Those of you who are part of a successful team already know what to do. You will commit to make a success of the outcome, which ever way you voted.

I once worked with a very successful team of executives. They had one critical rule. Members could disagree and argue as much as they wanted to inside the meeting, but not outside the meeting. And, once a decision was made, every executive acted as if he or she had always believed that this was the right decision.

The result? Most of their decisions were executed well and had successful outcomes.

I have also worked with executives who carried on wasting energy trying to convince others that the decision already taken was wrong and would fail. Strangely, many of them weren’t around long enough to see it succeed.

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Not older people. (I am sorry older people. And I’m not being biased; I’m actually becoming one of you).

The ‘not older people’ bit is according to a past chairman of Canon Corporation. Based on his experience, he believed that he wasted his time as an executive and a leader in trying to influence older business people.

You might think that this makes sense (i.e. that it is not nonsense). Many of us expect older people to resist change more than younger people do. But it does not automatically make sense for you to target younger people. Younger people might not resist change as much, but they normally don’t have the power to make change happen.

In most societies and in many organizations it is older people who have control, who are in charge and who make decisions.

I suggest you keep the following in mind before you decide who to engage in making change happen. Resistance to change has little to do with physical age. Whether they are young or old, better that you ignore the weight of their years as you measure their gravitas of spirit.