Title
Getting employee push back on your ideas, solutions, decisions or requests as a manager, can feel like a challenge to your authority or an attempt to undermine. Sometimes it is. Most of the time it is not.
I used to hate employee push back and challenge before I realised how incredibly valuable push back is. I can’t tell you how many BETTER ideas, solutions and decisions came from me encouraging employee push back. If I hadn’t accepted push back and challenge in a really constructive way, I would not have been anywhere near as successful in my career. I absolutely love getting constructive challenge as a manager because it enables much better outcomes.
7 great ways to handle employee push back on ideas, solutions and decisions
- Common sources of push back and why employee push back can a good thing
- How to invite constructive challenge and dissuade undermining or challenge to manager authority
- 7 straight forward steps to handle constructive challenge confidently
- 4 clever steps that stop employees undermining manager authority
Knowing how to deal with team member push back will create confident for you to invite constructive challenge. Getting challenge and push back from team members will literally give you an amazing source of ideas, options, problems and solutions. You can use challenge and push back to create high value adding projects and keep team performance well ahead of targets. Many minds are usually better than one, not matter how bright.
When you get unhelpful challenges to your authority through to undermining attempts – you need to know exactly how to stop employees undermining your authority quickly and make it difficult for individuals to continue their actions. I cover this towards the end.
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1 — Common sources of push back and why employee push back can a good thing
As a manager you will get employee push back. You want employee push back to enable you to do a much better job personally. I will explain why.
Common sources of employee push back come from
- Before or during periods of change. Everyone has a different threshold before change become unpleasant.
- Others having different ideas and solutions which is usually a good thing
- Others seeing problems with your idea or solutions which you may have missed
- Some individuals are very curious and ask lots of questions
- Push back can come from frustration, anger, unhappiness and other negative emotions
- Undermining happens when employees question or challenge to try to make you look silly and damage your credibility
- I have got plenty of push back purely from employee laziness
People are almost hard-wired to protect themselves against threats to their self-image, their security and their status. Expect push-back and challenge. Learn the best ways to deal with team member push back and these situations will no longer be an issue for you.
Challenge from employees is great feedback. The type of employee push back should give you good insights into what the individuals or teams are thinking and feeling. Better understanding helps you choose the best ways to handle the situation you face.
A lot of team member push back come from a lack of understanding OR they have spotted a concerning problem OR they have a better idea. These challenges from employees will help you do a better job and improve team performance. A win for everyone.
2 – How to invite constructive challenge and dissuade undermining or challenge to manager authority
The last thing you want is open season on you, damaging your manager authority. NOR do you want excessive challenges and push back, even if they are constructive. It would be hard to get anything useful done with the team.
Lay out clear ground rules or expectations with the team. This give them safety to constructively and will stop staff making you look bad. For example, some of the rules I would communicate to the team might include:
- I want you to challenge ideas, solutions and plans when what you say is constructive and helps the individual or team get better results or outcomes.
- Challenge might include highlighting problems or weaknesses, in which case I expect you to think of a solution with those problems.
- I expect you to question me and colleagues when you don’t understand something. You have to do this in a respectful and sensible way, again with the intention of helping.
- If in doubt, ask, again with the intention of making the team better off.
- Always sell your idea or solution rather than rubbishing a team members ideas or solutions.
Shut Down These Challenges
Don’t allow staff to use challenge or push back to:
- Score points
- Put others down or try to silence them in any way
- To make them look silly, unprepared or incompetent.
- Or embarrass them in any way
Clear rules are vital for how to manage staff who undermine your authority or are generally being difficult.
Set the ground rules or expectations on team member push back early on. Live the rules you have set out and enforce them with the team. This is one of best ways to handle team member push back before it has even happened.
3 – Here Are 7 Straight Forward Steps To Handle Constructive Challenge Confidently
1 – Get Control Of Your Emotions
The first thing to do when you get challenge from employees is to get control of your emotions. Take a few seconds to compose yourself before answering. You want to be calm, cool and unflustered when you respond to what they have said.
2 – Ask a Clarifying Question
Asking questions gains you time to think and plan out your response plus you understand their position better. It is fine to ask several questions. Make sure you understand their position.
3 – Consider The Situation
Consider the situation and type of challenge. This will enable you to respond in a more positive, useful and professional way. Three examples:
- For challenges to data or assumptions – ask them to share their evidence or data or talk through their reasoning for different assumptions
- If the challenge is around prioritising, link your prioritising to team goals, company strategy or go through your reasoning. Ask them for theirs and compare.
- If the push back is about use of resources, including staffing, or the timing of activities, again link to goals, strategy and planning. Ask them for their reasoning for different ideas or plans and compare.
4 – Use Data
Use available assumptions, evidence, data, constraints and options so you can talk FACTUALLY when explaining why you have chosen the route, decision, action etc that you have. [for how to create great KPIs, click here]
5 – Create Options
If it is appropriate, co-create better options or compromise options. This can be a very useful step, to increase the ownership of the outcome by those raising the challenge. In time pressured situations, this step is distraction and should be avoided.
6 – The Rationale
Explain your rationale or why you have chosen a specific route, process, decisions etc In my experience, this is a really good step to do as standard. Explaining the why often prevents challenge because you create understanding with your team. When you do get push back, ask for their rationale. You can select the best option for the situation. Tie in the why behind your choice to strategy, team goals, KPIs, risk, contractions etc. Ensure there are solid links to what is best for the team and company.
7 – Summarise
Summarise the decision, action or way forward and get everyone’s agreement. The more they own the outcome, the quicker and easier it will be to implement.
These seven steps are a good checklist to go through in your mind. The two most important factors in handling constructive challenge well is to keep an open mind AND to select the best option regardless of where it comes from. Don’t get hung up on your solution, idea, method etc.
Keeping an open mind and selecting the best option will encourage constructive challenge from the team which is exactly what you need to improve the overall performance of your team over time.
in summary
You want to encourage constructive push back and challenge within the team. The benefits include
- Better decision making through diverse thinking
- Innovation and solution building increases
- Blind spots exposed earlier
- You get higher levels of trust and psychological safety
- Employee engagement and ownership increases
- You get a stronger team culture
- Better leadership development within the team
- All this leads to higher team performance
Do put the seven ways to handle employee push back into practice being:
- Get in control of your emotions
- Ask clarifying questions
- Consider the type of challenge
- Gather evidence, assumptions data etc
- Co-create a better solution or option if applicable
- Explain your rationale or the why behind what you are proposing
- Summarise and get active agreement
If you have any questions on “7 Great Ways To Handle Employee Push Back on Ideas/Solutions/Requests”, please email me at support@enhance.training and I will get back to you.
I personally love push back and challenge – when it is done in the right way by team members seeking the best solution for the situation. I know from experience, that when team members are happy raising concerns, asking the difficult questions and pushing back – you have create the culture for a high performing team.
On the flip side, it is really important to know exactly how to stop team members trying to undermine you or damage your confidence and authority.
Combine both these skill sets and you will have an amazing team to work with that will deliver great results and team performance.
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