Point Lookout: a free weekly publication of Chaco Canyon Consulting
Volume 17, Issue 3;   January 18, 2017: On Differences and Disagreements

On Differences and Disagreements

by

When we disagree, it helps to remember that our differences often seem more marked than they really are. Here are some hints for finding a path back to agreement.
Many different viewpoints make for many different choices

Many different viewpoints make for many different choices

Usually, there's more than one way to convert disagreement into agreement. Choosing one can be tricky, though, because we so rarely appreciate all of what separates us or what distinguishes our views. Here's a collection of insights that might help find a path from disagreement to agreement.

  • If I don't think I can explain it to a child, maybe I don't fully understand it.
  • If it's urgent, go slow.
  • Accountability and blame are two very different things.
  • The problem is not the problem. The coping is the problem. — Virginia Satir
  • Questions are usually just questions. Even when they're counter-arguments in disguise, they're still opportunities for giving great answers.
  • When people I work with closely get into tangles, I'm probably involved in at least a minor way. Minor might still be significant.
  • In tangles, everyone has a role. Being a spectator is a role.
  • The person we all acknowledge as being involved in the trouble is only the person we're all willing to acknowledge. There are certainly others.
  • We probably aren't the first people in the world to get into this particular fix.
  • Our differences in this situation might contain echoes of our differences in another situation. Maybe one key to this situation lies in the other one. Unlocking this one might require more than one key.
  • Although there are some people at work who are actually trying to harm others, they are so rare that I probably don't know anyone like that.
  • The number of people who hold a particular belief isn't an indication of the correctness of that belief.
  • When I say something I later regret, I'm usually repeating a previous error.
  • For resolving differences, face-to-face is best. Phone-to-phone is next best. Voicemail is nuts. Anything involving a keyboard is totally nuts.
  • Nobody has an accurate view of everything. I might be mistaken on this.
  • There is almost always more than one way out.
  • When I think there is only one way out, I probably haven't thought about it enough.
  • When I Differences and disagreements
    are the doorways to growth
    think I've thought about it enough, and I still don't have a way out, I'm probably just tired. I take a break and try again later.
  • If I think I don't know what I want, maybe going for what I really want is too scary.
  • I can consider what to do about an unpleasant possibility without accepting that unpleasant possibility as inevitable.
  • I can't actually unsee what I've seen.
  • I can see in new ways things I've already seen in old ways.
  • I can see for the first time things I've never seen before.
  • I can see something for the first time only once.
  • I can't unlearn what I've learned, but I can learn what I haven't yet learned.
  • When somebody else seems to be trying mightily to make things worse, maybe I don't fully grasp what he or she is trying to accomplish.

This collection is a work in progress. rbrenyrWpTxHuyCrjZbUpner@ChacnoFNuSyWlVzCaGfooCanyon.comSend me yours. I'm always interested. Go to top Top  Next issue: How to Get Out of Firefighting Mode: I  Next Issue

101 Tips for Managing Conflict Are you fed up with tense, explosive meetings? Are you or a colleague the target of a bully? Destructive conflict can ruin organizations. But if we believe that all conflict is destructive, and that we can somehow eliminate conflict, or that conflict is an enemy of productivity, then we're in conflict with Conflict itself. Read 101 Tips for Managing Conflict to learn how to make peace with conflict and make it an organizational asset. Order Now!

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More articles on Conflict Management:

Spanish Walking Stick insect (Leptynia hispanica)Pariah Professions: II
In some organizations entire professions are regarded as pariahs — outsiders. They're expected to perform functions that the organization does need, but their relationships with others in the organization are strained at best. When pariahdom is tolerated, organizational performance suffers.
Two football teams face off at the line of scrimmageCovert Inter-Team Noncooperation
Occasionally teams find that they must cooperate with another team despite strong misgivings. Because noncooperation isn't an option, they find covert ways to avoid cooperating. Here's a little catalog of techniques of Covert Inter-Team Noncooperation.
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Some teams, business units, or enterprises are led not by individuals, but by joint leadership teams of two or more. They face special risks that arise from the organizations that host them, from the team they lead, or from within the joint leadership team itself.
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Some teams, business units, or enterprises are led not by individuals, but by joint leadership teams of two or more. They face special risks that arise from both the politics of the joint leadership team and the politics of the organization hosting it.
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Although retrospectives do foster organizational learning, they come with a risk of degeneration into blame and retaliation. One source of this risk is how we responded to issues uncovered in prior retrospectives.

See also Conflict Management and Conflict Management for more related articles.

Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout

A white water rafting team completes its courseComing December 11: White Water Rafting as a Metaphor for Group Development
Tuckman's model of small group development, best known as "Forming-Storming-Norming-Performing," applies better to development of some groups than to others. We can use a metaphor to explore how the model applies to Storming in task-oriented work groups. Available here and by RSS on December 11.
Tuckman's stages of group developmentAnd on December 18: Subgrouping and Conway's Law
When task-oriented work groups address complex tasks, they might form subgroups to address subtasks. The structure of the subgroups and the order in which they form depend on the structure of the group's task and the sequencing of the subtasks. Available here and by RSS on December 18.

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