Representing the Quiet Majority
I almost made two massive mistakes recently. The kind where I would have fixed something that isn't broken and broken something that works. What stopped me?
Remembering opinions don’t matter.
Both times: the data told a completely different story than the one I heard out loud. Yelp… that could have gotten messy.
Breaking (and Building) Patterns
I hope my therapist is reading this
In both projects, I started with a clear sense of what people thought. I'd heard the concerns, some quite loud, one I actually shared myself. Thoughtful, articulate people (myself included, naturally 💁♀️ ), had raised valid issues. Feedback was compelling, well-reasoned, and hard to dismiss.
In the past, as a solution-minded problem solver who loves to save the day (no capes), I would have jumped straight into fixing.
Heard the problem? Great, let me write a strongly worded letter based on those few emotive, vocal opinions. I got you. Identified the pain point? Brilliant, I'll rebuild a solution from scratch and ship it to you later today. I. GOT. YOU.
What? I really do like to do things! But I really have learnt the value in taking a beat. In resisting the urge to jump straight to solutioning and instead asking: what's actually happening here?
The Quiet Majority
Most people don't speak up. Not because they don't care. Not because they don't have opinions. But because:
They're reasonably satisfied.
They assume a problem can’t be solved.
They're not sure if their perspective is "important enough" to voice.
They don't want to seem difficult.
They simply don't think to offer feedback unless specifically asked.
We know this - people with strong feelings, positive or negative, are more likely to share them. Which may mean the feedback you hear organically is not representative of the collective. I learned the term recently through my Pragmatic Product course as the “Noisy 20%”, and, folks, they’re everywhere!
If you're making decisions based only on them, you're optimising for the most vocal, not the collective. And in optimising that - what are you breaking or ignoring for the collective? points at literally every political party
Your one opinion is irrelevant.
(But interesting, please still tell me things).
When you take the time to properly collect and analyse feedback - surveys, interviews, thematic coding, the whole methodical shabang, you're not just making pretty charts and colour coded highlighting tags. You're doing something that feels OTT but is actually critical: you're giving the quiet majority a voice.
The people who wouldn't have spoken up in a meeting. Who assumed their perspective wasn't important or it was obvious. The people who don’t want to rock the boat, but do actually have a brilliant idea or a strongly held opposing view. The people who are fine thank you very much, don't change that. The people who support the direction but have concerns about execution. The people who are in the process.
Without structured feedback collection and analysis, these perspectives simply disappear. And you end up making decisions based on incomplete information, no matter how thoughtful the voices you are hearing might be.
In both scenarios, without this encoding and decoding of feedback, I would have overhauled and created problems for the 80%.
People Matter.
So, look, I'm not suggesting that 💖appassionato💖 and articulate feedback isn't valuable - it absolutely is (and everyone loves a rant, don’t pretend you don’t). The people who speak up are highlighting real issues in their experience, but you mustn't knee-jerk. Take step back and look at the problem holistically.
Just because people aren't complaining doesn't mean they're happy. It also doesn't mean they're unhappy. You genuinely don't know until you ask.
Pain points experienced by some people still matter, even if most people don't share them. But the solution is different.
What might not seem valuable for some is very valuable to others and collaboration goes both ways, right? Rather than changing everything, what could be iterated or added on to to solve that problem?
Making decisions based on incomplete information, no matter how compelling that information is, leads to solving the wrong problem, fixing things that aren't actually broken, and breaking something that works.
Taking a step back, not acting on your opinion, and taking feedback is what any good superhero should do (there it is). Most superhero origin stories basically start with well-meaning person who doesn't consult anyone and unwittingly creates absolute chaos and destruction of the world. You know, with great power comes great responsibility. Er.. Spidey-senses activated. Bat-signal. Mojo JoJo?
If you want to save the day, start with being impartial
And learn about what matters to all. Do the right thing. The work can feel invisible. The value absolutely isn't, and the conversations we have had because of that work are just so much more productive; we’re working on building solutions on a shared understanding of problems, not on feels.
So when I’m implementing any type of change, I’ll keep collecting and coding feedback and considering everyone it impacts. The initial investment is so worth it.
