Decision Point: Listen or Win

Article no. 1: “For 364 days out of the year most of the world lives and works in monarchies not democracies, because we don’t know the difference.”

Article no. 2: Definitions for democracy, monarchy, and leadership

• democracy – A group of people collaborating to solve the problems that affect them.

• monarchy – Choosing one person and letting them make the final decisions.

• leadership – Those who implement the decisions of the monarch.

Article no 3: Definitions of historical versions of democracy

• Democracy 1.0 – Small-Scale collaborative problem solving through Direct Democracy

• Democracy 1.5 – Large-Scale Greek Direct Democracy with rotating leadership

• Democracy 2.0 – Large-Scale Roman Representational Democracy with career leadership

• Democracy 2.1 – British House of Commons under monarchy leadership

• Democracy 2.5 – US Constitutional Democracy w/ Checks & Balances and career leadership

• Democracy 2.9 – Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Democracy w/ Checks & Balances

It’s time for me to talk about the first of these new mechanisms of democracy. I’ve organized them into decision points along the path of life, taking a page from Robert Frost’s poem, “The Road Not Taken”. Unfortunately the paths are unmarked and the “right” choice can only be known after it has been taken, so instead I’m going to share these principles that I use to decide between life’s choices by thinking different.

Our choices at each of these decision points affect the following stages. So if we choose monarchy thinking at the beginning, we will have fewer opportunities to choose democracy thinking later. But the opposite is also true. If we choose democracy thinking earlier on, we give ourselves more choices further along our journey.

These decision points, however, will not be either/or choices because they are not opposites. These are two entirely different ways of thinking. For example, we can win a battle by understanding what caused it, or with zero knowledge. We can also understand the situation and then win or lose the battle. Where we choose to put our focus makes a huge difference. At each decision point, choosing the path to democracy will first make life 2x, then 4x, then 8x better the farther we go. But choosing the path to monarchy will first remove half of our options, then eliminate half of what’s left, then half again until eventually we grind to a halt. George Washington only decisively won one battle during the Revolutionary war, but the U.S. ultimately won their independence. Both sides wanted to win, but Washington focused on understanding. The British crown focused on winning.

The Path to Monarchy: Gathering Allies

Decision Point: Listen or Win

Historically our leaders were chosen by their ability to solve life-and-death problems. Their reputation, their success, and their very existence was decided by having the better solution. When decisions meant life and death, there were no opportunities to revisit choices, iterate on them, or explore better alternatives. The winners of a battle rated their leaders 10 out of 10 because the losers didn’t exist anymore. In the world of monarchies, solutions were, and still are, everything.

When we believe we have the right solution, the biggest challenge is getting people to accept it. In the time of monarchies, this was done through gathering allies. Leaders would do whatever they could to win supporters. They got married to powerful families, exchanged things of value, formed compromises, and waged wars to eliminate or subdue opponents. In our modern world all of these things still happen, though the battles are more frequently fought through debates, financing, and getting people hired or fired in positions of power.

A Note About Allies and Coalitions

As a reminder: these are not either/or choices. It’s not that building a network of allies is exclusive to monarchy thinking, or that if you are focused on finding allies and building coalitions that you are using monarchy thinking. In democracy we also make allies and build coalitions, but we do so by listening to others, understanding their problems, and aligning around common goals. In monarchy thinking, collecting allies is the goal, by any means necessary. In democracy thinking, we gain allies through aligning over shared problems.

The Path to Democracy: Listening to People’s Problems

Nowadays we usually don’t die when our plans have flaws. A better plan with a critical flaw can be adjusted and work better the next time around. When we don’t die, when we are still alive to understand the problem and fix it, we go farther faster than repeating our past solutions. As we evolved beyond killing the losers, we discovered that listening and understanding were more important than picking the right solutions.

The first step of democracy thinking is to understand people’s problems, before and separately from when we talk about solutions. Talk to people. Observe their lives. Get to know the problems and describe how we will both recognize those problems and recognize when those problems go away. When we find ourselves in an argument, the better choice is to pause the debate and switch to cataloging everyone’s problems instead. People are experts on their own problems, even if they don’t know how to solve them.

Einstein is quoted as saying, “If I had one hour to solve a problem, I would spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes solving it.” Identifying problems is not easy, but it is absolutely vital. If we never talk about what we want to leave behind, what the problem looks like and what caused it, we will never be able to see when the problem is solved. We end up stuck in a revolving door of solution after solution, lots of motion but going nowhere.

