Paul: [00:00:06] Welcome to Employing Differences, a conversation about exploring the collaborative space between individuals.

Karen: [00:00:12] I'm Karen Gimnig.

Paul: [00:00:14] And I'm Paul Tevis.

Karen: [00:00:16] Each episode, we start with a question and see where it takes us. This week's question is, "Who can fix this?"

Paul: [00:00:24] One of the things that Karen and I want to explore today are what we do when we get stuck. When we're working with someone, when we're trying to make some progress together with somebody, and we end up at loggerheads. We end up in a case where we disagree about what to do, or what do we want to do, to move forward.

Paul: [00:00:43] And we want to look today in particular at the different advantages and disadvantages we see when we're working in a consensus based space around this. And when we're working in a hierarchical based system around this. 

Paul: [00:00:56] Because we've noticed that the failure modes for those two situations are a little different. We've had some experiences that we want to kind of explore and look at how do we deal with the fact that we've gotten stuck, and we kind of want to get out of this situation that we're jammed up in? What are some options for dealing with that and what are things that we need to be aware of?

Karen: [00:01:16] I think I want to acknowledge here that, most of the time, we talk about ways to get unstuck. That are about having good communication skills and doing your own work and all of that stuff. And we still think that's a good idea.

Karen: [00:01:28] But what we want to talk about today is when you've done that stuff as best you can, as much as you know how to, and you're still stuck. And I want to acknowledge that that happens, I think very often. Especially in the land of consensus, we say, "Well, we'll just have to keep working on it until we find a path that works for us in whatever way."

Karen: [00:01:48] And the reality is that groups who do consensus for long periods of time, do run into times. That despite doing their best to do all the things that would help work it out. Sometimes we're just stuck.

Paul: [00:02:04] Yeah, I mean, it's clear in an organization, that has specific authority and hierarchy defined, what your path for escalation basically is, right? If Karen and I are working together on something and we disagree how we should proceed, and we both have the same boss. We can go to our boss and say, "Hey, we need to get unstuck with this." And there can often be some trickiness around that.

Paul: [00:02:26] Sometimes bosses will say like, "Well, you need to work it out amongst yourselves." And oftentimes we've tried. That's why we're here. That's not always true. But sometimes it is a like, you know, having the third person involved, can give you some additional perspective.

Paul: [00:02:40] But in a hierarchical situation, even if we don't report to the same boss, it's clear how do I escalate when things are stuck, when I don't know how to proceed. When we've tried to work through things, when we've used our best communication skills and our collaborative thinking and we and we still are stuck, we still can't make progress. It's at least clear who I can go to to try to deal with that. And in consensus spaces, it's us, right? There isn't a clear 'who can fix this' other than the people who are stuck.

Karen: [00:03:10] Yeah, and I think often this will happen in consensus when someone has been delegated a certain authority, or access to certain tools. Or whether it's been intentionally delegated or not, the fact is they, you know, know the code. Or they're the who has the stuff or whatever the thing is. That essentially, without their participation in some way, other members can't just do a thing. Like, there has to be some some way through that individual.

Karen: [00:03:43] And so the question is, if that individual is refusing, either blatantly or simply by being unavailable. Or I mean, there are all sorts of active and passive ways to be obstructionist. But if that individual, or small team, or whomever is obstructing, who does one go to when one needs that tool? Or needs access to that thing, or whatever it is, who do you go to?

Karen: [00:04:09] And of course, the answer is the only authority there is, beyond that individual who's holding the power at the moment, is the group as a whole. And then there's this tricky spot of 'Do you go around talking to all the different members of the group as a whole'? Which looks an awful lot like gossip, and has all the same negative potential as gossip?

Karen: [00:04:33] Or what? And I again, I want to say, I want to acknowledge first that the ideal thing is to talk to the person and try to work through it. But we're talking here in the case where that didn't work. What's the escalation then?

Paul: [00:04:45] Yeah, and I think there's an important piece around that escalation. Regardless of, "Hey, I'm taking this to the whole group because we're in a consensus based space" or, "Hey, I'm taking this to my manager, or our manager, because we're in a hierarchical situation."

Paul: [00:05:00] I think you, you need to involve the other person in that process. Like, you need to let them know, "Hey, we're stuck here." And the way that we resolve this is by either going to the group, or going to a manager, or things like that.

Paul: [00:05:14] I intend to do that. Because we can't resolve this. And this is we know that we can move forward on this. Will you come with me? Like, because if only one of us is trying to escalate, is trying to figure out how to unblock things. That, I mean, that- we talk about putting wedges between us in the way that the space works, right? It's like, we need to involve the other person because otherwise, you know, they can still just choose to opt out of the process.

