How to disagree with the rest of management?

The McDonald's method works well: praise in public, follow up in private. I'm not really sure if that's endorsed by McDonalds' management training program anymore but I recall learning it from there in my youth.

One book I really enjoyed that helped me a lot was, Extreme Ownership [0].

Discord and disagreements happen. If they're happening a lot then there's a sign that your organization is dysfunctional and communication structures could use some work.

If you have this open disagreement happening a lot it can give your team the feeling that it's their responsibility to disagree as well. And then you end up with everyone undermining each other instead of working together. You can't be an effective leader if someone on your team is acting like a squeaky wheel and refusing to follow your lead.

It's a good idea to know why you're a team. What makes your team more effective than any individual member could be alone?

[0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23848190-extreme-ownersh...

By handing in your resignation letter.

But seriously though, you might want to reconsider the choice. If you're in the management long enough, you'll realize that sometimes it's not just about doing the right thing, it's doing the thing that benefits you the most. Only by doing so, you gain power to control what you want. Even then, you'll realize that doing the right thing might not be your best option. Your job as a management is to ensure the group of people you manage is capable of accomplishing the task required by the company, not doing the right things you want.

Don't get me wrong, you can make your stand sounded, no, you should and must. However, after that you also need to take actions that could resolve the issue at hand, not just stop there, else you'll become the crybaby who is full of ideals yet never accomplish anything.

If you couldn't accept where the company is headed, trust me no amount of effort is worth to make it right, just look for a new job, you'll end up happier.

The problem is that management is probabilistic and not deterministic. If everyone got their way all the time, you'd have too much discord, as too many variables (opinions, styles, etc.) have been introduced. If you're voicing disagreement publicly, you embolden others without management experience or authority to in turn 'do their own thing' as well, multiplying the number of variables you have to deal with. Successful companies balance the input of experts, the happiness of workers, and the fact that their job is to follow the right strategies, as a whole, to achieve the primary mission (usually making money and growing).

Does it feel unfair to a lot of lower-level employees? Yep. Good managers are able to create 'autonomy of action/unity of effort' by providing and trusting the lower echelons with enough autonomy to stay happy and creative solving problems for the company WITHOUT going off the rails.

OP, you can be a leader inside your company by doing right by your team, being transparent with them, but also voicing any disagreement with upper management discretely. You're looked to as a leader and that means it's up to you to strike the aforementioned balance.

Great question. The short answer is this is going to be a really difficult uphill battle. This largely isnt about management. Its about culture and you alone cannot dictate that. Changing company culture is a huge undertaking and results in tons of departures.

If you have direct influence and control over your team, then you could try out your ideas within your span of control. That might act as an example of influence to other teams. You might also try meeting with other managers / friendlies 1:1 over coffee or a beer to test the waters and see where theyre at.

That being said, this would be a massive time and emotional investment. Youd likely be better off doing your job to the best of your abilities considering the circumstances, then find somewhere more compatible for your style.

Some good books I've found over the years:

Lencioni's "The Five Dysfunctions of a Team" is an often cited reference for team psychology. If you read through it (it's not long) it should give you more resources to analyze the current social context.

The second great resource - on personal influence - is Aristotles Rhetoric. Most modern resources try to appear more hip and current by more or less regurgitating what Aristotle already noticed - that personal influence is a matter of ethos, pathos and logos, and that in the general human context you need to take all of them into account.

Third resource that is very relevant to perceiving organizational mechanics is Cialdini's "Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion"

I've read through some of the comments and there is some solid advice. I work at a large company and see this fairly frequently.

You have to approach these things as what do you want out of it.

Do you want to prove someone wrong, just to prove them wrong? Do you want to steer them in a better direction? Is this something you will end up owning, so want to avoid the pain? etc..

There are numerous scenarios. For me, we are one company, large or small if I am not trying to steer it towards a better path, why am I here? If thats the case, I should just take my paycheck and shut up. It's good you care, it means you value your company and/or people.

That said, let me share my exp.

When I was 18 I managed a restaurant my dad had bought. I was a kid telling people who had worked there for years what to do. One day I disagreed with a head waitress that had been there for 10s of years. I did it in front of customers. She got defensive, stormed out, and I served tables the rest of the day.

The takeaway here is, theres a time and place. I feel my role as an employee is to work slightly behind the scenes. I advise my management why I think an approach is better or worse, highlighting we CAN go the way you suggest, but how do you propose we handle X. Usually you can lead them to the way you believe the correct one.

Another point to keep in mind, you dont know everything. I think the most valuable thing I have learned is to understand the motivating factor of why something is going in this direction.

