Are you afraid to talk to your superior about making changes in the workplace? How can you successfully propose a change to your boss?
Changes are natural in the workplace, and sometimes it takes a brave employee for a manager to realize this. You can be that employee who propels a positive change in the workplace by following Clay Scroggins’s three methods for leading your superiors.
Continue reading to bring about a new era in your workplace.
Leading Your Superiors
One kind of external leadership is leading your superiors, Scroggins says. Sometimes, you’ll notice areas that need change but are outside of your control. In these cases, you must leverage your boss’s authority to propose changes. You do this by communicating with them about the issues you’ve noticed and encouraging them to change those areas for the better.
(Shortform note: In The Practice of Adaptive Leadership, Ronald A. Heifetz calls this kind of influence over your superiors “informal authority”: the ability to hold your superiors accountable, even without hierarchical power. In our case, you hold your boss accountable for addressing the issues you’ve noticed. Informal authority is situation-dependent: You may have enough informal authority to suggest changes to a project you’re involved in, but not to unrelated issues. You can use your formal authority as a tool to increase your informal authority and leverage your boss’s formal authority, Heifetz adds. For example, if you’re in charge of tracking the project’s progress, you can highlight the issues you’ve noticed in your progress report to encourage your boss to address them.)
This is a delicate process, Scroggins emphasizes. Sharing your perspective with your boss thoughtfully and constructively can lead to improvement, but doing so ineffectively might harm your professional relationship and make it harder to create positive change. People tend to get defensive when confronted with ideas that upset the status quo. It provokes their fear of change, and they may perceive your request for change as an implied criticism of their past decisions that created the status quo.
Scroggins offers a few methods for overcoming this resistance to change:
1. Invest time in strengthening your relationship with your boss. As discussed previously, the more they trust you, the more likely they are to follow your suggestions. If your current relationship with your boss isn’t strong, prioritize strengthening it before suggesting change. (Shortform note: Before suggesting change, you may also want to reflect on your past experiences with authority figures. Heifetz says your emotions regarding previous authority figures can affect your relationship with your current ones, and you must move past negative past experiences to develop a strong, helpful relationship with your boss.)
2. Be prepared to provide a compelling justification for why change is necessary. If your reasoning is uncertain or unclear, it may confuse others, and they might resist change even if your suggestions are valid. In contrast, a well-articulated argument increases the chances of your superior agreeing to your proposed changes.
(Shortform note: A clear, compelling justification may be necessary because of “status quo bias,” people’s tendency to maintain the status quo even if the change would be better. Some psychologists say people fall back on the status quo when they’re overwhelmed with choices and have limited information. They choose to maintain the status quo because it’s less uncertain and thus seems safer. So, clearly explaining why change is necessary and your plan for creating it could reduce this overwhelm and give your boss enough information to make an educated decision, instead of a biased one.)
3. Maintain a calm, non-judgmental tone. Even the best ideas can be rejected if they’re presented with an aggressive tone. Avoid placing blame or issuing ultimatums, Scroggins warns. This will make your boss feel under attack, increasing their defensiveness. Instead, stay non-judgmental and decide how to proceed with your boss. This creates a collaborative environment where you and your boss work together to create positive change.
| Using Motivational Interviewing to Overcome Ambivalence As well as fear and defensiveness, ambivalence may stop people from creating positive change. Some psychologists define ambivalence as feeling two ways about an issue simultaneously, resulting in a frozen, unprogressive state. For instance, your boss may feel both open to change and resistant to it. This internal stalemate means no change occurs. Often, people try to break this stalemate by telling ambivalent individuals why they should change. Most psychologists say this is ineffective. Ambivalent individuals already know the arguments both for and against change—they’ve already argued with themselves. In fact, this method can make them more resistant to change: Since you’re taking one side of the argument (in favor of change), the ambivalent individuals automatically take the other. Instead, the psychologists suggest motivational interviewing (MI), a method of communication where you help ambivalent individuals identify and express their own reasons for change. MI relies on collaboration, acceptance, and compassion: You respect others’ autonomy and want to work with them to improve their situations, instead of just pressuring them to change. To practice MI, don’t judge or shame people, as Scroggins says. Instead, neutrally represent both sides of the argument and encourage ambivalent individuals to express their thoughts about both. This lets them evaluate their reasons for changing without feeling like they have to defend one side. Then, neutrally reflect their own reasoning back to them. This can help ambivalent individuals believe more strongly in their reasons for changing and overcoming the internal stalemate. For example, a conversation with your boss may look something like this: You: I know you like how efficient our current process is. It lets us fill orders quickly, and it helps us grow the company. I’m curious, are there any reasons you’d want to change it? Your boss: It’s efficient, but it also causes quality issues. I know those issues are hurting our reputation and losing us customers, but we’re barely keeping up with orders as it is. You: You’re worried that changing this process will make us less productive, and you also realize that the current process is limiting the quality of our products and customer retention. Your boss: Yes. Handling customer complaints is already wasting time we could use to fill orders. Maybe the current process is reducing our quality and productivity. It might be worth losing more productivity now to fix both problems in the long term. You: That might increase our customer base in the future. It may also lose us customers now. Your boss: We’re already losing customers. Something has to give. You said you have a plan for improving the process? Tell me about it. |
