cheap trust-builder : solicit the best version of the counter-argument against you

made w/ midjourney

No matter how noble and succinct your core values are, no matter how widely they are embraced and embodied, when you’re the leader, you are still likely to encounter reasonable skeptics. These are folks who weren’t born yesterday. It’s possible they’ve had some really rough experiences on the losing side of a power divide in the past. They are not about to be fooled again.

Pleading with such folks and preaching to them don’t go very far. It’s too easy for the skeptic to pattern match those behaviors with uses and abuses of power they’ve seen in the past. 

Leaders I’ve seen cut through that skepticism and build trust often solicit the best counter-argument against themselves. In a meeting, they don’t try to win the conversation. When they are the known decision-maker, that effort can feel gratuitous, even demeaning to others. You don’t have to win the conversation! You get to decide anyway. Geez.

If the leader seeks out the strongest version of the strongest counter-argument (the “steel man”), ideally from the person for/to whom that counter-argument is most important, they show that something matters to them other than the pure exercise of power. Something like “the truth,” or “clear reasoning,” or “democratic discussion.” 

-eric