Agreeing

How can people not agree with me when I’m always right?  I wish.
It is a fact of life that not everyone will agree with you.  As they say you can’t please all the people all the time.  However if something is my responsibility then the buck stops here.  Everyone has a right to an opinion, but not everyone makes the decisions.  One day it will be the turn of someone else, but while it is mine, I am the one that has to live with it.
It is why I am very much in favour of making informed decisions.  “Just because” does not cut it with me.  Neither does “it is the way we have always done it.”  It seems to me that decisions need to be made on evidence, from those for and against.  Personally I am not in favour of decisions being based solely on what was right once.  In many cases it is enough, but not always.  What worked before is good, but there may now be a better way of doing it.
Certainly some people will be miffed by my direction, but while the responsibility is mine, I will decide.  When it is their job to decide, I will leave them alone to go in the direction of their choosing.  I may or may not agree with them, but I feel I only have a responsibility to present my case.  Their direction is their choice.
When I am in a supermarket I marvel at how much is on display. Our personal food range is limited.  Half a shelving bay would do it.  Yet there are many other things to choose from, and people go for those things.  The direction I chose may involve what I am familiar with.  Someone elses direction may involve things I have never considered.  As they say “there is more than one way to skin a cat.” (where on earth did that saying come from).
What matters is that we are heading for the same thing – not how we get there. Even when the road being headed down does not lead to the best outcome, the best I can do is inform and not dictate.  My responsibility is only to state a view. Decisions are up to someone else.
I am not being honest with myself or anyone, if I do not present what I know.  Beyond that, it is another’s choice what they do with it, and what they use to make their decisions.  Letting go is hard.  It is particularly so, when the consensus is that the direction being taken will not lead to the best outcome.  However I am not all knowing, and just because something is not the way I would have done it, does not mean it will not work.
Personally I welcome alternate points of view.  I don’t need to agree, but it is best I know.