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- We'll do it unless...
A few days ago someone sent the following message to our team’s inbox, forwarded to all team members.
Hi team,
xxxxxx and I were thinking of doing xxxxxx. Before moving forward, we wanted to make sure you all are ok with it. Let us know what you think.
Thanks!
-xxxxx
There are two issues with this message.
As soon as one of the recipients “complains”, the sender is blocked. They have to address the feedback of the “complainer” before they can move their proposal forward.
Unless all team members reply and give a 👍🏻, it is unclear when the proposal can move forward.
If you take this to an extreme, this message gives every team member veto power on the proposal. It also requires a unanimous decision to move the proposal forward. Not ideal if you are trying to move work forward quickly.
Let’s rewrite the message using the “We’ll do it unless…” principle.
Hi team,
xxxxxx and I were thinking of doing xxxxxx. Unless we hear strong negative feedback by tomorrow’s end-of-day, we’ll go ahead and do xxxxxx.
Thanks!
-xxxxx
Phrasing the message this way addresses both of the issues above.
It moves from “Please give us permission to do it” (Allow List) to “We’ll do it unless you stop us” (Deny List).
It introduces a time constraint to disregard the opinions of the people who are late to the party (“You didn’t give us enough time to provide feedback!”)
I use the “We’ll do it unless…” principle almost every day to get sh*t done faster. Give it a go and let me know if you found it useful.
-Ale
P.S. What did you think about this post? Reply to let me know. You can also leave me anonymous feedback.