“If I had one hour to solve a problem, I would spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes solving it.” – Albert Einstein

Examples of Organizational Listening

Firstly, while I don’t have first-hand experience, it is said that in Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Democracy 2.9 everyone is allowed to speak. No decisions are made until everyone who wants to speak has had a chance. In addition, no decision is reached until each of the Six Nations agrees with each other through consensus. And before that happens there are multiple clans, e.g. the Heron, Turtle, and Bear clans, that exist across all of the Six Nations that speak for the needs of their clan members. Their system has many stages of listening.

Steve Blank revolutionized the study of entrepreneurism at Stanford through what he named “Customer Development”. Later championed by his former student, Eric Ries, the Lean Startup movement discovered that the worst thing for any new venture is to invest years working on a solution, only to release it to the world and discover that nobody cares. I had the pleasure of working for the Lean Startup Machine workshops around 2010, and the first thing we did was force people to “get out of the building” and go interview potential customers. It was a transformational experience for a whole generation of entrepreneurs.

Listening is a critical step in high-stakes situations as well. In his book, “Turn This Ship Around”, submarine captain David Marquet details how he stopped giving orders and switched to asking questions. He used this and other techniques to turn the worst-performing sub in the US Navy into a team that produced the highest score in preparedness that the Navy had ever assigned!

Or consider the example of Chris Voss, author of the book, "Never Split the Difference". Are you familiar with the phrase, “We do not negotiate with terrorists”? He is the reason that is NOT the policy of the United States. As the former lead negotiator for the FBI he learned that not listening was the shortest path to the worst outcomes. But he also learned that there is a huge difference between listening to terrorists and giving in to their demands. The first is vital. The second is optional.

It is also one of Stephen Covey’s “7 Habits of Highly Effective People”, namely, “Seek first to understand, then to be understood.” In Sociocracy, the importance of listening is one of the reasons that every meeting starts with a “Check in,” where we hear from everyone in the group before the main discussion begins. I learned from my friend, Laundrew, to start every meeting “with a 5-minute break.” It both allows time for people caught on other calls, but also makes space for those who are on time to connect as people before the meeting begins.

“Seek first to understand, then to be understood.” – Stephen R. Covey, “7 Habits of Highly Effective People”

Recommended Technique: The Advice Process

I first learned about the Advice Process through Frederic Laloux’s book “Reinventing Organizations”. It tells the story of “Teal” companies that run on the principles of democracy, like power company Applied Energy Services, tomato canning factory Morning Star, and healthcare services company Buurtzorg. They are some of the pioneers of Democracy 3.0. They all employ a process that Laloux shared under the name, “The Advice Process”. Essentially, if a decision is going to affect others, you must talk to those who will be affected BEFORE action is taken.

To clarify, there is an important part of the Advice Process that is usually unexpected and misunderstood. Like Chris Voss, you are not required to follow all of the advice that you receive. This process is not about “compromise”. It is an entirely new way of thinking, more like Stephen Covey’s “Think Win Win” principle from “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People”. The goal is to understand the unintended effects of our choices, gather suggestions, and then weave together a better solution that incorporates all of the feedback.

“If a decision is going to affect others, you must talk to those who will be affected BEFORE action is taken.” – The Advice Process

It exemplifies well the difference between democracy and monarchy. Democracy thinking leads us to help the maximum number of people, while hurting the fewest. Yes, a benevolent monarch also seeks to do this, but wanting to help the most and hurt the least is different than actually talking to those people to understand how the decision will help and hurt. And historically speaking, when benevolent monarchs did go out and listen to the feedback of the people, those were the seeds of democracy thinking.

Summary

What launches new projects in your organizations or community groups, a desire to listen or a desire to win? How many projects come to you with a vision for a solution already formed? How often do you go talk to the people affected by your work, before it affects them? Please share your favorite techniques for better understanding problems in the comments.

As the saying goes: While the best time to listen may have been months or even years ago, the second best time is now.

I recommend starting with the Advice Process. Go talk to or observe everyone who will be affected: leaders, employees, admins, accountants, lawyers, customers, suppliers, or at least sample groups of those people. Then you’ll be ready for Decision Point No. 2: “Prioritize or Plan”.

If you’d like to know more about how to use the Advice Process, leave a comment or send me a message. If you like where this is going or you're also fascinated with how to build better lives, subscribe below. I would enjoy discussing how to build a future where we all want to live. Please share this with others who you think should join the discussion.