While there is nobody in the world who will share your point of view on everything, there are people who will share your most important values and the ways in which you choose to live them out. Make sure you end up with those people.
* Source: Principles by Ray Dalio
In jazz, there’s no script: You have to figure things out as you go along. Sometimes you need to sit back and let others drive things; other times, you blare it out yourself. To do the right thing at the right moment you need to really listen to the people you’re playing with so that you can understand where they’re going.
All great creative collaboration should feel the same way. Combining your different skills like different instruments, improvising creatively, and at the same time subordinating yourself to the goals of the group leads to playing great music together. But it’s important to keep in mind what number of collaborators will play well together: A talented duo can improvise beautifully, as can a trio or quartet. But gather ten musicians and no matter how talented they are, it’s probably going to be too many unless they’re carefully orchestrated.
a. 1+1=3.
Two people who collaborate well will be about three times as effective as each of them operating independently, because each will see what the other might miss—plus they can leverage each other’s strengths while holding each other accountable to higher standards.
There are many reasons why meetings go poorly, but frequently it is because of a lack of clarity about the topic or the level at which things are being discussed (e.g., the principle/machine level, the case-at-hand level, or the specific-fact level).
a. Make it clear who is directing the meeting and whom it is meant to serve.
Every meeting should be aimed at achieving someone’s goals; that person is the one responsible for the meeting and decides what they want to get out of it and how they will do so. Meetings without someone clearly responsible run a high risk of being directionless and unproductive.
b. Be precise in what you’re talking about to avoid confusion.
It is often best to repeat a specific question to be sure both questioner and responder are crystal clear on what is being asked and answered. In an email, this is often as simple as cutting and pasting the questions into the body of the text.
Being effective at thoughtful disagreement requires one to be open-minded (seeing things through the other’s eyes) and assertive (communicating clearly how things look through your eyes) and to flexibly process this information to create learning and adaptation.
I have found that most people have problems being assertive and open-minded at the same time. Typically they are more inclined to be assertive than open-minded (because it’s easier to convey how they see things than to understand how others do, and also because people tend to have ego attachments to being right) though some people are too willing to accept others’ views at the expense of their own. It’s important to remind people that they have to do both—and to remember that decision making is a two-step process in which one has to take in information as well as decision. It also helps to remind people that those who change their minds are the biggest winners because they learned something, whereas those who stubbornly refuse to see the truth are losers. With practice, training, and constant reinforcement, anyone can get good at this.
It is harder to run an idea meritocracy in which disagreements are encouraged than a top-down autocracy in which they are suppressed. But when believable parties to disagreements are willing to learn from each other, their evolution is faster and their decision making is far better.
The key is in knowing how to move from disagreement to decision making. It is important that the paths for doing this are clear so that who is responsible for doing what is known.
It is essential to know where the ultimate decision-making authority lies—i.e., how far the power of the argument will carry relative to the power of the assigned authority. While arguing and especially after a decision is rendered, everyone in the idea meritocracy must remain calm and respectful of the process. It is never acceptable to get upset if the idea meritocracy doesn’t produce the decision that you personally wanted.
Everyone has his or her own principles and values, so all relationships entail a certain amount of negotiation or debate over how people should be with each other. What you learn about each other will either draw you together or drive you apart. If your principles are aligned and you can work out your differences via a process of give-and-take, you will draw closer together. If not, you will move apart. Open discussion of differences ensures that there are no misunderstandings. If that doesn’t happen on an ongoing basis, gaps in perspective will widen until inevitably there is a major clash.
a. Spend lavishly on the time and energy you devote to getting in sync, because it’s the best investment you can make.
In the long run, it saves time by increasing efficiency, but it’s important that you do it well. You will need to prioritize what you are going to get in sync about and who you are going to get in sync with because of time constrains. Your highest priority should be the most important issues with the most believable and most relevant parties.
* Source: Principles by Ray Dalio
When considering the kinds of mistakes you are willing to allow in order to promote learning through trial and error, weigh the potential damage of a mistake against the benefit of incremental learning. In defining what latitude I am willing to give people, I say, “I’m willing to let you scratch or dent the car, but I won’t put you in a position where there’s a significant risk of your totaling it.”
* Source: Principles by Ray Dalio
Remember this: The pain is all in your head. If you want to evolve, you need to go where the problems and the pain are. By confronting the pain, you will see more clearly the paradoxes and problems you face. Reflecting on them and resolving them will give you wisdom. The harder the pain and the challenge, the better.
Because these moments of pain are so important, you shouldn’t rush through them. Stay in them and explore them so you can build a foundation for improvement. Embracing your failures—and confronting the pain they cause you and others—is the first step toward genuine improvement; it is why confession precedes forgiveness in many societies. Psychologists call this “hitting bottom.” If you keep doing this you will convert the pain of facing your mistakes and weaknesses into pleasure and “get to the other side” as I explained in Embrace Reality and Deal with It.
a. Be self-reflective and make sure your people are self-reflective.
When there is pain, the animal instinct is flight-or-fight. Calm yourself down and reflect instead. The pain you are feeling is due to things being in conflict—maybe you’ve come up against a terrible reality, such as the death of a friend, and are unable to accept it; maybe you’ve been forced to acknowledge a weakness that challenges the idea you’d had of yourself. If you can think clearly about what’s behind it, you will learn more about what reality is like and how to better deal with it. Self-reflectiveness is the quality that most differentiates those who evolve quickly from those who don’t. Remember: Pain + Reflection = Progress.