Encouraging Hearty Debate in Your Organization

By Nels Lindberg, DVM, Production Animal Consultation

We all love the feedyard life, and feeding cattle is an incredible business. Cattle feeding is a noble endeavor, just like ranching, farming, dairy farming, and other agricultural businesses, because we are producing food to sustain human and animal life. While it is an incredible business, we face daily challenges, problems, and issues of varying degrees of severity. The things we do daily matter, and we must create an environment focused on reducing all kinds of risk, whether it be financial, health, nutritional, or safety risk. Every problem requires human interaction, action, and conversation to be solved in a healthy manner. Leaders must create an environment for hearty, healthy debate. Healthy debate allows us to achieve success on all fronts.

I am sure that each of us can think of several situations where hearty debate was needed but avoided. Maybe your team had a good discussion about an issue at your operation but no real debate occurred because your leader was set on getting his way regardless of anyone else’s thoughts, experience, or research on the issue at hand. Or perhaps you as a leader identified a problem and the best way to fix it but you were too “nice” to discuss the performance issues contributing to the problem.

Regardless of the organization, we have all experienced many situations in which hearty debate was not possible or was avoided, or in which hearty debate was attempted but failed miserably. As leaders, we must encourage people to challenge our team, identify when the team is screwing up, and give honest constructive criticism to improve team performance. We must help our team members to understand that if we are to be the best version of our team possible, we must allow everyone to speak up and create hearty debate. We must communicate that we appreciate and encourage hearty debate for critical and honest feedback. We must be clear that it is each team member’s responsibility to participate in these discussions. Hearty debate does not happen unless leaders coach the team in a professional manner.

Here are some keys to creating the right environment for hearty debate:

• Hire or surround yourself with people that have the courage to speak up and not be “yes men” or “yes women”. Leaders that do not encourage team members to challenge them will never reach their full potential and neither will the team.

• Avoid “why” questions and “you” statements, as they create a defensive atmosphere that distracts from the real goal of growth and improvement. Instead, encourage the use of “what” and “how” questions to create a more constructive atmosphere that encourages self-reflection and growth.

• Routinely remind all team members that we ask them to be honest and real with us. Make sure they know it is their responsibility to take ownership in resolving issues. Reward hearty debate. Thank everyone for successful hearty debate and conversations.

• Require humility of all team members. Everyone must check their ego at the door and adopt an attitude of life-long learning. As John Wooden said, “It’s what you learn after you know it all that counts.”

• Bring people into the debate that behave well. People who behave poorly or lack a high level of character will destroy the nobility and judicious spirit of hearty debate and ultimately the business.

• Bring people into the debate that get excited, not offended, when challenged and have the ability to listen, reflect, and learn from others in the room.

And here are some keys to having a hearty debate:

• The #1 question that must be the foundation of the debate is “What is best for the organization?”. Everyone must focus on what is best for the team or business or family, not on getting their own way or winning the debate.

• Everyone must speak up, be heard, and offer solutions yet not insist on them. Be respectful of others in the debate and yield to one another when needed.

• Be an active listener. Often times, we quit listening when others are speaking that do not agree with our solution or bias.

• Remind everyone, again, that everyone is on the same team, wanting success and what is best for the organization. We may have different approaches to achieve “what is best”, but if we speak with honesty and humility, hearty debate will arrive at the best course of action.

• Be prepared for the debate. Some people will bring more experience, knowledge, and intuition to the debate, while others will bring more research. Capitalize on those synergies.

• Be kind, not nice. As businessman Daniel Lubetzky says, “Nice doesn’t require much. You can be passive and be nice. But kind requires the strength of being earnest. There are some cases where people are absolute jerks, but there are far more cases where people are too meek and too afraid to share feedback and they cause far more damage because of how common it is.” [1] Instead of being “nice” and concentrating on sparing others’ feelings, practice being kind by sharing direct, honest feedback in a way that others are more willing to receive it.

As leaders, it is our responsibility to create a real, honest, humble environment that encourages good hearty debate at all times. We need to hear about problems in our organization. If we respond arrogantly or do not respond at all when problems are brought to our attention, our people will stop bringing problems to us to be heartily debated for the good of the organization. If our people bring problems to us and we have hearty debate without fear of any sort of retribution, our business can reach its full potential!

As President Donald Trump once said, “We must speak our minds openly, debate our disagreements honestly, but always pursue solidarity.”

Dr. Nels Lindberg is a people coach, team coach, business coach, and keynote speaker, available virtually or in person. If you have any interest in these opportunities, please reach out to his office at 620-792-1265 and visit with his right-hand lady, Jill.

[1] CNBC, 2023. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/10/26/self-madebillionaire-daniel-lubetzky-shares-his-no-1-tip-for-success.html