Buy-In

Saving Your Good Idea from Getting Shot Down

John P. Kotter, Lorne A. Whitehead

• Publisher: Harvard Business Review Press
• Year: 2010
• Print ISBN: 9781422157299
• eBook ISBN: 9781422170717
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Management
• Index: Business

You've got a good idea. You know it could make a crucial difference for you, your organization, your community. You present it to the group, but get confounding questions, inane comments, and verbal bullets in return. Before you know what's happened, your idea is dead, shot down. You're furious. Everyone has lost: Those who would have benefited from your proposal. You. Your company. Perhaps even the country.It doesn't have to be this way, maintain John Kotter and Lorne Whitehead. In Buy-In, they reveal how to win the support your idea needs to deliver valuable results. The key? Understand the generic attack strategies that naysayers and obfuscators deploy time and time again. Then engage these adversaries with tactics tailored to each strategy. By "inviting in the lions" to critique your idea--and being prepared for them--you'll capture busy people's attention, help them grasp your proposal's value, and secure their commitment to implementing the solution.The book presents a fresh and amusing fictional narrative showing attack strategies in action. It then provides several specific counterstrategies for each basic category the authors have defined--including:· Death-by-delay: Your enemies push discussion of your idea so far into the future it's forgotten.· Confusion: They present so much data that confidence in your proposal dies.· Fearmongering: Critics catalyze irrational anxieties about your idea.· Character assassination: They slam your reputation and credibility.Smart, practical, and filled with useful advice, Buy-In equips you to anticipate and combat attacks--so your good idea makes it through to make a positive change.

1.

the death
of a good plan

Your pulse is racing. Your turn is next, and public speaking isn’t your favorite activity. You serve on the Citizens Advisory Committee for Centerville Library. The committee is meeting right now in open forum, which means anyone the library serves can attend the session, and about seventy-five people, in total, fill the room.

The chair is about to ask for your presentation. Earlier this month, you agreed to bring forward a plan for endorsement this evening. It’s a proposal devised by you and some supporters of the library, one of whom is the manager of a prominent local company.

The proposal is simple. Centerville Library can’t afford the twenty-five to thirty new computers it needs, much less up-to-date printers and networking and other support equipment (like computer-friendly, ergonomic chairs). The total cost, at retail, would eat up a huge chunk of its very tight budget. But the local computer store, Centerville Computers, has agreed to help. It has offered that for the next three months, for every six Centerville families that buy a new computer from it, Centerville Computers will donate one state-of-the-art, big-screen, new computer to the library, along with sufficient printers, networking, chairs—everything you could dream of.

The proposal is a rare opportunity that makes total sense for the library and the town. The facts and logic are compelling. It clearly will help the library take a big step into the twenty-first century, especially since you can’t see how you would be able to find funds for this in next year’s budget or in the year after next. It will assist librarians. It will benefit the less affluent kids in town who need, but don’t have, easy access to good computers. Now the task is just to convince others, get their support, and move forward to execute the plan—and quickly, before Centerville Computers walks away.

Centerville Computers will need to get approval from its head office, and the library board will need to approve the commercial aspect of this donation as well, but the board almost certainly will do so as long as the plan is endorsed at this public meeting of the Citizens Advisory Committee. Unfortunately, the timing is tight—you need this endorsement tonight in order to get the approvals in time for the year-end buying season. Otherwise, the plan won’t work.

You feel particularly strongly about the proposal—strongly enough to do the public speaking that you don’t much like—because you know these easy-to-access computers would so benefit the less affluent children in town. Most can get to the library easily using public transportation. Many cannot easily reach the schools they are bused to, and the schools have shorter hours and are not open on the weekend. For the more affluent children, this is not a problem. They have computers at home, within a few feet of their rooms, if not in their rooms, and available whenever they want, seven days a week. Anyone in the next generation who is not highly computer literate is going to have a hard time in life. Failing to help everyone with this challenge, or worse yet not even trying to help, doesn’t strike you as making any sense for the economy, the town, employers, or the children. For all these reasons, you’ve developed a deep, personal belief in this project; you really need its approval this evening.