Is there a timeline? Funding constraints? Promises made? Is the person an idiot?

Again, there are so many different scenarios.

There is no black and white answer to your question. I will say though, if you make a statement, be confident you can back it up. Be sure you have thought it through, because there is nothing worse that saying someone is wrong, rallying people to your side, and being unable to deliver.

> managers cannot disagree with each other in front of other employees

Two important points on this:

a) The thing about being a manager is that people listen to you and try to do what you want. Your words set direction. The words also get amplified as they go down the hierarchy.

b) In a larger organization, doing the sub-optimal thing in unison leads to much better results then everyone doing their version of the optimal thing separately.

Put together this means that managers arguing about which approach should be taken publicly can be problematic because each of their teams may decide to implement their manager's prefer solution. Which then leads to wasted effort, multiple half-supported solutions, political bickering and so on.

As an engineer who has been in senior management positions, I can sympathize with your position. This is a good time for introspection.

Almost all companies go through growth pains from a very small, close team to larger teams. The politics of small teams is different from the politics of larger team. Some of your questions seems like you are not comfortable with how larger organizations work. When I was a CTO, I made a mistake of telling engineers to come to me with problems and suddenly I was trying to solve every single tiny issue. Make sure the problems come up to you are worth their time. Otherwise, the managers below you are not doing their job.

You need to trust your peers and earn their trust. Further, everyone works under different expectations and pressure. Everything is a trade-off and everybody makes mistakes is correct, but that itself can be very unhealthy attitude for the company. It breeds complacence and creates half-baked systems. Hold yourself, your teams and others to a very high standard, all the time.

I would also suggest that you learn how to influence others using soft power. Understand what they want, where they are coming from and what their goals are. Understand and respect org boundaries and do think about secondary effects.

Finally, you are management and you cannot disagree with yourself.

For specific points, if you and your peer disagrees, you do not want to do it in an all-hands. Similarly, you do not want your managers to fight in front of their teams - it creates us vs them issues naturally. Everything else there also has another side to that coin and I suggest you think about those very carefully.

> managers cannot disagree with each other in front of other employees

Honestly this is Management 101. You can't run a company when the messages from different managers are conflicting. People will just do what they want with no coordination. Disagreement is good and discussion and arguments about strategy are healthy, but you need to agree on a coherent plan for the rest of the company to follow.

> managers cannot disagree with each other in front of other employees

People have a difficult time receiving criticism, let alone in front of a group people/subordinates. I'm guessing this policy was put in place due to past incidences. The art of disagreeing with someone without coming off as disparaging isn't always straight-forward, but there are ways. e.g. "That's a good idea, but have thought of this way..." vs "That's not going to work. This is the way to do it.". You might want to try re-framing things when you are at a point of disagreement. If that doesn't work, probably best to speak with the person offline then and avoid a stressful situation.

I relate to your struggle and on the bright side, getting better at this does give you and your thoughts more autonomy.

Sorry, I don’t have a solution for you. However, I can share what I feel contributes to the barrier that exists between you, change, and change management. In jazz, being a good collaborator is often referred to as “having big ears”. It’s necessary for players to tune their style to match that of others and selflessly create space for others to do that realllly sweet sounding solo that’s so grooovy!

What’s the point? If you want to make change, focus on changing the environment so it nurtures the uncomfort of evolving change to take effect without trying to control it like an orchestra. Ken from Google Ventures has some good writing on this to check out.

To truly listen, you have to relinquish the desire to think about how you’ll respond or the thing from 30 seconds ago. How do you do that? Idk, lmk if you figure it out. It’s hard — and it requires practice.

Proactively changing your behavior to be receptive to others will lead to your inevitable growth into “leadership” or “influence”. The best leaders are the ones who listen best. It starts with you.

> "managers cannot disagree with each other in front of other employees, a manager cannot criticize management actions/decisions."

This seems to be the crux of your problem, and it is a thorny one. You can directly criticize leadership decisions, if you are OK with losing your job. Even for people who report to you, the guidance is: Praise in public, reprimand in private. It's very easy to humiliate someone when you intend to educate, especially if you do it publicly. It never feels good to be attacked and it's easy to take criticism as an attack.

What you can and should do is provide context to your team. Eg: we decided to do this because we care more about money than privacy (obviously phrase this better). It can be pretty powerful to ask other leaders to provide context for their decisions.

As far as communication styles: you must have a core of common goals and mutual respect. Look up Nonviolent communication and Crucial Conversations. You don't need to follow the whole format like it's a prayer or incantation, but take the good parts and use them. Don't expect the other side to follow the format.

