Who holds the pen?
If there’s confusion in your project, there’s a quick way to figure out why. I so wish I’d known when I started consulting so many years ago.
If you get a group of people together with the goal of ‘getting on the same page’, you can tell if it’s going to be successful by who holds ‘the power of the pen’.
A Consultant
The consultant stands at the whiteboard, everybody else is sitting. One person is holding the pen. The consultant is trying to direct the conversation the way they are wanting it to go. A small number of strong personalities dominate conversation. Several don’t say anything.
A Client
A key stakeholder stands at the whiteboard, they are paying the bills, so the consultants agree and generalise and dilute specific issues that need to be fixed, but aren’t comfortable to raise
The Consultant, then Client
The consultant starts the whiteboarding, then shortly after the pen is handed to someone else who has more detail. The original whiteboarder takes their place.
Everyone
This is the only way every person has a voice. Everyone has a pen and paper. They independently write down their thoughts in silence. No bias, no influence. Then they share their thoughts and place it on the wall. Once it exists on paper, it’s hard to throw away, it has to be heard.
The truth now emerges.
To work well you need to know the truth. To know the truth you need to give everyone a voice to share it. The truth is one that doesn’t require a higher decibel level to be recognised. Therefore, the truth is better found using the simplest tool. A pen and paper.
People are complex. Just as you need a calculator to work with complex numbers, you need tools to work with people. In Design Thinking these are called Methods.
Use methods to make sure every one gets a voice. Often it’s the person who says the least that knows the most. A method is a key to open the door.
Try this method:
