Instead of debating committed opponents, a sponsor spends effort on the undecided, building close working ties and answering their specific doubts, since they decide which way the group tips.
An example
Eighteen regional managers at a community bank would decide, in effect, whether branch staff would open accounts on tablets instead of at desks. The head of retail banking counted them before she did anything else: five were for it, four had said publicly it would cost the bank its older customers, and nine had said nothing useful either way. She stopped arguing with the four. Over six weeks she visited each of the nine at their branches, asked what would make them comfortable, and wrote down the answers. Most of the doubts were specific: what happened when a tablet froze mid-application, who would help a customer with no email address, how the pilot branches had done with customers over seventy. She brought data on the last and changed the process for the first two. At the operating committee, fourteen of the eighteen backed the rollout.
Why it works
For the people whose position is still open, the proposal looks better and agreement gets easier. Committed opponents are expensive to move and committed supporters need no persuading, so effort spent on either changes little. The undecided are usually undecided for concrete reasons, and a sponsor with a close working relationship can learn those reasons and answer them. Because a group tends to tip with its middle, winning most of the undecided often settles the decision. The doubts have to be answerable, and there has to be time to build real working ties.
The thinking behind it
Julie Battilana The Network Secrets of Great Change Agents (2013), by Battilana and Casciaro, reports a study of 68 change initiatives in British health care. Close ties to fence-sitters always helped change agents, because the ambivalent were reluctant to disappoint a friend, while close ties to resisters helped with small changes and hindered large ones. That finding is the case for spending effort on the undecided through real working relationships, and for leaving committed opponents of a large change alone.
Michael D. Watkins Watkins's chapter on coalitions in The First 90 Days: Critical Success Strategies for New Leaders at All Levels (2003) asks a leader to sort potential supporters, opponents, and convincibles, and to work out who defers to whom. The count that opens this tactic is that diagnosis. It tells the sponsor where persuasion can still change the outcome, which is among the convincibles.
When it fits
It fits a decision that rests on a group, such as a committee, a management team, or a set of regional heads, where opinion is split and a sizable middle has not decided. You need an honest count of where each person stands, enough time before the decision to meet the undecided one by one, and enough room in the proposal to respond to what they raise.
How to use it well
Spend most of your hours on the middle, and keep the edges informed.
- Count first. Sort people into supporters, opponents, and undecided by what they have said and done, and check the count with someone who knows the group.
- Meet the undecided one at a time and ask what would have to be true for them to support it.
- Answer those doubts with evidence or with changes to the plan, then go back and show each person what you did.
- Keep supporters informed and give opponents a fair hearing, so neither feels ignored.
Build the relationships before you need the votes. A working tie formed over several conversations carries more weight than one meeting the week before the decision.
What it costs and where it backfires
Opponents you leave alone may harden or campaign among the undecided while you are busy elsewhere. The time is real: individual meetings with a dozen people take weeks. Some of the undecided will want changes that weaken the plan, and some will stay undecided whatever you do. Honest answers to real doubts are the whole of it. Promising each fence-sitter something different, or telling them the group has already decided when it has not, turns persuasion into deception, and the undecided compare notes.
When it is used on you
Opposing a proposal, watch where the sponsor is spending time. If it is with colleagues who have not taken a side, that is where the decision is being made, so talk to the same people about your concerns, with specifics. If you are one of the undecided, take the meetings, ask hard questions, and hold your support until your doubts are answered in writing.