Picture this, you’re on Zoom for the all hands meeting listening to the CFO talk expenses. He’s using all the buzz words as he delves into the ratios and reserves for the company. You can see the few people in the room with him and their eyes are glazing over. You start to drift off in your head as well until he says process improvement. Now you’re thinking about how your team all uses different software to download documents to their computers. The inefficiency always seemed like a small issue. Now it’s staring you in the face as a possible solution. You start to envision all of the ways choosing one software would help the company. You’d only have to create one process, all of the other training aids would only need to align with that one vendor. Then it hits you, the big savings come in IT only having to support one platform! This plan is amazing! Just as soon as you hit that excited high you begin talking yourself out of it. You come up with a couple reasons it might not work and then ask yourself, is this idea even worth sharing?
All at once your vision of your boss presenting you with the President’s Award next January for your outstanding fiscal responsibility is dashed. It’s replaced by thoughts of snide comments about how bureaucratic this company is. How they want to control everything. They maybe even lost money with this plan. Everyone on the team is crabby that their favorite platform wasn’t chosen. Ugh. How do you even know if the idea is worth sharing? Would I be better off keeping it to myself? Prefer the answer in video? Check out YouTube!
Why don’t we take the risk?
Deciding to share an idea usually follows this same process, regardless of the scope and audience. Meaning, telling your spouse you’re in the mood for Mexican tonight when you’ve been planning to eat leftovers takes the same mental path as recommending the Sr VP considers purchasing a new software. You think of the problem, a solution, excitement, the risks of implementing your solution, fear, and the risk of doing nothing. Your idea (or solution) has to have a lot of excitement and limited risk compared to current state to take the risks to consider the idea worth sharing.
The problem is we’re wired to prefer the pain we know. So, even if the software is costing the company a lot in the long run and is annoying to work with, we’ll still keep it because the risk and fear of changing holds us back. Add to that assessment in our own brains the fear of everyone else’s opinions on the matter. Even if we can convince ourselves that our idea is great, we then need to convince ourselves that everyone else will think so too. It is an uphill battle so it is no surprise that things tend to stay the same. We don’t want to take the risks on sharing.
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How do you know your idea is worth sharing?
Any idea you have is an idea worth sharing! (I’m getting a full vision of me in my cheer leading days with that one.) To some degree yes, that is sort of true. If you’r idea is honorable you should consider sharing it. That being said, in the real world there is such thing as a dumb question, and a bad idea. So if you can see yourself in that cycle now, or you know you have a tendency to talk yourself out of sharing great ideas, I want to help. Here are three questions to ask yourself to determine if your perspective is useful and if you have an idea worth sharing.
Does it advance the goals of the organization?
If your example is like the one used in the intro, you’re very likely already advancing the goals of the organization. This just means, are your ideas and plans aligned with what you and the team are tasked with accomplishing. This question requires a little more reflection with you develop an idea of of a pain point that you noticed yourself or heard from a co-worker.
For example, someone on your team complained, It’s so frustrating that I have to make all of these calls, and you got an idea to build a call free customer service department. This would be the time to ask yourself, does this advance the goals of the organization? Reducing calls based on this situation may or may not be a good idea so you need to consider why it would be in alignment as a baseline before moving on to the next step.
Do you know at least 2 alternatives?
One of the biggest mistakes I see new leaders make is being just a little too eager. First of all, I would much rather see someone too eager than too timid. However, I’m here to help you find the balance when possible. A great way to balance the eagerness to share your idea is to find alternatives to the solution you have. For example, in our example the idea was to choose the one best software. An alternative solution could be allowing everyone to choose the software that works for them but limiting what IT will support. Another alternative could be addressing why these employees are downloading documents at all, should this work be done somewhere else? Then there is always the alternative of doing nothing, more on why this is important in the next one.
Identifying alternatives doesn’t have to meant that you change your idea. Rather, it helps you gain clarity around why your idea works and is important. If considering alternatives really does make you think twice about a new idea or solution to share what a great problem to have. You just iterated on your idea before you even put it out there. Well done!
What is the risk(s) making the change, and of doing nothing?
Whenever possible you want to work with human nature. That means that we’re going to leverage all of those concerns that naturally start swirling in our head. When those risks and road blocks enter your mind, simply take note of them. Like in our example, there was a risk that the team might not be on board right away. Maybe there would be more work up front in the transition. Now, also consider and take note of the risks of keeping everything the same. For our example, there is a risk that we still pay out too much in expenses. People are still bogged down by duplicated processes for systems. When you’re deciding if you should share your idea, take note of those risks on all sides of your idea.
Keep in mind, there are risks and opportunities for every idea, action, and change. The goal isn’t to eliminate all of the risks but to make sure that you understand them and can make a clear decision using those risks, for all all sides, as support for the decision. At this stage in the game you’re just deciding whether or not to share your idea. You don’t have to have all the answers just a clear idea of what questions need to be answered if your idea would be implemented.
An idea worth sharing is worth sharing well
If you can answer each of these three questions, you’re ready to share your idea. You can be confident sending that email or setting that meeting to discuss your thoughts and collaborate on just how it will work. This is a great way to show leadership beyond your current level and demonstrate to your boss and their circle that you have great things to offer. Step into that spotlight with confidence. Frame your idea in a way that makes the most sense for them to say What a great idea! How do we get your thoughts on more of these things?!
This is the moment you’ve been prepping for friend. It might feel like you need an act of God to have them take your idea but really, you’ll drive your point home with your notes from above and simple plan for your communication. You can take those ingredients and create the perfectly crafted influential pie to demonstrate what is in it for them. If you’re ready to take this next step, the Ripple Effect workshop can get you completely ready. There you will workshop the change you want to see take form to present your idea with anticipation. Click here to save your seat!