From Conflict to Convergence: Coming Together to Solve Tough Problems

CHAPTER 15Achieving Consensus and Impact

After participants have agreed on fundamental principles that will guide their final recommendations and brainstormed possible solutions, you can turn to the final steps of collaborative problem-solving: building agreement on a set of higher-ground solutions that satisfy the widest range of stakeholders and then developing a plan to move these ideas forward.

Sometimes areas of likely agreement emerge during brainstorming, with a few clear winners, quite a few “maybes,” and perhaps some ideas that that aren't attracting much enthusiasm. If you've got some clear winners and some promising “maybes,” you may have a leg up in the process of finalizing solutions that the entire group can support. On contentious issues of some complexity, the group will almost always need to review their potential solutions with care. While doing so, it's helpful to use the OPTIONS (“Only Proposals That Include Others' Needs Succeed”) technique that was described in Chapter 11, “Generate Options for Mutual Gain.”

Skillful facilitation can make all the difference here as the group engages the potential solutions, either alone or in combination with each other, and discusses how they meet—or don't meet—the needs of various stakeholder interests. The facilitator's job is to draw out the views of everyone affected to ensure that participants fully understand where people stand, but it also helps enormously if each participant continues to be invested in listening ...