What your plan would look like
The read
What is actually happening, said back to you plainly. Not the problem you arrived with — the mechanism underneath it, and why the obvious response aims at the wrong thing.
Three moves, in the order to try them
Which three depends on the room. Same complaint, three rooms, almost nothing in common.
You are in the room, and you can push
If a moment you will recognise, then the move.
Why this one first, and what it costs you.
“the words, with your people and your meeting in them.”
Behind it: the research, and what it does not cover.
You are in the room, and you cannot
If a moment you will recognise, then a different move.
The moves from the room above would cost you more here than the credit did.
“the words, lower risk, still with your name attached.”
Behind it: the research, and what it does not cover.
It already went up, and they heard it as someone else’s
If a moment you will recognise, then a different move again.
Nothing in the meeting helps now, and the window is short.
“the words, factual, addressed to the confusion rather than the person.”
Behind it: the research, and what it does not cover.
What not to do, and why
The obvious response, left out on purpose
Usually the thing you were about to try, and why it costs more than it returns.
The one that fixes a different problem
Named, so you stop spending effort on it.
Keep the record
Write the date each time. That is the whole method, and it is the part most people skip.
Plans people write down and never track mostly do not happen — intending to act produces about half the behaviour you would expect. Watching your own progress closes a measurable part of that gap.
| Date | Which move | What happened |
|---|---|---|
Four rows on purpose. If nothing has changed after four meetings, the plan is wrong rather than slow.
What changing looks like
- The first sign, and roughly when to expect it.Specific enough to notice without looking for it.
- The tell that credit has actually moved.Usually something other than praise.
- The one that lasts longer than what people remember.Written down somewhere other people check later.
Where the evidence stops
We name the research so you can check it, and we tell you what it does not cover.
In one plan we wrote, one of the three moves had no study behind it at all. The interruption research measures who gets interrupted, not whether holding your turn works. The move stayed, because it is sound practice. The citation went, because it would have been decoration.
Where a study exists, it is named. Where it was run on something adjacent, the plan says so instead of borrowing its authority. Where there is nothing, the plan says that too.
Very little of this research was done in Asia. Every plan says so.