Strategic Waiting

Sometimes waiting is the strategy of choice. Waiting can lead to the best outcome for all concerned, or if you aren't concerned for all, it can lead to the best outcome for you. Strategic waiting isn't procrastination. It isn't simply enduring the passage of time until whatever is happening (or not yet happening) stops happening (or starts). Strategic waiting is a choice to achieve favorable results, or to increase the chances of favorable results, by exploiting the passage of time.

In past issues, I've discussed several examples of strategic waiting in different situations. Here's a collection plus a couple more.

Take time to prepare your response to bullying

Most bullies know far more about bullying than their targets know about responding to bullying. When preparing to finally respond to the abuse, a common error targets make is to respond before they're really ready. Waiting to respond while making full preparations is a smart strategy. See "Biological Mimicry and Workplace Bullying," Point Lookout for March 31, 2010, for more.

Make space for others to volunteer

Usually, voluntarily taking responsibility for an unpleasant or risky task is appreciated. But volunteering is wise only if the degree of appreciation is in proportion to the risk or unpleasantness of the task. When in doubt, consider waiting to see if someone else volunteers. See "The Power of Situational Momentum," Point Lookout for February 24, 2010, for more.

Wait to accumulate solid evidence

When contemplating filing a complaint about someone's behavior or performance, be certain that you have a solid, documented case. Waiting for evidence to accumulate to a sufficient level is wise. See "The Power of Situational Momentum," Point Lookout for February 24, 2010, for more.

Solve problems with time

Creativity Strategic waiting is a choice
to achieve favorable results,
or to increase the chances of
favorable results, by exploiting
the passage of timehappens even when we aren't trying. Sometimes, setting a problem aside for a while is all that's required for generating the insight that opens the path to a solution. Waiting for your brain to work on the problem, in the background, can be a useful strategy. See "The Shower Effect: Sudden Insights," Point Lookout for January 25, 2006, for more.

Some problems vanish when solutions present themselves from unexpected sources, but that's more likely to happen if you give it a little time. And some problems are never resolved, but with time, resolving them can become unimportant or even irrelevant.

Let trouble be a lesson

Some people, groups, or organizations need to learn important lessons. For whatever reason, they don't heed warnings however sincere they might be. Waiting for a small example of the trouble foretold can be an effective means of changing minds, if the example is small enough to prevent major damage, but big enough to focus those minds.

Express opinions at the right time

When expressing an opinion sufficiently divergent from what most believe, prepare for opposition and rejection. That's acceptable. But if you express such opinions often enough, opposition and rejection happen independent of the opinion expressed. To limit this risk, wait for the group to move toward your view just a bit before expressing your view. Too much divergence, too consistently, erodes your credibility even if your views are usually valid.

How to use some of these waiting tactics might not be obvious. Give it time.  Top    Next Issue

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Related articles

More articles on Problem Solving and Creativity:

Figuring Out What to Do First

Whether we belong to a small project team or to an executive team, we have limited resources and seemingly unlimited problems to deal with. How do we decide which problems are important? How do we decide where to focus our attention first?

Asking Brilliant Questions

Your team is fortunate if you have even one teammate who regularly asks the questions that immediately halt discussions and save months of wasted effort. But even if you don't have someone like that, everyone can learn how to generate brilliant questions more often. Here's how.

Is the Question "How?" or "Whether?"

In group decision-making, tension sometimes develops between those who favor commitment to the opportunity at hand, and those who repeatedly ask, "If we do that, how will we do it?" Why does this happen?

Reactance and Decision-Making

Some decisions are easy. Some are difficult. Some decisions that we think will be easy turn out to be very, very difficult. What makes decisions difficult?

Virtual Brainstorming: II

When virtual teams must brainstorm, they try to do so virtually. But brainstorming isn't just another meeting. There's a real risk that virtual brainstorms might produce inadequate results. Here's Part II of some suggestions for reducing the risk.

See also Problem Solving and Creativity and Conflict Management for more related articles.

Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout

Coming July 18: High Falutin' Goofy Talk: III

Workplace speech and writing sometimes strays into the land of pretentious but overused business phrases, which I like to call high falutin' goofy talk. We use these phrases with perhaps less thought than they deserve, because they can be trite or can evoke indecorous images. Here's Part III of a collection of phrases and images to avoid. Available here and by RSS on July 18.

And on July 25: Exploiting Functional Fixedness: II

A cognitive bias called functional fixedness causes difficulty in recognizing new uses for familiar things. It also makes for difficulty in recognizing devious uses of everyday behaviors. Here's Part II of a catalog of deviousness based on functional fixedness. Available here and by RSS on July 25.

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