When it’s your turn to speak, you make a brief presentation and then ask for questions and comments before making a formal motion. There are a few minor, good-natured questions, and then it happens. Pompus Meani raises his hand and begins to speak.

Here’s the thing about Pompus Meani: he usually values self-importance above doing good. He has been on the Citizens Advisory Committee for a long time, and at least his behavior is consistent. If something will make him seem wiser and more important, he supports it. And if not, he opposes it, sometimes stealthily and sometimes flamboyantly as a show of power. He wants to be elected chair of the committee later this year. Even though you have no interest in that role, Pompus sees you as a threat and wants you to look foolish.

The characters
Not their real names (obviously). But given the way they often behave, they might as well be called
—Pompus Meani —Avoidus Riski —Allis Welli —Divertus Attenti	—Heidi Agenda —Spaci Cadetus —Lookus Smarti —Bendi Windi
Your brother-in-law Hank
and you!

He begins by faintly praising your efforts (you have worked really hard on this, by the way), and then he utters the dreaded word, “but...” In a serious, earnest-sounding voice, he says something worrisome, and a few heads nod. He adds another problematic comment, and others look both surprised and concerned. Finally, he makes a motion to defer this matter until it has been possible to consider his concerns carefully and properly. The motion is seconded.

Your known supporters, at least a dozen people in the room, actually fear Pompus, offer no comment, and just look to you. And you’ve got...nothing! You just don’t have a satisfactory response at your fingertips. You mumble that it will be very unfortunate to have such a delay as it may kill the project, which, you say, is a terrible mistake. But with the motion seconded, a vote must be held. The majority, around 55 percent, vote for deferral, and the plan is dead. All your work has gone up in smoke. An important opportunity to help the kids and the library and the town is lost. You feel embarrassed and incredibly frustrated. And you must restrain yourself from a maddening impulse to strangle Pompus Meani.

So what did Pompus say? And what could you have said in response? These are questions related to one of life’s more fundamental skills, to crucial capabilities for those trying to transform institutions in an age of rapid change, and to abilities that, when missing, can leave us emotionally distraught, no matter the setting or our role in that setting.

Attacks that derail good ideas can come from all sorts of people, not just Pompus Meanis. For example, Pompus has a cousin, Heidi Agenda, whom you admire, but who has an undisclosed personal reason for opposing the plan—a reason that is more important to her than fairness or your friendship. Furthermore, there is always Bendi Windi, who usually blows with the wind and may, without really trying to be mean, say your plan is bad just so she can fit in. And there are others to take into account, such as Avoidus Riski, Divertus Attenti, and Lookus Smarti, whose most common traits will be left for now to the reader’s imagination.

Of course, Avoidus and the lot live not only in Centerville. They are all around us. You have seen them many times before and will surely see them many times in the future. You will encounter them in a meeting, in an attack on your memo, in a telephone call between Houston and Hamburg, in your school, or (perhaps) in your own family. We see this behavior on and off the job. Even you (gasp) might behave as they do some of the time. When the issues are small—with minor encounters that happen weekly if not daily—the Pompuses of the world can cause frustration and embarrassment, but such feelings quickly pass. However, when the issues are not small, the loss of a good idea can create consequences that can linger for a very long time.

In some ways, it is a shame we even need a book like this. But we do—first, because our requirement to implement good ideas is a central part of what life is all about; second, because in an era of increasing change, the number of new plans or strategies we need is growing; third, because genuinely good ideas are damaged or killed all the time for all sorts of reasons; and fourth, because a most fundamental and powerful solution to this problem is not at all obvious: that to get people to truly buy into a new idea, you can go into the arena, armed with the knowledge in this book, and encourage them, not stop them, from sending in the lions.

One important caveat: we are not talking here about the creation of good ideas—the gathering of information, brainstorming, or the process of generating new proposals. Much has been written on these issues, and we take that as a given. Here we focus on how you keep those ideas from being shot down and how you build sufficiently strong support around them so that successful action follows.

But enough for now. Let us go back to Centerville and let the meeting begin again. Unlike in the real world, this time you and the others who created the proposal will have a second chance. And this time, you will be hit by confusing, sneaky, and illogical commentary that can undermine essential support for any smart idea. These generic behaviors, seen so often in real life, will be devilishly hard to deal with, partly because they can sound so sincere, or reasonable, or logical. So get ready, because it will be brutal, indeed much tougher than we normally see in reality. And this time...well, you’ll see.

