Surviving Being Right

I’ll never forget running into a former co-worker early in my career, when we’d both been affiliated with the same national financial institution. He’d been a vice president in the company and was a very likeable guy. He seemed to work well with everyone I knew, and most people held a high regard for him (or so I thought).

One day, when the executive group came back to the office after being out of town for a meeting, we learned that he was leaving the company to “pursue other interests.” We all knew that it was a euphemism for having been canned. No explanation was given for his quick exit, and everyone wondered what had happened.

The truth came out when I saw him several weeks later at a social function. We exchanged pleasantries, and then I couldn’t stop myself from asking him why he had left the company. He nodded, thinking, and then answered simply, “It’s not good to be right when those in power are wrong.” It turned out he disagreed with a senior executive on some matter and became intractable in his position. He wouldn’t compromise, so they fired him.

This happened a long time ago, yet I still remember it clearly because his words contained a nugget of wisdom that I’ve recalled time and time again. During my career, I’ve seen a lot of people hang themselves and become organizationally ineffective or destroy their careers by feeling the necessity to be right.

Don’t get me wrong—I’m not saying that people shouldn’t speak up when they know that those in power are wrong. I’m just saying that there are effective ways to have your voice heard so that you win not only the battle, but also the war.

Wield Influence Without Power

Most often, I’ve observed this problem of being right in areas that require deep vertical expertise—engineering or accounting, for example. Sometimes people with vast knowledge about a subject are so attached to their cause that it becomes more important to get their way than to see the big picture of what’s best for the entire company. They’re like a horse with blinders on—they only see one path.

These folks work in their organizational silos and don’t know how to get cooperation from other people across the company. In today’s workplace, where outsourcing, partnerships, and alliances are the norm rather than the exception, learning how to exert influence laterally is key to surviving and to getting things done. Protecting turf and participating in office politics belong to a bygone era. My co-worker from years ago might have kept his job—and still had his way—if he had been more persuasive than combative, a coalition builder instead of a silo protector.