Hi, I'm Kevin Eikenberry, and
I'm here to help you reach your potential as a leader and a human being.
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Episodes like this one where I'm helping you play
Devil's advocate to devil's advocates.
Are you ready?
Let's get started.
You've seen the devil's advocate at work before.
You're having a brainstorming.
Meeting someone makes it, shares an idea,
makes a comment, and someone else starts to make a negative comment.
Or it could be in a one on
one conversation where you say something and the other person shares a negative
and then they just excuse themselves
and say, Well, I'm just being a devil's advocate.
And when this happen,
the person saying that feels justified, like I'm just being a devil's advocate.
But what they've done is they've squelched ideas,
they've hurt people's feelings, perhaps, and they've limited
the number of ideas that might actually show up
because the advocate is shooting things down all along the way.
Now, this phrase devil's advocate comes from real life.
It's not just a made up thing that we just all heard.
It comes from the Catholic Church.
In the Catholic Church.
There are several steps taken before
someone can be granted sainthood, which is a big deal.
And for almost 400 years ending in 1983,
there was a formal role called
The Devil's Advocate, whose role was in the last
step of the sainthood progression to argue against
and give any final reasons why a person shouldn't be sainted.
Now, in that case, that makes a lot of sense, right?
There are four important points in this historical example.
That's the precursor of what we call being the devil's advocate
for important pieces.
Number one is it's an appointed person, not someone self-appointed themselves.
Well, I'm just being the devil's advocate.
The second one is the role came at the end of the process.
This is maybe the most important one.
It's not Whenever someone felt like they had something to say
or whatever they wanted to justify
their negative comment, it came at the very end of the process.
Third, it was difficult.
Considered unpopular and not necessarily a role.
Someone wanted.
And yet some people today sort of relish that role, don't they,
using it as their excuse.
And then lastly, it required significant preparation.
It wasn't just based on personal opinion or preference.
It required tremendous research and preparation
to be in the role of the devil's advocate.
Little of these things apply to the self-appointed
devil's advocate role we experience, or maybe even do ourselves.
So when we see this in someone else, what can we do?
Now, we don't know what their intentions are,
but all we can do is try to not have the downfalls
come from that person squelching ideas, etc.
So when we experience it, what can we do?
The first thing is to get some agreement from people
to delay negative judgments.
So in a meeting situation, if we're going to brainstorm,
we can say we're going to hold the judgment till later.
So even if someone wants to play devil's advocate,
there'll be a time, but not right now.
We want to get all of the ideas out before we start to judge any of them.
Second, perhaps assign someone rather than anyone
just deciding to be devil's advocate.
You could have someone be assigned for a particular brainstorming session.
Hey, why don't you sort of sit back and play devil's advocate
on these ideas when we've got the full list?
Next, let them know the impact of their words.
Like now it's happened, right?
Someone has just back to our scene
and someone said, Well, I was just being the devil's advocate.
You can, in a gentle and kind way, say, you know, I appreciate that.
And yet there are some downsides to what you just did there
that may cause people to be
unwilling to share other ideas, or you may have squelched
the whole conversation, whether that was your intention or not.
Don't assume your intent or assume their intent,
but just walk through that with them and let them know.
And then lastly, thank them.
Hey, thank you for that perspective.
It's really useful, but can we hold on to that a while?
And let's explore these ideas a little bit more before we start
to shoot them down, find the holes in them, etc..
That's something we want to do.
We just don't want to do it too soon.
Let me close with today's tweet.
Playing devil's
advocate Too early isn't helpful.
It limits the number of ideas that will be considered.
Well, speaking of the number of ideas that will be considered
or that will be offered,
if you were to join us for our Virtual Leader Khan event,
you're going to hear hundreds of ideas if you join us for the entire
two day event.
Whether you join us for the entire Tuesday,
September 20th and 21st, or just for a selected portion,
I promise you it will be one of the very best things that you can do
on your for your own development as a leader this year.
Virtual Leader Con 2023 September 20th and 21st.
If you missed the live dates, never fear.
Go to the link below. Anyway.
You can learn about what happened
and how you can get access to whatever content from it.
Whatever advice, whatever leaders that we share with you that you can get.
Let's do the ending again.
That would be what is Do it from the tweet.
Okay, Playing devil's advocate Too early isn't helpful.
It limits the number of ideas that will be considered.
Stop right now.
Get your calendar out before I give you this date.
Are you ready?
September 20th and 21st, 2023.
Those are the two dates of Virtual Leader Con 2023.
Two days where I will be joined by 12 thought leaders
from around the world talking about all things related to leadership development.
Not only that, those who join us in the community in the virtual room
have the chance to interact with each other and with all of those guests.
All of it is get this completely free.
But if you miss those two days, the 20th and 21st of September, have no fear.
Go to the same link
and you can learn about how you can get access to the content for yourself.
Hope you'll do that and I hope you'll be back with us again
for another episode of Remarkable TV and the remarkable Leadership Podcast.