Disagreement

Many of us who have managed teams before know the good and bad of hearing our team member's thoughts and complaints. We also know of our own frustrations with operations, practices, environments, and other forms of work life.

I believe it is the leaders responsibility to pull from their team constructive criticism and to encourage everyone to challenge the process and to continually refine their efforts.

The challenge is to encourage disagreement and healthy conflict while maintaining morale and team work.

One principle I believe in with teams is a policy on complaints. It's simple... you're welcome, ALWAYS, to share a complaint... but it must come either with a good resolution suggestion or in proper humility.

Leaders fail if they create environments that are not conducive to challenging the process, but there is a means and method for doing that properly. If someone does have a problem, how great is it for them to know and be encouraged to come to the table with a solution.

Complaints do nobody any good, but complaints with solutions not only help solve the problem, they build team work and camaraderie of group effort.

Humility of spirit is also important to me in this topic as well. If someone doesn't have a solution, that's still okay... but I do look for an attitude of humility and a desire to see a solution (though not having one to offer).

This policy among others is extremely important for your team to hear you communicate. You must open the door for people to disagree and challenge the process. It takes strength to hear the bad of your world, but in the end, everyone is better off for having expressed what's in need of repair.

Challenge: Be strong in your leadership to proactively encourage disagreement and opportunity to challenge the process, but set the expectations for your team as well in how to do that.