Dive Brief:
- For a Chief Human Resources Officer (CHRO), disagreeing successfully with a CEO or CFO is a skill that requires some deft maneuvering and needs to be done judiciously, according to the Harvard Business Review.
- Author Priscilla Claman, president of Career Strategies, Inc., writes that there are times – for example, in HR's case, when an important talent or spending decision might be met with a negative response – where going to the mat is worthwhile.
- She cautions to save it for the right occasions, or your negativity factor will rise. Claman also offers a few ways to disagree successfully with a senior executive without having to dust off your resume.
Dive Insight:
In all, Claman offers six tips for making a case with a C-Suite exec. For one, it requires thinking strategically. Think about why you disagree before making your case. Along those lines, create a presentation with facts, not conjecture. She also says it helps to get some pre-feedback from a trusted colleague, someone who has credibility with the C-Suite.
Of course, it helps to be right, she says, so leave no stone unturned.
"... if you just agree all the time, senior people will think of you as a doormat with nothing to contribute," she writes. To gain the respect of the C-Suite, "it’s important to disagree" but do it in a "strategic way."
