Work with True Believers – Smile and Ignore the Rest
Someone who doesn’t believe in your vision never helps you achieve it.
Unbelievers:
Don’t waste time convincing unbelievers to support an effort they understand, but don’t believe in.
Work with true believers.
Encourage weak believers.
Ignore unbelievers.
One passionate unbeliever has more power than many half-hearted believers.
Dos and don’ts for dealing with unbelievers:
- Listen politely and ignore unbelievers. Nothing an unbeliever says will move the agenda forward. Their goal is to slow and stop progress.
- Appeasement is death to vision. Never appease a team member who doesn’t believe in the future you’re working to create.
- Throw gas on pockets of energy. Smile and work around foot dragging unbelievers.
- Distraction destroys progress. Change threatens the status quo. Don’t slow down to please unbelievers. They won’t be happy until you fail.
- Distract detractors. Give unbelievers assignments that move them out of the way.
- Don’t pollute a team of true believers with even one unbeliever. Destruction is easier than construction. It may seem kind to invite a resistor on the team. It’s death.
- Work with allies who have position and authority.
- If the person at the top doesn’t believe in the change, convince them, distract them, remove them, or work around them. If it’s not worth bleeding for, don’t do it.
- True believers may worry about appeasing unbelievers. Their ‘kindness’ is sincere, but destructive.
- Unbelievers complain when change gains momentum. They’ll ask you what you are doing about other problems and challenges. Smile and IGNORE THEM.
Lost momentum is seldom regained.
2 questions:
Success requires feedback. When receiving counsel, correction, or criticism, ask:
- Does this person believe in the vision?
- How does this counsel add fuel to the fire? When it comes to change, slowing down is death.
How might leaders lead change successfully?
How might leaders lead change successfully? Leaders need to be able to see beyond the wall,
the visions we develop become cloudy at times, should be open to to others visions as well, that share common bond. When visions don’t match be respectful of others as perhaps your vision needs modified to seek the plateau ones wishes to reach, climb every mountain independently!
Thanks Tim. I’m a believer in adapt as you go. However, changing the destination is more challenging.
The idea of getting input is very important, especially at the beginning. The nature of input changes after one has begun. At the beginning, it’s about ‘what’ to do. After you’ve launched, it’s about ‘how’ to do it. True believers work on ‘how.’ Unbelievers want to change the ‘what.’
I believe you have hit the nail on the head!
Thanks Tim. And thanks for being a regular contributor.
Dan this post was extremely profitable to me. I wish I ahd it three years ago. I have lived through what you stated about inviting unbelievers on the team. The project ended in disaster. Thanks again for this timely post.
Thanks Willis. You experienced what so many of us have. This post is written from my own experience. Any lessons you might see were learned at great cost.
Why would we ever allow someone who doesn’t believe in what we’re doing to have any significant influence.
Inspired by your post, I revamped your two ending questions for my office whiteboard to help my team stay focused. I wrote: Vision is like a fire. 1. Do you like the warmth? 2. Are you carrying gas or a fire extinguisher? Hoping it will ‘spark’ conversations!
Thanks Tim. It’s all about the conversation. 🙂
In my work culture, I particularly see #9 a lot have even been that person in the past. The experience of losing momentum and fire among team and project/vision believers too many times painfully taught me that lesson. A great reminder to stay steady and fuel the flames of passion while ignoring the opinions of those that don’t share the dream.
Thanks John. I shudder to think of the times that I slowed down to appease an unbeliever. It’s a sure way to live a life of mediocre impact. There will always be differences of opinion. The problem is allowing some who doesn’t like something be the reason you slow down. Typically, they don’t have anything better to offer. They are great at being against. They are also great at wanting someone else to do things while they watch from the sidelines.
I wholeheartedly believe in this concept!
Thanks Katie.
Love the first line of this post. Great inspiration today!
Thanks Emily.
Dan, Your posts are consistently clear and inspirational, and this one certainly fits that, too. I can think of numerous ways to apply it to my own work. And, when I read it not to fit my own perspective and situation but in the current political climate of the U.S., I shiver, imagining whole groups of people (usually those already disenfranchised in some way) easily labeled as unbelievers and pushed further out of the discussion. What am I missing here? Am I unfairly extrapolating your words into a situation you did not and do not intend? Thank you for your work.
Thanks Jeffrey. I write from an organizational/leadership point of view, not politics. I realized, about half-way through writing this post, that it might seem like an endorsement of Trump’s agenda. Actually, I was reflecting on a couple of major blunders in my own leadership journey.
I decided to post it, even though it could be taken as a political statement. It isn’t.
I hope compassion for the disenfranchised is different than allowing ‘unbelievers’ to control the agenda. Someone who wants to make something better is different from someone who wants to stop something. (I write from an organizational point of view.)
Finally, if you does not have enough consensus, it doesn’t matter what you try to do.
Every change effort has detractors. If you let them control the agenda, nothing will change. If you aren’t willing to bleed for what you believe in, find something else to believe in.
Thank you, Dan. I very much appreciate this response; it clarifies / emphasizes for me the strong points you were making. Thank you.
So glad you joined in.