I have worked as a manager less frequently than as an IC but my experience is that when most people transition to management they think most about downward management, i.e. managing your team. But in nearly every case the real challenge is upward management and this is much harder and much more ambiguous.

I'm in a similar situation (similar sounding company as well) and while it is tempting to just leave, I realize that for me personally my job is making sure they lives for my team suck as little as possible.

When you're an IC nearly every problem has some sort of solution, but as a manager this is not true for upward management. Creating space for your team to function, be happy and do work they are proud of is surprisingly challenging, and never solved. Even when you do your best your team and upper management may both end up frustrated with you.

The really hard part of good management is that achieving what I described previously will ultimately hurt your performance rather than giving in to the demands of the rest of leadership. This is why bad management is so prevalent (just like bad teachers are so prevalent in universities), the easiest path to being successful is to just be a bad manager and focus on getting promoted.

Without a doubt there are better companies out there, but management in most places I've seen has this same frustrating structure. I realized that I derive the most satisfaction from my team when I can run interference with leadership and give them the freedom to create great things. So my advice is to start looking elsewhere but in the meantime focus on doing what you can in your corner of the world to make that look like the world you want, and don't worry if people above and below are unhappy with you. You can't change corporate culture but you can fight for you part of the culture to be better.

first: build trust with rest of the management. And you do that by delivering results they need in the beginning. If you come across things you disagree as you do these, collect data points, anecdotes so that it will help you to build strong argument second: push for culture change once you have established the trust to have open conversations. something similar to amazon's leadership principle "disagree and commit". I recommend looking at amazon LPs in this case which clearly summarizes the culture of disagreement (not that its a perfect company, but at least the principles are!) finally: it all boils down to building relationships, data which is valid/provable, earning trust (team, peers and upper management) and change the culture bit by bit before it comes super toxic.

https://www.amazon.jobs/principles

IMO it's important to set up a united front, but in private it's fine to express your personal point of view to your direct reports or to your manager. There's def ways to do it in public, but we'd need more specifics on a particular situation to understand how to help

> even totalitarian to me - managers cannot disagree with each other in front of other employees, a manager cannot criticize management actions/decisions.

Management is to some degree there to represent the company's position on a matter, and if there is substantial differences between the managers someone isn't doing their job.

A manager can disagree, but there is an expectation of a united front on "this is what the company is doing" when passing on management decisions to employees.

The trick isn't to be insincere about what you think; just be clear that a manager's job at a company isn't about the managers ego and personal opinions.

Would look into different research regarding managing up, down and across and persuasion more generally. Robert Cialdini has a classic book called Influence I would highly recommend. I think at the management level you're describing, managing disagreements is often about trying to create internal alliances to advance whatever project/policies/changes you think are in the company's best interests.

It also might be that your company has grown to a point where not everyone's self-interest is aligned with the company's best interest. Would recommend Loonshots by Safi Bahcall which explores that idea quite a bit too.

Read about Management Process. Sounds like your company lacks this; or could argue have built one that is dysfunctional. It's not uncommon to have a consulting firm come in and evaluate/coach on this topic, it should be seen as a good thing. However, based on your description, admitting there is a problem may be difficult. If that's the case, reach out to a firm that does management process consulting. They can give you pointers. Don't try to solve this alone. You need to gain influence within the ranks, acknowledge the problem with positive intent, and offer some solutions.

I can't tell what level management you are. It sounds like middle mgmt and the senior leaders are driving this culture. This is a unique viewpoint because you see up and down the org chart. If there's a C or VP level person you have good rapport with, that also has high level of influence (CEO or maybe COO, VP HR, etc), try to get a lunch/breakfast meeting. Mention that you've read _insert some book_ and had a conversation about it with a _friend who has mgmt consulting experience_ and you feel that the company could be operating as a higher performing team if we dealt with some of these issues. You may have to do similar things with multiple people. It's a bit like being a rights activist. You may need to be the face of the movement. You also may get stifled. But this is a practical way to start the conversation within the company.

Mid managers are basically plumbers, figuratively speaking. They're in charge of ensuring a smooth flow (of orders, policies, and good results in the opposite direction), and also making sure that there're no leaks in the system (passing only needed info down, relaying needed info back).

The subordinate employees in that sense are dwellers.

So the open disagreement is considered a leak, it signals a warning to subordinates and spews gases to the upper floors.

To avoid this sort of disturbances, the management usually holds their own management meetings, at which there's some chance for discussion before the 'consensus' is adopted. After that it's just the flow, and it got to be smooth...