Paul: [00:05:42] But I think it is I think a useful step is being able to say, "We're stuck here like and I want you to be a part of the unsticking process."

Paul: [00:05:52] And I think the other thing, that I often recommend that people do in this case, is that when you are escalating. When you are going to the larger group, or to the manager, to try to figure out how to unstick this, that the useful thing to do is to actually advocate for the other person's position. To speak from where they are coming from.

Paul: [00:06:11] And if I say, like "Karen and I, we're stuck on this thing. Karen, will you come with me to the group so that we can try to get unstuck on this?" "Because I want to make sure that I'm articulating your viewpoint to the group well. And if you're not there, I don't- There's no guarantee I'll be able to do that.

Paul: [00:06:26] So, my thing is like trying to involve the party that we're stuck with in the escalation process, even though they probably don't want it.

Karen: [00:06:37] Right, even though they probably don't want it. And I will say, the trickiest places I've seen in consensus, completely concurring with everything you just said, is a good idea. That the trickiest places is when they not only don't want it, they just say no. Or don't respond. Or like, they just go that really passive route.

Karen: [00:06:57] And I think there is a point when you don't really have a choice. I mean, you do have a choice. You can accept the status quo, and let them have their thing, and not be able to get what you think is the right thing for whatever reason.

Karen: [00:07:09] Or you can go to whatever authority that you have. And I think in consensus situations in particular, it's wise to get clear about 'What are the likely outcomes of my choices?' And, 'I may not like any of them, but I at least can choose the one I like the best.'. 

Karen: [00:07:28] So I kind of take it on faith that if someone holds power in a certain part of a group's function, most consensus groups are pretty conflict averse. Which means they're not going to be thrilled if I come and say, "We have a problem here. This person is being obstructionist and unwilling to work with me. And as a group, we need to do something about that."

Karen: [00:07:53] The last thing a consensus group wants to do is overpower someone, which is essentially taken to an extreme. That's where this goes. Do we want to get there? Probably not. Do we get there very often? Probably not.

Karen: [00:08:06] Although I will say I think some of why we don't get there very often is because we choose to live with it. Rather than accept the unpleasant sides of the escalation that's possible.

Karen: [00:08:16] And so that's, I think that's the dilemma that we have to get comfortable with. That we get all the benefits of consensus. And sometimes we have to choose between being the person who brings the conflict or living with something that we don't like. And that doesn't seem right. And that is a reality sometimes in consensus.

Paul: [00:08:37] Yeah. And when we talk about pros and cons of consensus and hierarchy and things like that, it is one of the realities of that space. You know? And, you know, we've talked before about the fact that, hey, because there isn't an individual authority that it's very easy to appeal to. Like, that does kind of force us to get better at working things out between the two of us. That is one of the benefits of being in that space.

Paul: [00:09:00] It's a similar thing in, you know, in my company we're basically three equal partners. And there's no boss that we can appeal to! So we have to lean in. Kind of a focusing thing for us where we realize when we have a disagreement, we either have to choose to live with it, or get our hands dirty and work through it. Because we can't kick it to somebody else.

Paul: [00:09:20] Like, that's one of the things that's really easy to do. You know, when we have a manager, or we have a boss or something like that. It's very easy for us to say, "Well, I'm just going to escalate this to my boss. And if they don't fix it, it's not my problem," right. "Now I can feel better about, you know, I can at least blame them for not fixing the issue."

Paul: [00:09:36] And we don't have that option when we're kind of in the consensus based space. But yeah, I do think that there is a, that oftentimes we get a chance to exercise that muscle more. To learn more about how to do it. But we may still be pretty conflict averse and we may be in a pretty conflict averse group. So we may not always be as willing to use that, that muscle.

Paul: [00:09:57] I do think that being realistic about when you try to bring, you know, a thing to the larger group, to point out there's a problem. Being able to recognize the group may not be willing to deal with it.

Karen: [00:10:08] Right! 

Paul: [00:10:09] And being okay with that. For me, there's a piece of "It's my duty to bring this to the group, to point out that this is happening" and also to recognize "I may not get the resolution that I want out of it, but I can at least feel like I've done what I needed to do."

Paul: [00:10:25] Because if it turns out the same person over and over again is doing this to many, many, many people, the group might at some point start to go "Maybe we're not as non-hierarchical as we actually think we are", right?

