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Refusal as a Doorway to
Commitment
 In our desire to
create effective workplaces and lives with some meaning,
finding genuine, from-the-heart commitment is the
illusive prize. All the strategies, tools, and structures
in the world are useless if there is no commitment to
make them work. In our personal lives, personal dreams
cost us more than we imagined and constantly question our
commitment. And so a major challenge is how to create
commitment in others and find commitment within ourselves
to fulfill our intentions.
We pursue
commitment in many ways; we encourage optimism, we enroll
others through our vision, we urge a can-do attitude, we
devise elaborate reward systems, and plaster our walls
and calendars with inspirational messages. Authentic
commitment, though, is a strange commodity. It is much
like happiness, if pursued frontally, it eludes us.
Commitment is most likely to occur if we approach it from
the back door. Commitment enters through the portal of
refusal.
The basic idea is that if we cannot say no, then our yes,
our commitment, has no meaning. It is our capacity to
withstand the conventions of society, the demands and
expectations of others, the rules of the game that
initiates commitment. Commitment carries a price, and
that price is the willingness to live with the possible
cost of saying no.
No Easy Task
The problem with this is that in most high-control
cultures, we believe that to say no, to comment on the
emperor’s meager wardrobe, and to be the bearer of
bad news, are forms of institutional suicide. Most
cultures believe that if you stand up, you get
shot.
As a result of these injunctions, we operate on the basis
of compliance, which too often masquerades as commitment.
Commitment is the choice to say yes, without barter,
without a promise of future return, in the face of a
culture that may or may not value what we pursue. It is a
difficult choice to make. That choice is more likely to
occur if we understand its intimate connection with our
willingness to say no, or to refuse. There is a power in
the act of refusal that we do not fully appreciate. Here
are some variations on this theme:
- Our identity is defined by our boundaries—by
being as clear about what we are not, as being clear
about what we are. An infant’s first inkling that
it is a separate being from its mother comes through
the act of saying no. By the age of two we have
developed this capacity to an art
form.
- Genuine commitment always begins with the
expression of doubts. If we have no doubts about a
proposal, an action, or a strategy, then it means that
we do not care. I have no doubts only about those
things that do not matter. Confidence is the
willingness to proceed in the face of our doubts, not
in their absence.
- Carl Jung stated that all consciousness begins
with an act of disobedience. Adulthood begins at the
moment we betray the expectations of those who have
power over us. In the family, our freedom is first
claimed when we understand that we are not the children
our parents had in mind, and that is fine, the way it
should be.
- In the workplace, we become emotional owners of
the business when we set limits on what we will do and
declare our doubts about what does not make sense to
us. Being a partner in the business means we have the
ultimate right to say no, and not have to leave the
business. If we cannot say no, then we are a property
of the business, not a partner. Partners do not vote
with their feet, they find their voice and use it. We
may never exercise this right to say no, but knowing
that it exists is what engages us in full
membership.
- Refusal, which can appear to be a form of absolute
individualism, serves the community when we realize
that refusal is the beginning of a conversation, not
the end of one. Refusal is an early act of engagement.
It begs to be responded to with a question, not with a
demand. “ I have my doubts,” asks for a
response of “tell me about
them.”
- Leaders can reap the benefits of refusal as a
means of commitment only if they accept that every
question asked of them does not need an answer. If
people have doubts, are even angry, that is their
business, not ours. An important role of leadership in
building a culture of commitment is to hear the doubts,
the refusals, without answering them or fixing them.
This means that leaders have to admit they do not have
all the answers, which is always the
truth.
- For society at large, refusal has an even more
noble tradition, which is the role of dissent as a
cornerstone of democracy. Freedom of speech is not
about saying yes; it is about the right of refusal. The
phrase freedom of speech expresses the intimate
connection between refusal and our freedom. We might
say that if you cannot say no, you have surrendered
your freedom.
- One more dimension of refusal is its role in the
struggle to find balance in our lives. We hear about
the struggle for work/life balance. We complain about
our plate being too full. So much to do, so little time
to do it. These are all symptoms of our inability to
say no. If we want more time for “life,”
then it has to be purchased by turning down
opportunities. We will have to disappoint some others,
even yield on some of our own desires. Staying in
balance is dependent on our ability to say no to others
and also to say no to ourselves.
The Contribution of Refusal
The possibility of refusal means we are acting on choice.
It recognizes that change and transformation occur
through choice, not compliance. This means that we
achieve change through invitation, for it is invitation
that carries the possibility of refusal. In fact, the
heroic journal always includes a stage where the call to
greatness is refused. We see this in religious terms and
in the nature of a calling. We have many cultural stories
of the calling to God, being called to serve. We have the
proverb that many are called but only a few answer.
Christ’s 40 days in the desert was a period of
doubt, an opening to the possibility of refusal, and
formed the basis for his surrender to his own destiny,
which is the ultimate act of commitment.
A Commitment Starter
All this means that saying no is a gift. It is a gift
from others when they express their doubts or reluctance
to us, a gift from us when we name our own unwillingness
to them. The gift of refusal is in the way it initiates
powerful conversations. Saying no in this context does
not mean it is our final answer. The discussion of doubts
is a source of energy in our dialogue. It makes the
conversation real and creative, and thereby creates the
condition for commitment.
Commitment comes when doubts lose their destructive
power, and they lose their negative power through
expression and dialogue. It is the suppression of doubts
that builds steam. This means that discussion of doubts
is an action step. An action step essential to our
freedom, essential to the emotional investment that
anything of value requires.
False Refusal
Granted there are false and compulsive forms of refusal.
Sometimes we make refusal a life stance, or rebel simply
for its own sake. These are really not forms of refusal;
they are more about resistance and reaction to power than
the acquisition of power. In fact, the belief that we
work in a culture where doubts are not welcome, and no is
not an option, is in itself a form of resistance. It is
the wish for a free pass, and reluctance to enter the
passageway of our own freedom. This steals from our
institution and us all the possibilities that genuine
commitment has to offer.
Peter Block is author of the best-selling books,
The Empowered Manager, Flawless Consulting,
Stewardship, and The Flawless Consulting
Fieldbook and Companion. Block can be reached at
pbi@att.net
.
February 2002 News for a Change
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