Has this happened to you? You’ve come up with a product idea, a strategy, a way around a big problem, or a different way to get better results cheaper as your next move. You have worked hard on a presentation, and excitedly shared your ideas with your boss…and WHAM, they say No. They might do it by politely ignoring your recommendations. You might hear the painful “Are you kidding? You can’t be serious.” The worst (my opinion) is being told in a patronizing tone, “You don’t really understand our situation. Stick to what you know better.” You feel stomped, squished, and shut down. You were so sure this was going to go well!
Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth. -Mike Tyson
As a leader you have a few choices as to what your next move will be.
You can yell, scream, whine, tell someone they are an idiot because they can’t see the brilliance of your idea, etc. You can see yourself as a victim, and wallow in self-pity. You can store up another “they done me wrong” story in your collection for whining to sympathetic listeners. You can feed a grudge until its grip on your mind lasts to your grave. You could call yourself an idiot for trying to make the world a better place, and fade back to sleepwalking through life.
Fools take those options. Your best leader self is not a fool.
Instead, work through these four options to make your best next move:
Learn from it to make your next move.
We often learn more from failures than successes, if we’re willing to. First, embrace your emotional responses, acknowledge them, and then set them aside. Analyze the situation. Put yourself in the position of others – how might your idea have been perceived by them? Any clues about what they focused on or why they said no? Was there a larger context that you weren’t aware of?
Practice separating criticism of your ideas from criticism of your identity.
Don’t begin with the assumption that saying no to your idea is about you personally. It’s unlikely to be true, for starters. Leaders gain strength when they have the discipline to hold their identity separate from their ideas. Reading and imagination are important but only take you to the brink of experience.
Consider taking another run with your idea or proposal.
Review whatever feedback you have, get some other perspectives, and find ways to address all the concerns and risks. Review your presentation and see if a modified approach might work better. “With patience a ruler may be persuaded, and a soft tongue will break a bone.” (Proverbs 25:15) Have confidence in yourself, and sharpen your idea and your presentation.
Choose to walk away without nursing wounds.
You always have the option to say “Nope, I’m done with that. But I’ll keep looking for new ideas. I won’t let this experience stop me from doing a good job with my next move.” That’s a professional response.
Love this post, Glenn – especially point # 2. If the world knew how to separate criticism of their ideas from criticism of their identity, people would have more self confidence. Someone needed to say it.
I just pressed the imaginary “LIKE” button in my mind, Adam.
A significant portion of my Ph.D. training was to hammer this idea home. You can’t be an effective scientist if you can’t dissociate your identity from the experimental design and results.
You’re exactly right, Glenn — it all comes down to choice. We always have a choice. We may not choose what happens in our lives, but we always have the choice of what we will do next. To do otherwise is to accept that victim mentality that bemoans how “life is happening to us,” instead of choosing to “happen to life.”
A few things sparked by this post:
Within the context of an organization (as opposed to seeking funding, publishing, etc. from an outside source), I wonder if it’s best to do preliminary work and pitch an idea in basic form before going all in on research and presentation — much like a query letter in publishing. This might cut down on the frustration of putting tons of work into something, when you aren’t even sure the higher-ups are in a place to be interested in the core concept.
It’s also quite possible that GOOD, SOLID ideas are being rejected by management who is stuck in the past, overly cautious, etc. While we do need honest assessment (from others and self), it’s not always the case that rejection or criticism of an idea means it was a bad one (cf. Copernicus, et al).
Finally, I’m trying to imagine the context within which the idea is being presented. Is it your job to present or pitch new ideas (i.e., ad campaigns)? Or is it within the context of your trying to make yourself invaluable within your organization? If the latter, and if new ideas are consistently rejected, are there other ways to accomplish the goal of making yourself invaluable? If the former, maybe trying the preliminary idea pitch above would be a good start. In addition, becoming known as someone who seeks constructive feedback may help. What if you put a standard post-presentation feedback questionnaire into play? Might it encourage an exchange that is actually helpful, revealing what parts of your presentation did resonate, as well as those which did not? It seems to me that it would certainly show initiative to invite feedback this way, and it would subtly “train” people to think in more detail than “yes” or “no” when it comes to your work.
As usual, Erik, you expand my thinking :-). I need to give some more thought to how organizations equip and train people to package and pitch ideas/proposals.
I second Erik’s comment. You’ve got a “like” from me as well! I love the strategies you outlined. We don’t have to “play the victim” when things don’t go our way. There are choices available & you provided four excellent ones!