Paul: [00:10:38] Because now we get into Jo Freeman and The Tyranny of Structurelessness all of this idea, like what that starts to do is it starts to point out where the real power in the group actually lives, rather than where we say it lives.

Paul: [00:10:49] And then, then the group gets to deal with the, you know, the uncomfortableness of, "Well, what do we want to do about that?" And again, maybe the group chooses to live with it. So it is one of those spaces where it's not always obvious that there is someone who can, or will, fix something when we get stuck.

Karen: [00:11:06] Yeah. And in the end, part of the choice is "I'm part of this group for whatever reasons I'm part of this group. And I get whatever benefits I get." And it can be very easy in these moments of 'stuckness' to just focus on the stuck, and forget that there's all these other great benefits.

Karen: [00:11:25] And in co-housing, there's a shared space called a common house. And I often encourage people to think about the frame of this thing that you think is not right, and it should be different. Is it burning down the common house? Is it totally wrecking something? If it's not, what is the scale of it and what is it worth?

Karen: [00:11:45] And is this the thing that I want to use my group collateral for? Is this the thing that I want to make shift? And is it shiftable for all the reasons that we've said? At which point, if I choose to stay in the group, I'm choosing, knowing that this is the choice I'm making.

Karen: [00:12:07] Like, I know that it's going to be this way. I know I'm not going to have access to that tool, for example, or whatever that is. I know that certain kinds of conflicts are not going to get worked through in this group because I've seen it, I've learned it. 

Karen: [00:12:19] And I don't get to pretend that I didn't know or that some injustice is being done to me. Whether it's explicit or implicit, the rules of a group may be that this person gets to have control of certain things. That these things are done a certain way, that we avoid certain kinds of conflicts.

Karen: [00:12:36] And then my choice is, is the rest of what I get, from being connected to the group, which might be a paycheck. And it might be where I live, or it might be access to shared things, or it might be that it's my friends and I have a great time when I'm there. There are all sorts of reasons. Or it does something that I believe in and care about, all those things.

Karen: [00:12:55] If that's more beneficial to me, then with the whole package of the things I don't like, if that on balance is a good thing, then I keep doing it. And if not, I should think seriously about leaving the group.

Paul: [00:13:08] So to track where we've been today. We're kind of talking about those cases where we're disagreeing with somebody, where we're wanting to move forward with something, and we're feeling stuck. And that we've engaged all of our our good communication and collaboration skills. And it's just not working. We're just not making progress.

Paul: [00:13:26] And what can we do there? Who can fix this? The idea that you have very different paths, depending on whether or not you're in a hierarchical or consensus based space. That there's often a clear escalation path, when you have a boss or a manager or someone who is in charge, who has the authority to to make decisions around this. 

Paul: [00:13:45] And that that path is often less clear when we're in a consensus based space. That kind of regardless of which of those spaces you're in, it can be really beneficial to engage the other party in whatever your collaboration process is. To be able to say, "Hey, it's clear that this is not working between us. So I want to escalate this and I want you to be a part of that so that we can actually continue to hopefully work together in the future."

Paul: [00:14:10] But recognizing that may not always work out. That particularly in consensus based spaces, although it does help us to strengthen our muscle for resolving conflict, for working through these kinds of things. It may also be that the group's tendency is to not want to force people to do stuff. And so that they may be kind of conflict averse.

Paul: [00:14:32] So being realistic about what the possibilities for whenever we want to escalate this process is what may happen. What are we willing to live with? What's important for us to do?

Paul: [00:14:44] And recognizing that that this is one of those spaces where consensus based decision-making can sometimes not provide as satisfying a result as a more hierarchical structure does.

Paul: [00:14:56] But to not lose sight of the benefits that we get from being in that kind of space. And to remember to be aware of "I may not get what I want here and am I willing to live with that?" What does that reveal to me about the way that this group works, the way this group operates? What actually happens? Not just what we have down on paper. 

Paul: [00:15:16] And, "Am I willing to continue to engage and be part of this group? Because I either do or don't value all the other things that I get out of being part of that." 

Paul: [00:15:25] To recognize that, "Yeah, this is one of those spots where the benefits of collaboration sometimes fall a little flat", but that it's it in general we need to look in aggregate how we feel about being part of this group. Knowing that these kinds of things may happen when we get stuck.

Karen: [00:15:43] That's going to do it for us today. Until next time, I'm Karen Gimnig.

Paul: [00:15:47] And I'm Paul Tevis. And this has been Employing Differences.