the art of leading

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Your ideas will face opposition in any field of life. Do you want to prove to your boss why you deserve that raise? Do you want to convince that friend of yours to lend you the money you need to start your dream business? Then you need to get those ideas heard and supported. How do you do that? By knowing how to argue. Here are some tips on how to argue.

1. State your objective. Some arguments start out of nothing, and have no purpose other than just ‘winning’. When you state your objective for arguing, you make it clear for yourself and the other party what the discussion is about. If you are honest in doing this, it also shows genuinity
2. Be concise. Most people don’t appreciate others going on about irrelevant details.
3. Be nice. I don’t mean “smile at all moments” type of nice, but at least don’t make others hate you. Don’t try to force the other party to like you, but don’t make it hard for them either.
4. Exude confidence. It’s much easier for people to listen to others who are sure of themselves and who believe in their positions. This also transmits credibility, and being perceived as honest is essential to prevail in an argument.
5. Know when to stop arguing. Don’t ramble about unnecessary or irrelevant details. State your case, and close. Going on after you’ve made your point could just make you unlikeable.

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Tim and Bob are both junior executives in a big corporation. Both are faced with the same situation: Their boss has signed a particular contract, which is pretty clearly a waste of resources in their eyes. But their boss is 100% convinced that she’s doing the right thing. Tim and Bob both are 100% convinced that she’s wrong. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a difficult case in our hands. This is how Tim and Bob each go about in trying to convince the boss that she’s wrong.

1. Tim goes right up to the boss and, with an obvious air of superiority (thinking, “how dumb are you! I’m right, you’re wrong.”). “We all know that you’re making a terrible decision. This is a total waste of money.”
2. Bob knows his boss is a hardheaded person, who normally takes other people’s advice lightly. He makes an appointment with his boss and courteously chats about the contract. “I hope you’re making the right decision. I trust in your judgment, since you’ve already proved to us that you have the company’s best interests in mind. However, since the moment you announced the contract I became aware of some numbers I thought you should know…bla bla bla.”

So who is a better ‘arguer’ then?

Well, wait a minute there before you answer. We first need to answer this:

WHY do we argue?

Let me give you a short answer: To get things done. Not just to ‘be heard’, but to accomplish something concrete.

So with that in mind, who is more likely to get something done? Who is more likely to make the boss reconsider her previous decision? Tim or Bob? I’d have to put my money on Bob. His priority was to keep his boss’s and the company’s best interest at hand. He didn’t shout and thrash about, but I’m pretty sure he was able to disarm the boss and get his point across. Tim, on the other hand, had eliminated his chances for prevailing from the moment he entered the door, before even opening his mouth. His attitude problem talked more clearly than his words: “I’m better than you, and I know more than you.” Who will react positively to that?!

So go ahead, don’t be afraid to argue. We all need to get ideas across, and get things done. But please, don’t argue merely for the sake of “winning”, whatever that means.

P.S. The next post will provide some pointers on “how to argue”. Stay tuned.

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The Art of Leading is back. Life circumstances didn’t allow me to post regularly (almost nothing at all). But from now on I’ll be aiming to post three high-quality articles per week. Happy (late) New Year! Please keep visiting for new, reinvigorated content.

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