How do you disagree with your employees? Have you ever disagreed with an employee in a meeting? How did it go? Did it shut things down, or did it spark debate and dialog? The best leaders know how to engage in debate in meetings and know how to push back in meetings skillfully.

To get the most out of your team, you must build a culture where it’s safe to disagree and debate in meetings. If you don’t, important things will go unsaid, and you’ll miss opportunities for insightful dialog and shared decision-making. How you disagree with your employees in meetings will set the tone.

In this week’s episode of Reflect Forward, I share a process I use to debate ideas in meetings. It includes the importance of building connections and trust within your team, having awareness about how you are showing up, what your tone sounds like and what messages your body language is sending. I discuss the importance of engaging all team members in the dialog, especially when you disagree with an individual, and then follow up with the employee and team afterward.

Leaders need to debate and disagree with their teammates skillfully. Remember, disagreeing isn’t about getting into a fight, being mean, or wanting to win. And disagreements don’t have to lead to damaged relationships. Teach your team how to debate and disagree skillfully by role modeling how it’s done.

Question of the Week

This week’s question came from an audience member at one of my recent keynotes, and he said, “I work for a big company. How can you scale the ability to build a people-centric organization in a large organization?”

Great question, as building a people-centric organization isn’t easy. My answer was to focus on teaching middle management what a people-centric organization is and how to construct people-centric teams, and middle management is the key. Listen to find out more!

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