Why Great Leaders Love Complaints: Complaints Exorcise Frustrations That Stand in the Way of Progress

The greatest threat to an organization’s progress lies less in the likelihood that people might disagree with the direction it’s going than that they might be distracted from it. When people are focused, they are marvelously able to perform even in the service of decisions and directions with which they disagree, but when their attention and energy are unfocussed or focused elsewhere, they are unable to contribute meaningfully to even their fondest aspirations. In such a situation, it is not the disagreement people feel that cripples them; it is the frustration that arises from feeling out of control and victimized. This kind of inner conflict is a leader’s enemy because it can quickly consume a person’s thoughts and emotions and leave nothing left to work with.

For this reason, perceived pressure to conform mentally and emotionally can be more debilitating to individuals and organizations than the loftiest expectations of performance. People frequently find it easier to contribute to something they do not entirely support than to something they feel forced to “believe in” against their will. Counter-intuitively, allowing someone to disagree with a decision can free them up to contribute more effectively to carrying it out.

Make no mistake, this is a delicate and dangerous truth. Exceptional leaders are not content with mere compliance from their teams-- they are diligent and adept at cultivating believers rather than mere followers through their influence--  but they know that dissent is not always a sign of disengagement.  Effective collaborative effort requires the ability to contribute meaningfully to collective goals even when those goals differ from an individual’s own. Tolerating some expressions of this dissonance actually enables team members to commit their energy and activity fully to the group’s success without being distracted by the pressure to give up their own opinions and values en route. It allows them to intentionally choose the advancement of group goals over their own. While leaders need team members who are cognizant of and committed to their own values and aspirations, their ultimate success depends upon members’ willingness to selectively subjugate those personal priorities for the sake of collective aims.

Many people carry on long animated conversations in their heads in which they set their bosses straight and say the critical things they’ve been longing to say out loud. I have a friend whose coping strategies for conflict include a long run during which he stages a dramatic confrontation in his imagination and plays it out part by part as he pounds the pavement. At the end of his physical exertion, he has successfully exorcised the emotional conflict constraining his overall “fitness”. This is not to say, he has necessarily reversed or given up his previous personal perspective. Quite the contrary, his new “fitness” and ability to move forward are frequently born of his enthusiastic reaffirmation of that perspective and the deliberate choice to temporarily set it aside rather than to overthrow it.