Intelligent Disobedience
It's often stated that leadership can occur at any level in the organization. What's your opinion, do you believe this is true? If so, have you witnessed it? Leading is not for everyone. It takes courage and guts. During my career, I have worked for many leaders that were outstanding. I have also worked with others that are leaders in title only. To lead effectively, leaders simply cannot always make the popular decision or easiest choice. This is especially true when attempting to drive change. For an individual, project team, or organization, change occurs through dissonance. Some level of discomfort for those being asked to change will be necessary to incite change.
When I worked at Hewlett Packard several years ago, I had an individual on my team whose parents trained guide dogs for the blind. These dogs are purposely trained in the art of “intelligent disobedience” before they’re allowed to be used as guide dogs for the blind. As an example of intelligent disobedience, consider a blind person with one of these guide dogs waiting to cross a busy intersection. If the individual initiates a movement to cross the street at an unsafe time, the guide dog will “intelligently disobey” the command. Therefore, the individual learns to trust the guide dog to the mutual benefit of each.
Project managers are often the guide dogs who must resist doing what they are told to do by managers and customers. The ability to say “no” to the demands of powerful managers and customers that will put the project, and hence the organization, in harm’s way is not for the weak. As with actual guide dogs, this requires trust and empowerment. Without each, catastrophe awaits. For example, if a project manager does not feel he or she will be supported when refusing an ill-conceived “command”, it is likely that many projects will be doomed to failure. Consider the below conversation.
SPONSOR: “I need you to deliver this nine month project in five months.”
PM: “Sure, what scope can I remove?”
SPONSOR: “You cannot cut any scope, every item is critical to the success of the project.”
PM: “From where can I get additional resources to complete the tasks on the shortened timeline?”
SPONSOR: “There are no internal resources and we do not have any budget for contractors. This project must be completed with the resources we currently have, within the same budget and scope, only in five months instead of nine.”
Does this exchange sound all too familiar? According to failed project statistics the odds are very high that you’ve been involved in a discussion similar to this one. How do we intelligently disobey in such a way that those we’re disobeying are not made to feel talked-down-to, disrespected, or disobeyed? As with all communication, the secret is in the delivery. Remember the following actions to when faced with a situation of intelligently disobeying direction.
1. LET THEM SPEAK. It’s important to let them have their say. Allow them to finish their point-of-view and give the direction.
2. PAUSE. This is important. The pause allows you to let emotion subside and provides a time for you to plan your response. It helps if you’re able to think well on your feet. This is because during their speaking, you should be listening for understanding…not planning what to say. It’s also effective to follow the pause with an open-ended question.
3. ACKNOWLEDGE THEIR VIEWPOINT. This communicates to them that they’ve been heard and understood. Let them know that you understand their concern and are empathetic toward their view.
4. STATE YOUR POSITION. After your acknowledgement start by saying, “I understand your direction, but have you considered...?” By phrasing the question in this manner you provide them a way to save face (never underestimate saving face).
5. Do what you know is right. Do not sacrifice your integrity, morals, and/or ethics for anyone. It’s not always the easy choice, but you absolutely need to be able to face the person in the mirror every day.
Let’s now revisit the previous conversation applying these principles and see if we can make any difference.
SPONSOR: “I need for you to deliver this nine month project in five months.”
PM: “Sure, what scope can I remove?”
SPONSOR: “You cannot cut any scope, every item is critical to the success of the project. We also have no budget for additional resources.”
PM: “PAUSE (take a deep breath and relax)…What’s driving the need for the shortened delivery time?”
SPONSOR: “Our customer is nearing the end of their fiscal year. They must have delivery of the project before we can invoice them for the cost. If we do not deliver this in five months, we will miss this window and they will not have funding.”
PM: “I can certainly understand your concern. Have you considered that it may not be the right time to undertake this project? If we fail to hit the five month date we will have realize the project cost as sunk.”
SPONSOR: “Yes, I understand that. However, our profits have been lagging for some time. We need this project to succeed or we will not meet our forecast.”
PM: “I will do all that I can to optimize anything in the schedule that I can. However, I cannot commit at this time to such an aggressive schedule. Until I have a definitive answer on whether this is even remotely achievable, I will have to log and communicate the schedule risk to all stakeholders.”
SPONSOR: “Fine. Let’s just get moving.”
The project manager has not committed to anything. The sponsor has also been made aware of the risk the project manager will be monitoring and communicating to all stakeholders. If the project manager discovers that the five month schedule is not, in any way achievable under the constraints given, he or she should refuse to accept the project. As a project manager, if you have agreed to a schedule which is not realistic—you have failed as a project manager. It is not ethical to accept what you know is not realistic or achievable. Do you all of you PMP-certified project managers remember that from your exam studying days?
I hope this helps you in your project endeavors. I would love to hear your perspective on this topic. Until next time…be safe out there.
Ioan VINTOIU
April 5, 2010
The concept of ‘intelligent disobedience’ I love very much. I liked your article. Unfortunately, simply following-up the actions you mention is not enough. Reality is much harder. Indeed, intelligent disobedience is something that is missing from many project managers these days. I saw so many of them being just a ‘yes’ man within a team doing more harm than good for project, customer or his/her own organization. I like that you have mention also about the ‘Professional and Social Responsibility’.
Cheers.
Shamsuddin Surani
August 5, 2010
Very well written article with many good points. I like this.