Being (I assume) a recent manager, you'd need to forge the operational alliances among your fellow managers. This could be both reassuring and helpful to eventual promoting of changes.

"Difficult conversations" [1] would be the best direction, to my knowledge. It is written by creators of Harvard Negotiation Project that deals with conflict resolution.

Audiobook version [2] is narrated by authors, and it's great.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Difficult-Conversations-Discuss-What-...

[2] https://www.audible.com/pd/Difficult-Conversations-Audiobook...

From what I understand, this will differ greatly depending on your location / the local culture & norms. In some cultures, dissenting against authority, even local management authority, could be a major faux pas. In others its to be expected, so your mileage may vary.

Overall though it sounds like your team(s) and org aren't offering a psychologically safe environment. I would suggest investigating the concept of psychological safety in teams and the workplace, how to implement it and from there make a plan of how to introduce and influence the adoption of the concept in the teams you have influence on.

To echo what lots have said in this thread this sounds like a cultural shift which is a large lift.

I’d recommend reading Heart of Change by John Kotter for ideas on approaches for change management and influencing change.

If managers are disagreeing in public, it is either because they never agreed to something in private beforehand (poor communication) or because the couldn't stick to the agreement (lack of professionalism). Such disagreement is thus a symptom, not a cause of management problems. You shouldn't be undermining eachother with arguments, but forbidding such arguments does not fix the underlying issue, it only hides it and lets it fester.

> managers cannot disagree with each other in front of other employee

This is not necessarily a terrible policy, as long as it's explicit and it's also explicit that the correct and expected course of action is to have a private sidebar, and that disagreements up the chain of responsibility are also expected and valued (both explicitly stated and via followthrough in taking action on the dissenting opinion when it's justified).

Other people in the thread gave solid advice and things to consider about how to handle that within the company.

Obviously it might not be valid choice for you but I'll expand on an idea of changing companies by describing some of my experience within a company of which management showed unique level of integrity.

The company was Base CRM (now Zendesk Sell). I joined quite early in my career and the company life and it definitely shaped me as a professional.

There was no need to talk much about values because the management clearly lived by them. Transparency and constructive, direct communication was the core. I've never felt out of loop, employees were treated like partners when it comes to access to information. There was rarely a need to ask questions because any piece of information that might be of interest to anyone was proactively presented. Whether the situation was great or not I've never felt something is hidden me. Even when there was a need to make cuts including parting ways with some people I believe most of the company didn't feel angry or frustrated as we had the full context on a daily basis and really felt that they've done what they can to do right by everyone.

I've felt safe delivering constructive feedback directly to everyone, even management. When I made a mistake to discuss something I didn't like in CTO's behaviour to executive closer to my team the reaction was honest and clear: "Yeeaah, but why are coming with this to me?". We've quickly resolved the issue with the CTO directly afterwards.

I'm terribly lucky and grateful to have had a chance to grow in such environment. It taught me that even if the company is not so small it still can be flat in practice, with no visible politics, everyone committed to finding best possible solutions for given problems as long as the management share a common set of values and have common goals.

I assume you raised through the ranks because of your contributions and not by politics. You grew vertically on the professional field. Surely there's enough of things you've done you're proud of and would be solid points on your resume. Maybe at some point it would be a good idea to also grow horizontally by finding a leadership position in some other company.

Feel free to shoot me an email if you are interested in more details or... anything. :)

The trick isn't to disagree. It is to suggest a well thought out alternative that has more benefits. One that is concrete, fleshed out, and quantitative.

Don't just raise red flags about other peoples' plans. Make your own plan and sell it.

When you sell this new plan, it should barely even mention the plan you don't like. It should stand on its own, but it should also solve the problems that the original plan you dislike solves.

tldr; Be part of the solution.

In a racing shell, everyone pulls together and the boat moves forward on the coxswain's call. That's what "being part of a team" means. It means not stopping to argue about the cadence. Not stopping to criticize another rower's last stroke. It means commitment to moving the boat forward.

Sure I hate sports analogies, too. So to put it another way, moshing is out of sync with la macarena. Good luck.

> Currently the company follows approach that feels a bit insincere or on times even totalitarian to me - managers cannot disagree with each other in front of other employees, a manager cannot criticize management actions/decisions.

The reason you can't find research about how to handle this problem is because no one would advise you to try to handle it. You should leave this toxic company.

You seem to have a conflict with your altruistic ideals and those of your employer. Note that a business is not a "social contract", and it is not a "co-operative".

It may be worthwhile to spend time understanding this closed culture, the decision making, and its overall impact on the business. I recommend reading "The Culture Map" by Erin Meyer.

