Building support person by person, a sponsor wins one ally, folds that person's concerns into the plan, and uses the improved plan to win the next, so the coalition and the proposal grow together.
An example
A quality director at a snack food manufacturer believed the company needed a dedicated allergen-free production line, a $4 million project nobody had asked for. He started with the plant's maintenance manager, who liked the idea but pointed out that the space he had in mind sat over the main steam line; the plan moved to the warehouse annex. With that version he went to the head of sales, who wanted it only if the line could also run a gluten-free product for a grocery chain that had been asking. He added it. The revised plan, now with a customer attached, won over the plant manager, who insisted on a staged build. The staged version won the controller, because its first stage cost less than the threshold that required board approval. By the time the director brought it to the operating committee, four people had shaped it, and each spoke for the piece they had changed.
Why it works
Each step makes the plan look better, since every ally's concern becomes an improvement the next person can see, and makes each next yes easier, since the plan arrives already tested and backed by someone the next person respects. The coalition grows along with the proposal, so allies feel they own part of it. The sequence depends on early allies whose input really improves the plan and whose support persuades the next person, and on a sponsor willing to change the plan as it goes.
The thinking behind it
Rosabeth Moss Kanter The Change Masters: Innovation for Productivity in the American Corporation (1983) describes innovators inside large companies, whom Kanter called corporate entrepreneurs, who had to gather support, money, and information beyond their own authority, and organizations that innovated well let people build coalitions across units. A quality director with an unrequested project is that kind of innovator, and growing the coalition one manager at a time is how support gets gathered without a mandate.
Michael D. Watkins The First 90 Days: Critical Success Strategies for New Leaders at All Levels (2003) advises leaders who need support beyond their authority to work out who defers to whom and to sequence conversations so that early supporters help recruit others. Asking each ally whom to see next, and bringing their endorsement and their changes to that person, follows the same logic: each conversation sets up the one after it.
When it fits
Ideas with no mandate yet, carried by a sponsor without the authority to impose them, are where it fits: an innovation from the middle of the organization, a project nobody asked for, a change that crosses several managers' territory. The proposal has to be flexible enough to absorb changes, and you need time to work through people individually and a rough idea of whose support will open the next door.
How to use it well
Start with someone likely to say yes whose input will make the plan better, usually a practitioner close to the work.
- Show them a draft, ask what is wrong with it, and change it.
- Ask whom you should talk to next and whether they will vouch for the plan to that person.
- Bring the improved version to the next ally, say who has already shaped it and how, and repeat.
- Keep a record of each change and whose it was, so every ally can see their contribution in the final proposal.
Leave the people with budget and approval authority for last, when the plan carries the support and the improvements of everyone before them.
What it costs and where it backfires
It is slow, and the plan you end with may differ a great deal from the one you started with. Each concession has a price, and a plan that tries to satisfy everyone can lose its point. Word may travel ahead of you, and someone who hears about the idea secondhand may oppose it before you reach them. Tell each person truthfully who supports the plan and what they changed. Claiming support you do not yet have, to win the next ally, will be found out when people compare notes.
When it is used on you
When a proposal reaches you already endorsed by several colleagues, ask each what they changed and what they still doubt, and judge the plan on its merits. Coming late in the sequence leaves less room to shape it, so if you care about the area, ask to be consulted earlier and say which of your concerns the plan has not yet addressed.