kupietzky says.
At least that’s the hope. But sometimes, they’ll see all the information and still disagree. That’s when your conviction is crucial.
“Then you make sure it’s very clear a decision’s been made,” he says. “You don’t want to leave it hanging that, ‘Well, we can always reverse this,’ because then people will undermine it. So I tend to spend more time on, once we got to that decision — independent of how we got there — let’s just make sure we’re all bought in to it.”
Don’t confuse conviction with inflexibility, because you may have to reverse a decision. While being clear that your decision is made, you should also acknowledge potential obstacles.
“You explicitly call out that you’re aware of the risks and the challenges, and here’s how you feel we’re going to achieve them,” Kupietzky says. “You have to be optimistic but cautiously optimistic so people don’t think that you’re just drinking the Kool-Aid. Recognize, if you are wrong and it’s something that can be reversed, you still make that reversal and admit your mistake.”
If you acknowledge that the path may change, doesn’t it give employees reason to resist? Only if they feel like you’re making decisions without reason.
“If you’ve gone through a good enough process to ensure that the issues were raised, the decisions were vetted and then you make the call, I think generally people would prefer to be moving with work being done than stagnating,” Kupietzky says. “When everybody’s in their highest gear, they rarely get concerned if we are doing course corrections. It’s when people feel, because of the indecision we’re idling, that’s when people get frustrated. Even if we don’t know the right direction, it’s just so important to get people engaged and active because you can always get to that right place later.”
Of course, outcomes will ultimately determine whether employees are meeting goals to achieve the mission. But constant communication with them will keep everyone on board and aligned. That way, even if the direction changes you’ll all be moving together.
“It’s easier to change the direction once the train is moving on the tracks than it’s sitting in the station and you’re still trying to figure out which way to point it,” Kupietzky says. “I use that analogy a lot because I think we’re better off as an organization if we’re executing well. We can always figure out where to point if we all believe we know where we’re going. [That’s better than if] we can’t get out of the station because we’re not executing.”
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