There is a moment in a technical debate that I have learned to recognise in myself, and it is not a flattering one. I started out asking what the right answer was. At some point, without any conscious decision, I switched to asking how I could win. From the outside, nothing has changed; I am still using the same reasonable voice, still making arguments that sound like arguments. But the discussion has changed.

The costs of this are larger than they appear, and most of them are invisible to the person paying them. The immediate cost is a worse decision. The deeper cost is that people stop bringing you ideas. In research anything that is a wonderful breakthrough has started as half-formed idea. If I go in without genuine curiosity, that idea, often from a young PhD student, will never see the light of day. 

What I have come to believe is that the compulsion to be right is almost never a competence problem. It is a confidence problem wearing a competence costume. I have had to learning that saying something along the lines of "I hadn't thought of that" or "you're right, that undermines my point" is a great way to defuse the situation. So, as a reflection for today: in your last real disagreement, were you trying to be right, or trying to get it right?