Assume Good Intentions in Others

Recently I participated in a two-day workshop with a few dozen managers and executives at a company trying to re-align its culture as part of a major change-management effort. Over the last few years this firm had developed or acquired a number of new services and offerings, designed to facilitate a more holistic, value-added approach to meeting its clients’ needs. The goal of the workshop, among other things, was for participants to discuss the kinds of values and principles that would be important to the company as it transformed itself into a different kind of business – one that was more client-oriented rather than product-oriented, and focused on selling multifaceted solutions, rather than standardized services.

In a workshop like this, it’s important for the participants to think about and then “own” the new values themselves, emerging from the session motivated and energized to carry them forward. Among other things, you’re trying to impart a sense of mission at the company that can drive an internal culture capable of sustaining the change you are trying to accomplish. Workshop participants had been invited, not solely because of their rank or position (although the senior leadership team was included), but also because of their perceived level of internal influence with their peers.

One task was to come up with a list of “core values” that would be important to the company’s future success in this new role, brainstorming first in small groups, and then honing the list of values to just a half dozen or less – an easily memorized set of “who we are and what we stand for” values.

Virtually everyone agreed that one of the most important core values for defining the company’s future culture would be “trust,” for two reasons: First, they wanted a company that would always be dedicated to its clients’ success -- being fair with each client, proactively protecting a client’s best interest, not taking advantage of a client’s lack of knowledge, and so forth.

But also, trust was an important core value because the workshop participants themselves all wanted to work at a company where people could trust each other. And this is where I thought the discussion got even more interesting. What kinds of behaviors would you expect to see in a company where people really do trust each other? What sorts of behaviors should be encouraged, recognized, and rewarded if a company is going to sustain this type of work environment?

Number one on our list: Assume good intentions in others. When we go into meetings or discussions, or when we interact by email or phone, we should assume that the people we’re interacting with have good intentions. We may disagree with someone, but when we do we should still give them the benefit of the doubt. If their intentions are good, we should cut them some slack.

This is a very important idea, because whenever you disagree with someone’s opinion, or with their judgment about a situation, the natural inclination is to suspect a flaw in the other person’s character. Either they aren’t as smart as we are or (more likely) they’re just acting selfishly. After all, you yourself have no problem at all seeing the right course of action to take, so the most expedient way for your own brain to process the fact that someone else doesn’t see it like you see it is that their intentions must be bad. From a psychological standpoint this is the “easy” way to explain a disagreement to your own selfish ego. It doesn’t require too much hard thinking to remain confident in your own grasp of reality.

It’s easy to rationalize your own point of view by attributing bad intentions to people with dissenting viewpoints. Cognitively, it’s actually hard work to assume that people who disagree with you have good intentions. It doesn't come naturally, and we have to force ourselves to assume that a person we disagree with must have some legitimate reason for their point of view.

To assume good intentions in others, you have to make a sincere effort to see things from their perspective. This means being an active listener, not being defensive, remaining open to new or different ideas, and not taking personal offense at contrary points of view.

Try it a few times. You’ll get better with practice. Next time you find yourself in a disagreement of any kind – with your co-worker, your boss, a customer, vendor, or anyone else – step back and force yourself to remember that their intentions are almost certainly just as good as yours are.

And wouldn’t you like to work for a company where everyone did this?