The Two-Objection Policy

Collaboration and consensus are important for Creatives, and as a leader, it's up to you to gather inputs and manage dissent. Both of these are important, but it's easy to either lose them, or let them get out of hand. You need a leadership approach that encourages healthy debate while allowing the creative process to move forward.

Strict, hierarchical structures and authoritative systems tend to stifle dissent and, by reducing the need for consensus, may also discourage people from taking the risk of presenting their ideas. If you have talented Creatives (and hopefully you do) these ideas they keep to themselves may be pretty good. Preventing good ideas from coming forward is what we call "a bad thing."

So you as a leader need to avoid pushing your Creatives toward a particular solution that you've chosen in advance without letting the conversation overwhelm the decision-making. Your job is not to force a specific solution; rather, your function as a leader is to force a decision to be made so progress can be achieved. You need to set timelines and identify the point by which a decision needs to be made so you can move on to the next phase of your project.

But this is tricky. How do you force the creative process to move forward without stifling dissent?

Consider "The Two-Objection Policy."

For a few years after college I worked in a crisis management organization, not as a planner but as an on-scene leader (yes, I know, I wasn't leading Creatives, but bear with me). When I led a team I often had to make critical decisions in a hurry without time for discussion. My hope was that our training had allowed us to work out scenarios in advance and understand requirements and capabilities, to the point that we would know what needed to be done. Of course, we couldn't prepare for every situation, and I certainly didn't know everything, so I needed an opportunity for dissent that could be addressed in a hurry. A boss taught me The Two-Objection Policy and it served me well.

The premise was simple. When a decision needed to be made I'd get inputs as time allowed, and ultimately I would say "we're going to do X." If a team member disagreed they needed to pop up and say, "no, I think we should do Y," and then convince me quickly. If I disagreed I'd say, "no, we're going with X." If they felt strongly enough about it they could take one more shot at convincing me, but if they still couldn't, their objections would stop and we'd go with my decision. Either way, the responsibility for success or failure rested with me.

How does this work for you? Simply put, when you reach the decision-making point on your timeline, you as the leader make the decision based on all the discussion and debate you've had. Any of your Creatives who disagrees has two chances to change your mind, but if they can't, then you press on. This only works if you explain your philosophy to them in advance and let everyone know how you work, so they know what they have to do to convince you, and also know when to accept your decision and move forward.

Your main role as a leader is to help your Creatives be successful. Use their ideas, but don't get so bogged down in debate that you never produce anything. It really doesn't have to be difficult, as long as you have a method for decision-making that everyone understands.