1.2 Constructive dissent and destructive consent

Resistance is not always about causing trouble for organisations – it can serve a more ‘constructive’ purpose, helping adaptation and growth. This kind of leadership is known as ‘constructive dissent’ (Grint and Smolović Jones, 2022). The argument is that people in senior positions need active and motivated followers who are prepared to step in at key moments, providing disagreement and opposition to those with more power than them when they think that a decision or direction of travel is wrong. Providing a necessary corrective to poor leadership and decision-making, it has been argued that such forms of resistance are far more common than we imagine – and indeed their importance in maintaining the health of organisations greatly under-appreciated (McCabe et al., 2020).

Constructive dissent can be more or less public. When it happens privately, it is usually within small groups of people who are committed to improving the organisation through dialogue. However, such attempts to provide constructive dissent are sometimes not acknowledged or listened to. Under such circumstances, dissenters need to decide how far they are willing to go to influence an organisation. Ultimately, dissenters can opt for whistleblowing as a solution, when they feel that the organisation they find fault with has failed to listen. There are many examples of whistleblowing over racism.

One is the case of the professional cricket player Azeem Rafiq, who was subjected to racism at Yorkshire County Cricket Club. Having failed to gain a satisfactory outcome to his complaints internally, he publicly revealed his claims to the media and in Parliament. Following an investigation by the national governing body for cricket, the England and Wales Cricket Board, most of Rafiq’s complaints were upheld. Like many whistleblowers, Rafiq faced significant personal attacks in the media and threats from members of the public, which forced him to move abroad for a period of time (Liew, 2023). He also admitted to, and apologised for, using anti-Semitic language in messages he sent in 2011 (BBC, 2021b).

Figure 3 Dissent can empower leadership rather than diminish it

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Figure 3 Dissent can empower leadership rather than diminish it

Motivating Rafiq’s whistleblowing was a desire to fix behaviour at the club and to ensure that future players did not experience racist bullying. It was important for him that there was ‘acceptance by the new leadership [of Yorkshire] of what happened to me, which was the most important part for me, and a real willingness to do the right thing and take proper steps to address racism at the club’ (Protect, 2022). Although the process has been difficult for Rafiq and his family, his leadership has resulted in significant personnel change at Yorkshire and a general reckoning with racism in cricket. Dissent, therefore, can be constructive, aimed at repairing a broken system.

The flip side of constructive dissent is the notion of ‘destructive consent’ (Grint and Smolović Jones, 2022). This is the phenomenon of followers staying silent when they know that a leader’s decision-making or behaviour is flawed, even catastrophically so. For leaders to fail, followers need only stay silent. The case at Yorkshire is an example of destructive leadership, an unwillingness of staff at the club to properly address racism when it was first highlighted by Azeem Rafiq. This highlights poor leadership that was compounded when the club chose to release the player in 2018, a year after he raised his complaints.

The causes of destructive consent and constructive dissent are numerous, as you will now explore.

Activity 1 Exploring consent and dissent

Timing: Allow around 20 minutes for this activity

The degree to which constructive dissent and destructive consent happen can depend a lot on the organisational conditions. At work, it is possible for people to make it easier or harder to speak up. You will now engage with what some of these conditions are.

Part 1

Watch the following video of OU PhD graduate Lace Jackson as she talks about the times in which she has witnessed both destructive consent and constructive dissent, and the conditions that seemed to enable them to happen. As you watch, make some notes about the main conditions highlighted.

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Transcript: Video 1 Lace Jackson – Constructive dissent and destructive consent

[MUSIC PLAYING]

 

LACE JACKSON

Constructive dissent for me in Black leadership in relation to what came out of the research was that it was a way of global majority leaders finding emancipatory ways to exercise and practise leadership. So for me, it’s how do they find ways to be the first in role. How do they find ways to collaborate? How do they find ways to support each other to be able to exercise their leadership even though there are so many obstacles in the way?

So for me, that’s a form of constructive dissent. What was really interesting from my research was how faith played a big part in a number of global majority leadership practice. So even if it wasn’t as explicit and they didn’t necessarily make it known, it was a counter-narrative that ran throughout the leadership practices of the majority of the participants. And, therefore, I would say that is a constructive dissent from the leadership on offer.

So destructive consent in Black leadership can take a number of forms. Mainly, what I’ve found throughout my research was about intercultural and intercultural betrayals. And that led to disconnection from communities. It would mean that other in-groups within the global majority leadership could judge each other more harshly.

We hear the term coconut that you’re Black on the outside but white on the inside. Those are the types of things that come through in destructive consent. So you’re consenting to the patriarchal norms of the organisations in which they operate, which then excludes other groups.

The example of constructive dissent that I could give you was shared with me by a research participant who was a senior police officer. They had witnessed, which was known in terms of public media or social media that there was a death in police custody of somebody who’d been assaulted whilst receiving treatment in the hospital became aggressive and was then arrested. But they ended up dying in police custody. They made representations of that, asking questions as to why did this happen.

But being a senior police officer, they knew that would limit their career. If I gave an example in light of destructive consent, it would be that they would be in that similar role and not say anything about how that situation should not have occurred. I guess what I wanted to really illustrate was the cost of that to Black leaders in that it did limit that person’s career by having that constructive dissent.

End transcript: Video 1 Lace Jackson – Constructive dissent and destructive consent

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Video 1 Lace Jackson – Constructive dissent and destructive consent

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Part 2

Can you think of some examples of constructive dissent and destructive consent in your own experience? Were the conditions similar to those highlighted by Dr Jackson or did you identify any in addition?

Comment

Below are some examples of answers you could have provided.

Destructive consent:

• Organisations headed by people with oversized egos can generate a lot of destructive consent. Senior executives and managers can over-personalise the organisation as revolving around their feelings and self-image rather than focusing on the purpose of the organisation. They can reward people for agreeing with them and punish those who disagree.
• Destructive consent can be heightened when an organisation’s conditions of employment are poor and precarious. If people do not feel secure in their jobs, or if they are made to feel disposable, then they will be more likely to perceive speaking out as risky or even pointless.
• Concentrating power and decision-making in very few hands can disempower everyone else, making them less likely to want to speak out at important times.

Constructive dissent:

• Organisations headed by people committed to the mission of the organisation and pursuing its purpose over their own interests are more likely to attract constructive dissent from colleagues, who will be similarly committed.
• If conditions of employment are good and secure, people will feel more empowered to prevent an organisation from making poor decisions.
• If power is widely shared, it is likely that workers will feel more responsibility to speak up at important times.
• People holding senior roles in organisations can model constructive dissent by showing that they are open to disagreement and ready to listen to the views of others.