Back in the days when I was owner of the vision, head of development and product manager of a dotcom startup I had this really great boss. He was creative, supportive, caring, trusting, fun, really intelligent, self confident and, well, he had most all of those treats you wish all your bosses should have. Yet, he used to do one thing that puzzled and even annoyed me at times. It was when we were preparing for a meeting.
I have this way of always trying to be on the offense and to own the initiative. Not always succeeding, of course, but I imagine that thinking positive will help. I guess I’m a incurably naïve.
My boss of back then also was one to want to own the initiative. But he, generally, had a different approach. He played it defensively. Covering all bases. To do that you need to be able to think negatively. There’s the source for my annoyance. I just have a hard time following the line of thought when it goes the negative way. When preparing meetings I had to endure my boss when he raised the arguments against our case. What if they say this? What if they argue that? To me it’s “So, what if? Our offer is excellent! Let’s focus on exposing that!” I don’t want to cover all bases. I don’t want to imagine all the shit that can happen.
Yes, I’m biased. But I honestly think that my general approach is better. Go full force with your thing! If you feel it’s not good enough to throw your full support behind it, then chose another thing. Make sure you work with something you really believe in. And hone your blade. But hone it for attack. For defence trust your reflexes. Apply positive thinking. Playing the Devil’s advocate just drains your energy resources. At least it has that effect on me.
Addendum June 11 2009: I wrote this article when I was a bit upset. I’m glad that I did, but still, I think I should have asked Joakim Ohlrogge to write instead. Here’s his take (pasted from the comments):
A thought: I despise DAs more than I like them. But the question is if it is really DAs I despise or if I despise idea-poachers. It’s hard enough the get ideas to fly even without having a sniper shooting them down before they take off. It’s often all too easy to come with a “what if” and I’ve experienced some people who make it their task to figure out every obscure situation that could possibly go wrong. There needs to be some rime and reason. You can always find something that goes wrong, after all, we work with software.
I would not want to be without DAs but I don’t want them to take up more time than daring enthusiasts do. Also, they are not there to prevent disasters, they are there to inspire different though paths. A DA can never replace the ability to respond promptly when “shit happens”.
#1 by Jelena on May 28, 2009 - 00:18
Hi,
I agree that positive thinking is a great asset, but a Devil’s Advocate role can be a good tool against groupthink. I personally do not like a designated DA person, ideally everyone should feel free to give pros and cons in the process of deciding.
Maybe have a DA card that is rotating between persons within a group when making common decisions that may help people to say what they really think and do not dare otherwise, if it is a critic. Or run a 5 minutes where everyone writes post-it notes with pros and cons, and go through them together – that can be fairly anonymous, if needed.
Interestingly enough, there is almost always a person who takes on DA’s role himself, free willingly. Maybe those persons do have different thinking patterns than majority, but for their own, and the group’s good, I think it is better to alternate role, or ideally, as said, to nourish an environment where everyone is free to say what they think, even when negative.
All this I am writing relates to a group. About your concrete example – I think that it would probably bore me to have a person that behaves like that before every meeting, if I have to listen to it. But I am not a fan of extensive preparations for meetings, I also like to take care of things and questions when they come up.
#2 by PEZ on May 28, 2009 - 09:17
Indeed, the example is from a small team of two. But I don’t like the DA approach even in larger groups. There are much better ways of fighting group think.
However, I think I failed to make it clear in my blog post, my intent is _not_ to create an environment where things can’t be questioned. Far from it. I agree with EA in their slogan “Challenge Everything”. My colleagues sometimes hate me for it. Some of them sigh and say things like “PEZ always have to take the opposite stance”. I bet they sometimes think I’m playing the Devil’s advocate! (I’m not, I just have a weirdly wired brain.)
There’s a timing issue here. Before deciding for the next move, don’t be afraid to challenge common sense and don’t let group think lower the quality of your decisions. Indeed think about pros _and_ cons. Just make sure the cons are honest, not something you make up to balance things up. (I.e. no DA stuff!) And then, when you know what you want, what you believe is the right course. Then go full force in that direction. Think positively. Grab that initiative. Take that element of surprise and make it yours.
In me you have a friend in that “take care of things when they come up”. It’s just Muda to spend time on them before. Like with that boss of mine. I think that only once did any of his DA scenarios actually happen. Yes, maybe we had a quicker response than otherwise. But what about all that time spent on scenarios that never played? He needed it for comfort I guess. Me, I don’t seek comfort! I like surprises. And by like I mean love.
#3 by Jelena on May 29, 2009 - 16:32
I would trade trade at least 3 devil’s advocates for one daring enthusiast, any day!
Intuitively and emotionally I just do not like DA’s role either. It is one of those unfortunate tools that still do work in certain situations, they really do. Maybe if there are no enthusiasts around… I do not know, it is in a way similar to the Good cop/bad cop routine… it creates emotional variations within a group, and sometimes that is needed, to stir the group up.
#4 by PEZ on May 29, 2009 - 20:44
I think maybe it’s the DA _role_ that’s the problem, as you have been suggesting all the while. If it’s not a role than it could probably be a good tool at times.
But you can also try to split the meeting up in time slices. Odd slices is for creative thinking, even slices for logical thinking. During creative think, idea generation, people are not allowed to say words like “good” or “bad”. During logical think time all help in trying to see pros and cons with ideas generated during the creative time slot. Choose ideas to keep working on. Then enter creative mode with those again. Two, three pairs of creative-logical and you might end up with something quite amazing.
#5 by Joakim Ohlrogge on June 11, 2009 - 08:46
A thought: I despise DAs more than I like them. But the question is if it is really DAs I despise or if I despise idea-poachers. It’s hard enough the get ideas to fly even without having a sniper shooting them down before they take off. It’s often all too easy to come with a “what if” and I’ve experienced some people who make it their task to figure out every obscure situation that could possibly go wrong. There needs to be some rime and reason. You can always find something that goes wrong, after all, we work with software.
I would not want to be without DAs but I don’t want them to take up more time than daring enthusiasts do. Also, they are not there to prevent disasters, they are there to inspire different though paths. A DA can never replace the ability to respond promptly when “shit happens”.
#6 by PEZ on June 11, 2009 - 09:45
You nailed the problem much better than I did. I updated the article. Now people can first get confused by my ranting and then saved by your coherence. =)