Receiving Input & Creating Alignment — Redbubble Leadership Curriculum
Tags: Alignment, Leadership, Inclusion, Collaboration, Bias

The leadership curriculum series covers topics that we feel are relevant to the development and continuous evolution of our leaders. For previous articles, check out our leadership collection.

Last month, we challenged you to all look inside. To uncover your mindsets and big assumptions around collaborative planning.

This time around, we are going to focus on the collaborative aspect of planning. For you as a leader this is all about being able to receive and accept input, as well as create alignment, and a major aspect of doing this well is creating an inclusive environment.

Interlude: Diversity & Inclusion

We all understand diversity and inclusion are good things. And sometimes these two concepts are used synonymously. But they’re not. Diversity is a state of a company, inclusiveness is part of the culture. Yes, you can have a short-term impact on your diversity numbers (e.g. through hiring), but without being inclusive, those changes won’t last.

Why is Inclusion challenging?

In one word: Biases.

Our brain makes lots of decisions in split-seconds. And by default, most of those are exclusionary. This is not because we’re bad people, but has to do with what’s in our DNA (e.g. fight or flight) and our experience to this point (e.g. parents, school, etc). We even tend to do worse in moments of pressure or stress

Some common types of bias:

Similarity Bias — birds of a feather / people like me

Confirmation Bias — looking for what we expect to see

Groupthink — consensus over common sense

Stereotypes — generalisations and exaggerations

When it comes to collaborative planning, let’s look at how these biases might show up.

Similarity Bias

I am in the same office as you, therefore I’ll trust you more than someone overseas

You and I play table tennis at lunch time, so your opinion must be good

You’re a peer to me, so your opinion is worth more than others

Confirmation Bias

You last idea didn’t work out, so this one can’t be good either

The last time our two teams worked together it didn’t go so well, so I won’t listen to ideas that involve collaboration

Groupthink

All leaders agree that this is a good idea, so it must be

There’s more men than women in this team, so we’ll go with whatever the men think

Folks in my office think this may work, so I won’t listen to concerns from another office

Stereotypes

You come from a different (professional) background, so your ideas can’t be any good

As a woman you must be less technical that us men, therefore your ideas must be worse

None of these biases are vocalised or conscious — at least not often. This all happens within a split second and you’re not even aware of them!

At a high level, we need to challenge our biases and default responses by:

Staying open to new ideas — from different people

Sit with ambiguity — experiment with new solution

Challenge stereotypes — avoid biases and assumptions

Flex and adapt — to new realities

Let’s put this into practice with some hands-on exercises and examples.

Objectivity Hacks

Thinking tools to guard against biases:

Make devil’s advocate a formal role that rotates through the team

Serial questioning, e.g. 5 Why’s

Get opinions from folks outside your team and outside your office

Neuroplasticity

Help the brain by directing the attention:

Be mindful and catch biases in the moment, e.g. watch your language

Notice when you’re stressed or under pressure

Framing Nudges

Flipping the default, e.g. assume it’s a great idea

Changing the frame, e.g. revisit all the things that didn’t work previously

Process Nudges

Be a neutral observer in some sessions

Make it a habit to take turns in group conversations

Inclusive meetings

Run your plan past folks outside the team

Being more inclusive doesn’t happen overnight, but we can make a big difference by starting with a tiny habit. Even if we get only 1% percent better today, and another 1% next week, it’ll all add up and compound over time.

Recap & Reflection

Collaborative planning can only happen if you’re providing an inclusive environment, which depends on how well you can manage yours and your team’s biases.