Management always has a reason to do things a specific way. You need to get to the root of why the management structure reacts the way it does. It could be cultural. Generally you have to believe people will do the right thing in absence of issues to guide them. Understanding those issues and fixing them is where being a real manager shines through.

What you describe is a strong signal of a culture with very low trust and very insecure leadership.

https://hbrascend.org/topics/research-insecure-managers-dont...

Sounds like you're talking mostly about disagreements over strategic decisions and the problem that the senior managment is not open. Don't lose you way, however, also don't forget to prioritize yourself and your career and the people who work for you.

I recommend reading several articles from https://randsinrepose.com/archives/agenda-detection/

fsloth recommended Lencioni's "The Five Dysfunctions of a Team"

I'd second that, and suggest reading his other books, too. Particular 'The Advantage', which provides practical steps to solve the problems highlighted in his other fable/story books.

It's unlikely you will change the culture single-handedly. Maybe try to find others who have similar observations, share with them your ideas (or just buy them a copy of The Advantage) and go from there.

You don't change things by disagreeing or arguing. You change things by getting people to agree before agreement is necessary.

Can you criticise actions/decisions among other managers, or in private with the actor/decider?

> managers cannot disagree with each other in front of other employees

Just do it.

The reality here is that you are a junior manager who has come up through software engineering. I'm hearing some patterns that I have to work with my staff on and they are pretty typical for this background. First and most importantly, despite what you might think, nobody is telling you what to do anymore. You need to have your own point of view and agenda and work constructively with others to accomplish that goal. The biggest problem I see with junior managers is to think that somebody is going to tell them what to do and how to have impact. That's gone now. I have managers because I do _not_ want to have to tell them what to do every day. Every minute I have to spend telling a manager to do their job is a minute I'm not spending on strategy or trying to discover the big picture. This is critical because it sounds like you spend a lot of time arguing with the people you think you have to please. You don't. Do your job. Trying to convince somebody to tell you how to do your job the way you want to do your job is never going to work. They will always want you to do your job their way, not yours. Next, it looks like your influence and communication skills are a bit lacking. Criticizing somebody's ideas to their face or in public is almost never going to work and just set them against you. Most real work at the leadership level is done in "private." That's where ideas can be exchanged and worked through without anybody feeling threatened or defensive. You almost certaintly have to stop the negativity. I know bad things are just about to happen and you can see that really, really clearly, but your reaction can't be "no, this is terrible", it needs to be: "yes, and..." that's the way you win support and not set people against you. Third, things aren't "rational" anymore. The trade-offs and uncertainty are getting larger and larger with every step you take, and rational decision making processes are less and less effective. A pretty typical decision for a leadership team to make is: should we continue serving our existing customers or should we move up-market? You might have some really strong opinions on this, but you are lacking most of the relevent information--what does the board say? what is the burn rate, the TAM at the current market? can you get a cash injection with a strategy change, but not one without? What about the sales team? Is it strong enough to pivot? Has any of them sold into Fortune 500 companies before? Executives at Fortune 500 companies? Does your pricing strategy scale? What services do you need to develop? This is an immensely difficult decision and even if you have a very clear perspective on your domain, you are still likely missing the big picture. Next, nearly everything you see from other people at your level and above is actually somebody trying to do organizational politics. This isn't bad, this is how organizations function. I see you criticize brainstorming in a sub-threads. Brainstorming usually isn't about finding the best idea--it's about getting organizational alignment around an idea. That's the important thing. Strong alignment around a weak idea is better than weak alignment around a strong idea, since everyone will end up doing their own thing and the idea will fail. Lastly, I would encourage you to do some self-reflection, so you are aware of your own personality and biases. This is really the only way your career can grow from here on out, since for most of us, we are our own biggest blockers to success. I usually recommend learning and studying the enneagram as a way to notice your patterns and how they tend to undermine your relationships with others. I recommend "The 9 types of Leadership" for people starting out and focused on a professional context. Good Luck! Like I said, this is all very normal and a typical part of the growth process.

The clue in your description is that you are a software engineer in management. I would guess that most if not all the other managers are from non-technical backgrounds. Thus they are directly or indirectly indoctrinated into MBA and/or McKinsey Management Consulting group-think. Only the insecure and their sychophants would instigate the sorts of practices that you describe.

Hate to put it bluntly, but you are attempting to swim against the tide by attempting any form of debate and examination of dissent. The management team around you have played their hand. It appears that you are vastly out-numbered.

You have two choices: go with the status quo; or the highway.