2.

saving the day
in centerville,
part one

This time, we begin our story the evening before the town meeting. The proposal is so sensible that it should sell itself. But you find yourself writing notes and more notes, which should make you feel more prepared and thus confident. But they don’t. Then a little light bulb goes off in your head, and you think of Hank.

Hank is your brother-in-law. Unlike some of the people you know who aren’t particularly enthusiastic about their brothers-in-law, you have always liked Hank. He is both intelligent and a genuinely good person. He also has had considerable experience in dealing with groups of people, small and large, inside businesses and elsewhere. He is plainspoken but, from what you have seen, very sharp.

You call him. When he suggests that instead of a phone conversation, he would be willing to come over to your house, you accept his offer enthusiastically.

Upon arrival, and after a few pleasantries, Hank asks you to brief him. You do. Computers and support equipment are really needed, yet that would require a large expenditure for the library, which has a limited budget this year, the next one, or for who knows how long. Centerville Computers has offered to help in the following way, and so on.

He is impressed with the proposal. He hadn’t even heard of it, making you wonder how many other people in town haven’t, either. Hank asks what you have already done to explain it and get support from others. You tell him. The group behind the proposal has sent a brief description of the idea along with the invitation to the meeting tomorrow night to the many hundreds of people who use the library. The group members have given some thought to who might object and why. Two of the proposal’s supporters are prepared to make carefully planned comments from the audience when you go into a question-and-answer period.

Hank nods as you talk. When you stop, he explains that he has actually thought much, over his long career, about why his best ideas either soared or were shot down. He says he has often wondered why his bosses’, neighbors’, and friends’ good ideas have been supported and implemented in some cases, but in others were ignored, or left crushed on the pavement.

Hank points out that there are many ways to poke holes in any simple plan or complex change, but—don’t panic—most are very easy to deal with because people have their facts wrong. For example: “The computer store will raise its prices as soon as we okay this proposal!” Response: “A part of the deal we made is that last week’s prices are set in cement for the duration of this program.” Such objections can be a little more difficult to diplomatically overcome if the objector has thought carefully about your idea, yet misunderstood a subtle point. But if you have clarity of the facts and the logic, you just explain, and do so as clearly and simply as possible. For a reasonable person, the response will work. Actually, having to think through the facts and logic before presenting an idea is always useful since you may find it’s not such a good idea!

But—Hank says—there are a handful of distinct and familiar types of questions, concerns, and outright attacks that are used against new ideas everywhere and are surprisingly tricky to deal with in “real time,” no matter how sound the idea. These are little bombs that cannot be defused with a few facts, or bullets that can so fluster you that your response creates problems instead of solving them.

He reminds you of an old and politically incorrect joke, where a cunning reporter asks a young nominee for an important judicial position, “Sir, have you stopped beating your wife?” The poor soul stammers, “No, yes, I mean...” and the evening news clip is complete, whereas an experienced person might smile and calmly respond, “It’s well known that I’ve always been kind and respectful to everyone, most certainly including my rather formidable spouse.”

Hank says that a “beating your wife” question, thrown at a fine young candidate for public office, may seem so ridiculous as to be unworthy of serious discussion. But there are very real assaults—made verbally or in written statements—that can be equally bizarre or stupid, yet have the capacity to seriously trip you up if you are not well prepared. Because these “attacks” are used often and widely, anyone wishing to impede a proposal probably has seen them and their potential power. Fortunately, Hank says, they can all be dealt with if you are prepared and the audience isn’t too nasty.

Hank patiently goes through a typical scenario. You listen, literally leaning forward on the edge of your seat. Then he continues with scenario after scenario. “Someone says the proposal does not go far enough,” he tells you. “A good response is...Someone asks why he or she should risk a change since the person has been so successful in the past. A good response is...” When he runs out of thoughts, he takes a break to find som...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Copyright
• preface
• part one: the centerville story
• part two: the method
• APPENDIX: how the method helps large-scale change
• about the authors