I don't have the resources

by Steve Johnson
<scj@transmeta.com>

Steve Johnson has been a technical manager on and off for nearly two dec-ades. At AT&T, he's best known for writing Yacc, Lint, and the Portable Compiler.

and Dusty White
<dustywhite@earthlink.net>

Dusty White works as a management consultant in Silicon Valley, where she acts as a trainer, coach, and trouble-shooter for technical companies.

Have you ever come up with a really good idea, one of those ideas that you just know will be great for the company, revolutionize your industry, or even make everyone's work easier? You could just feel that this was the right thing to do, and you could already see the results of having it implemented. You could even hear others already telling you that it's a great idea.

The only problem, just a minor problem in your eyes, was that you would need other people in the group to help you bring about the great things this idea promised.

So you rushed into your manager's office and poured out your idea, only to hear, "I'm sorry, we don't have the resources to do this."

What does this literally mean? If this idea were the most important thing for the group to do, would it get done? Certainly! It's clear that the immediate response translates to "No."

"No" is a very ambiguous word. It could well mean:

1. "I think this idea is really stupid, but I don't want to argue with you about it."

Or it might mean:

2. "I don't know how I'm going to get done what I already said I would do. Don't bother me with anything else."

Or it could mean:

3. "The other things my group is working on are all more important than working on your idea."

Or it could mean:

4. "I'm so stressed out I haven't really heard or understood your idea."

It's important to understand what the "no" means in order to decide how, or whether, to move it to a yes. How can you move beyond the no?

Several columns ago, we discussed chunking. Chunking refers to the size of the ideas being discussed — you can chunk up to bigger and bigger concepts by asking questions like "What is the intention of that?" or you can chunk down to smaller and smaller concepts by asking questions like "What, specifically?" We also pointed out that as you chunk up you tend to get agreement. (Listen to politicians on talk shows — they try to please everyone by using highly chunked phrases like "good government" and "compassionate conservatism," while their questioners keep asking "What, specifically?")

So when you get the "not enough resources" response, you might try chunking up. "Well, my idea is intended to support [lofty corporate goal] by [a few cogent details]." Hopefully, even if your manager thinks your idea is dumb, she/he will be nodding, since everyone supports [lofty corporate goal]. If your manager looks puzzled, expand on the response you get and give details until your idea is understood, including how it supports these corporate goals. Now, since you both support the same goals, it's natural to explore how the new idea could be supported and implemented. When you have agreement (and have eliminated the "dumb idea" response, above) you can now chunk down, preserving this agreement.

For example, you could ask, "What would happen if you supported my idea?" You could encourage your manager to get more detailed, and discuss who is working on what in the group, and what would have to be dropped or delayed to support the idea. In this discussion, you might discover that all the people in the group are indeed working on things that are more important than your idea, and go off, with renewed respect for your manager's judgment, to look for another way of implementing the idea. Or you might discover that you could assist one of the group members in return for his or her help with your idea.

Even if the disagreement remains, by using this method you can usually reduce the impasse down to a priority call — is some current project more important than carrying out the new idea? You may need to seek help from outside the group in making this priority call.

The work required to come to agreement on priorities is rarely wasted. Some of the most frustrating business situations arise when two groups have different, unspoken rankings of company priorities, and proceed to frustrate each other while at the same time being convinced that they are safeguarding the best interests of the company. By smoking out and resolving these priority calls, many future problems can be avoided.