How the Universal Healthcare Debate Can Improve Your Leadership
So are you enjoying the debate over universal health care in the United States? Do you find the dialogue stimulating and refreshing? Each morning do you celebrate the progress the U.S. is making? Are you proud of how people are representing themselves? And do you find yourself full of excitement for the future and enthusiastic about contributing?
Pardon our sarcasm. It is presented here for the purpose of asking this: Go back to the top paragraph and substitute “universal health care” with any topic your company is facing right now. Do the answers to the question change? If they don’t, you’ve got an elephant in the office.
The toxic debate that’s being played out on the national stage is often replicated at the micro level within organizations . Countless companies are paralyzed because this elephant sits on top of their progress.
The Elephant
Somewhere, somehow some people got it in their heads that in order to get ahead, in order to move things forward, it was necessary to 1) Focus on where they don’t agree with their adversary, and 2) make the other team look stupid. It goes against all logic – yet these two approaches pervade much of society.
Consider the most important conversations that take place in any company. These are not the conversations occurring during meetings. On the contrary, it is the dialogue that happens in the one-on-one conversations outside of the meetings. This is where politics are played. And sadly, this is where too many people succumb to discussing strategies about what they don’t agree on and ways they can make the “opposing party” look bad.
You can change this today. And it’s relatively easy. Stomp this destructive elephant by:
- insisting that all parties start with and focus on where there is agreement. Start on common ground and build from there. And
- insist on making everyone look good. Be relentless in your creative pursuit of the solutions that serve everyone.
Then hang on – because your organization will move forward fast.
