A Playbook for Disagree and Commit

Decision making at scale and without casualties

Photo by Frank Busch on Unsplash

Have you ever experienced any of the the following?

• Decisions are made by whoever has the most important job title in the room
• Whoever has the most stamina for the disagreement wins out
• Disagreements rumble on and on without coming to a conclusion
• People back channel to campaign for the decision they want
• Decisions you thought had been made are actively undermined by people
• You are in disagreement with someone in another team and don’t know how to progress

If you answered yes to any of those then this article is for you. You’ll have come across the term disagree and commit and probably heard it misused. Disagree and commit doesn’t mean “stop disagreeing with me”. Or even in the worst instance “I commit to disagreeing with you when I’m proven right”. It means that everyone has agreed to proceed with a particular course of action even if it is not the one they would have chosen originally.

It’s worth understanding how large scale misalignments come about. As companies grow it becomes probable that any significant decision will affect a large number of people with vested interests. You get multiple people who are used to being the…