Coordinate and act
Ringi — circulate the written proposal
Circulate a written proposal for sign-off
Walk a written proposal through the people it affects before the decision, so agreement is built in advance rather than fought out in the room.
Borrowed from Ringi, a Japanese practice in which a written proposal circulates for review and approval. Read the original source.
Changes a rule or role · Days or ongoing effort · Anyone on the team can start it
Try this first
Write the proposal down and walk it past each key person before the meeting.
Use it when
Decisions land without shared ownership.
Skip it when
It costs time, so use it on significant decisions with people to bring along. And it fails as a formality where input gets collected and nothing ever changes.
How to introduce it
Before a significant decision, write the proposal down and walk it through the people it affects, one at a time, inviting concerns and endorsement from each. By the time it reaches the meeting the input is gathered and the ownership is shared. You built the agreement rather than forcing it.
How to show up
Help the owner circulate it properly. The right people, real input, revisions along the way. A signature tour collects names and no buy-in.
How long it takes
Days rather than minutes to circulate, ahead of the decision. Faster implementation after.
What makes it hard
Run as box-ticking it produces signatures and no commitment, so push for input that revises the proposal. It is slower upfront than deciding in a meeting and usually cheaper than the conflict it prevents.
What it looks like when it's working
The proposal improves as it moves, and by decision time the affected people understand and support it, so implementation goes smoothly. Sign-off followed by resistance means the circulation was shallow.
How long until it sticks
Expect a few decisions before the team values building agreement in advance over deciding in the room.
How you know it stuck
Significant proposals get circulated first and the meeting confirms an agreement already built.
The idea behind it
Agreement assembled in advance holds better than agreement extracted in a meeting. Circulating a written proposal lets people shape it before anyone has to take a public position.
Where it comes from
The Japanese practice of nemawashi. A lightweight written proposal that gathers input and sign-off before the decision, not after. A proposal document travels through stakeholders, each adding their endorsement, building shared ownership bottom-up.
Why it matters for senior teams
It shapes direction and consequential decisions