I agree with this wholeheartedly with one small caveat – I would use caution with “ignoring” contrary input. Sometimes those angry contrarians actually have a good point. Once that input has been evaluated as not valuable to the endeavor, THEN ignore any further input on the topic. And be ready to have a specific “why.” A well thought out plan trumps resistance to change.
Thanks Nathan. A closed mind should be different from ignoring those who want to stop you. The latter is foolish. The former is necessary.
What I’ve found is that skillful unbelievers often try to make it look like they are being helpful. They want to soften the change. They use language that makes them seem like they care for others. Their ultimate goal, however, is stopping change. (Slowing change is the same thing as stopping it. It just takes longer.) The danger of skillful unbelievers is they just come across as being concerned for you and others.
Being polite is always appropriate. However, the real issue is are they trying to fuel progress or slow it.
Listen to people who believe in what you are trying to accomplish, especially when they offer constructive dissent. Be polite, but ignore people who don’t believe in what you are trying to accomplish. They aren’t trying to help you, even if they say they are.
Dan, hi, I think I understand what you are saying but if someone on my team, even one is saying ‘what we are doing is wrong’, I will make time to be infected by him. Especially if the person is known for pulling the oar generally. The only person who is entitled to unquestioning believers is the One who is 100pct right. Not us humans, alas. Thanks so much for this place you’ve created to discuss these matters
Thanks Cate. I’m writing about change. If there are no ‘unbelievers’ the change isn’t worth pursuing.
This is not about moral absolutes. This is about what you want to accomplish as a leader. Not everyone will buy into it. This is as it should be. In my experience, the sooner we come to this, the better off everyone is.
The alternative is limping along trying to appease someone who doesn’t buy in.
Thanks so much for jumping in today.
Thanks, Dan. I was finally able to push out an unbeliever after 3 years of turmoil. 6 months in, I knew we were in for trouble. I progressively quarantined her from the rest of the team. It’s a new day and I can’t wait to set this team loose on an unencumbered vision!
Thanks Rad… It’s painful, but necessary. Being helpful to someone who wants to stop you is putting a knife to your own throat.
Very true! …And please, call me robotank.
Got it. 🙂
You can’t be serious … !?
Vision is a function of the imagination …
it is SEEING SOMETHING THAT DOESN’T EXIST.
(though perhaps it could, or “should”).
EVERY vision has to be cultivated,
tempered, and modified
by the reality in which it is to be borne –
which includes garnering the participation of those
who, at first, may be disbelievers …
but must either die off, or be persuaded
before the vision can get traction
and become/be “made” real;
otherwise, it is simply a “revelation” –
a view of another world(view) [like, say, the “afterlife”]
that can be neither proven or disproven.
“True” believers tend to ignore the empirical (practical) reality
and have been (emotionally) manipulated and/or coerced into “giving” of themselves and/or those they are responsible for/obligated to;
which results in a CULT. That never works well for civilization; or the cultist.
(speaking as a designer … bridging synthesis and analysis as a habit).
Thanks Eric. You added some useful stuff and, in my view, some stuff that goes beyond the intent of this post.
Yes, I am serious.
You suggest cult-like blindness. I’ve written about the value of seeking constructive dissent. However, people who don’t believe in the change effort disagree to prevent progress. People who believe in the change disagree with the intent of making things better.
If you are concerned that leaders might come down from ‘on high’ with a vision they haven’t explored and developed with others, we are on the same page.
Having said that, if you can lead any significant change effort with people who don’t believe in the change, you need to write a book.
Thanks for adding to the conversation.
I don’t write books … a failure of opportunism, I suppose; I get “normal” people to act and achieve (excellence). All politics is local (first).
“The truth in what one says is in what one does.”
To ignore the opposition is to invite “whiplash” and/or “blowback.”
Witness the US election 2016 … progressives not only “ignored” the suppressed opposition, they “deplored” them – a major mistake of arrogance and willful “ignorance.” That would be whiplash … now we have a demagogue in chief … no good for anyone of average means or ways.
It’s not about “belief” (faith) so much as it is about “will” (capacity). Change is inevitable – whether progressive or conservative – it’s about temper and humaneness. The true question is whether human nature “changes” in proportion to the speed at which human “reason” changes … written history spews an emphatic, “NO!” … it doesn’t. That’s the (inevitable) blowback.
We all struggle with the eternal essential tension between the progressive impulse (to improve) and the conservative impulse (to maintain) our advantages.
To “ignore unbelievers” is to invite catastrophe. With all due respect.
Perhaps I am misunderstanding but are you advocating in this post for the establishment of an echo chamber as a primary strategy in goal attainment. When does a common team focus become too focused?
I have seen for myself how destructive it can be when even a single wrong person is added to an effective team. That said, I have also seen teams destroyed an great waste as a result of narcissism fostered when top leaders surrounded themselves with lieutenants unwilling or afraid to truthfully report potential problems or suggest alternatives.
The means adopted to achieve a target and bring a project into shape, in my opinion, is as important as achieving the goal itself. Persons insisting to go by correct procedure to steer a project and averse of manipulating the rules of the game, may run the risk of getting labelled as ‘Non-believer’. If so, the project and the organisation may do well to recognize the point brought out by the so called ‘Non-believer’ than simply ignore him/her.
Love this piece! It did make me wonder, a lot, about two groups of unbelievers trying elected to work together–i.e. School Boards, Legislators!