The trouble with concensus
Consensus, stakeholder engagement, buy-in, continued business sponsorship, standards followed, fewer obstacles.
Design by committee, less effective decision making, 'all things to all men', group think, group polarisation, slow, distrust.
'grist to the mill', making it happen, get things done, more effective decision making, speed, trust, benevolent dicator.
No buy in, constant debate, dictat, favoured few, command & control, more obstacles, internal & external resistance.
Consensus requires engagement, engagement requires time, both from within and without. Consensus within large teams involves many people. Involving many people means many people are involved in many things.
Apartment thread the project and consensus is reduced. Small teams reach conclusions that are communicated but many people aren't involved in many things. The project is simpler to understand and more transparent. Trust is required, hard but once it's established is clearly beneficial. Each work packet has dedicated resource and energy is focused in one place. The project is invigorated and dynamic.
Everyone will attest to the fact that having someone working on multiple activities at the same time creates problems when tracking work or ensuring work gets done. However, it wasn't until this week that I realised how much consensus works to break down singularity of purpose. Consensus doesn't just make reaching decisions harder, it de-focuses the team. Worse, it's a slow acting poison. Initially reaching consensus makes life easier and more efficient. As the team grows the drip drip drip of consensus sets expectations. Before you know it, all the key players are on all the work streams, so they can all reach consensus.
I think it was really only this week that I realised just how significantly consensus de-focuses individuals.
Caveat
Consensus on small projects is easy, there is only a small group of people. My comments only apply to large projects where people end up being involved in N strands of work, just to ensure that consensus can be achieved.
Design by committee, less effective decision making, 'all things to all men', group think, group polarisation, slow, distrust.
'grist to the mill', making it happen, get things done, more effective decision making, speed, trust, benevolent dicator.
No buy in, constant debate, dictat, favoured few, command & control, more obstacles, internal & external resistance.
Consensus requires engagement, engagement requires time, both from within and without. Consensus within large teams involves many people. Involving many people means many people are involved in many things.
Apartment thread the project and consensus is reduced. Small teams reach conclusions that are communicated but many people aren't involved in many things. The project is simpler to understand and more transparent. Trust is required, hard but once it's established is clearly beneficial. Each work packet has dedicated resource and energy is focused in one place. The project is invigorated and dynamic.
Everyone will attest to the fact that having someone working on multiple activities at the same time creates problems when tracking work or ensuring work gets done. However, it wasn't until this week that I realised how much consensus works to break down singularity of purpose. Consensus doesn't just make reaching decisions harder, it de-focuses the team. Worse, it's a slow acting poison. Initially reaching consensus makes life easier and more efficient. As the team grows the drip drip drip of consensus sets expectations. Before you know it, all the key players are on all the work streams, so they can all reach consensus.
I think it was really only this week that I realised just how significantly consensus de-focuses individuals.
Caveat
Consensus on small projects is easy, there is only a small group of people. My comments only apply to large projects where people end up being involved in N strands of work, just to ensure that consensus can be achieved.
posted by Andy S at 4:23 AM
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