> It's hard to communicate to someone who sees a very thin slice of the company and wants to disagree and do something different to appeal to their perspective. A lot of the time I knew very clearly that we weren't picking the "best" alternative, but after hearing everyone out and weighing the tradeoffs a decision was made.

You're saying it's hard to communicate that, but you've just done it really well. If you were to tell me a bit about those trade offs so I can also consider them the next time, I'd be a perfectly happy camper even if my idea isn't being picked up.

I'll answer for him -- even if he does a great job communicating it, not everyone does a great job receiving it. It's just like honesty: it really takes two and if someone is intransigent enough even the best of us cannot penetrate.