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I think you listen too much to the soldiers. No lesson seems to be so deeply inculcated by the experience of life as that your should never trust experts. If you believe the doctors nothing is wholesome: if you believe the theologians, nothing is innocent: if you believe the soldiers, nothing is safe. They all require to have their strong wine diluted by a very large admixture of insipid common sense. – Lord Salisbury’s advice to an increasingly alarmist Viceroy in India (via Joshua-Michele Ross of Opposable Planets)
In a prior post I wrote about the value of sandpaper within an IT organization. The challenging of ideas and building a better organization through people voicing their perspectives. As this concept takes root the natural question is what is the implications to managing in this environment.
Let’s put Lord Salisbury’s quote in the context of an IT department. If you have developed your culture where there is a healthy sandpaper to challenge ideas, there will be no shortage of voices to listen to. Are they all equal in volume? Are they all equal in critical thinking? Are they all equal in importance? The obvious answers are no, no, and no.
Every voice will be speaking from its personal perspective. It may have a broad perspective, but will necessarily be biased. Some voices will be headlining the positive, others the negative. How much of either is played up or down will be a personal attribute of the individual voices.
It is necessary to differentiate the message from the agenda. Sometimes the message is a façade designed for a purpose other than the message itself. The payload in this case is more in the driving a reaction or behavior than in the message itself. It is necessary to understand how the messages support /amplify or negate / mute each other. Confusion arises when the messages are contradictory. A clearer understanding occurs when there are congruences.
Where is the insipid common sense as Lord Salisbury describes in the quotation above? In many ways this comes from knowing the people behind the voices. It will become second nature to hear what is not said, as well as what is said. The level of hierarchical authority will play less importance than the domain authority. The valuable insight will be distinguished from the less meaningful banter.
No magic bullets here. Many alerts and alarms. As you shape your organization, and transform it to it next phase there will be many voices with many messages. Where you place the filters and microphones will be important. Get it right and you will be well on your way to understanding more of your world. Get it wrong and you will quickly feel your decent.
