I have never myself seen true consensus work anywhere. It ends with a) one person caving and being resentful, or b) abandoning consensus because everyone realized for important things that it took too long or it never got done.
Even on small teams, it's been a goal, but often we have to say "ok, well you're outnumbered, so unfortunately we aren't taking that direction."
A lot of software is produced in a very bad way. But in my line of business (looking at tech companies) the ones that really get it outperform the ones that don't by a very large margin and there are enough of them to make a real difference.
The machinery of consensus forming requires that people know what they know, and more critically, what they don't know. If a team is unable to determine the strengths and weaknesses of the constituent members then that's a recipe for trouble and this will lead to the frustrations that you outlined.
Let me give you one example of such a situation:
A while ago the front-end of an aging website had to be re-built, it's days were numbered but there were many good reasons to invest some time, money and effort into it but not to go overboard. The programmer hired wanted to do a 'good job' and came up with a whole raft of changes that were totally out of scope for the size change we had in mind.
Instead of forcing the issue I opened the books, calculated roughly how much it would require to do it the 'right' way and how much it would cost if we just did what was needed. In the end the decision was mine but I felt confident that we had achieved enough common ground that to do things 'wrong' no longer felt as bad as if it had felt if I had just told him that since I'm paying this is how we do it.
The project finished on budget, on time and was a pretty good success financially and we both benefited from that.
So yes, it is possible, but it will require an investment in time to educate your team members rather than to 'cause people to cave and become resentful' or to 'abandon consensus'.
I don't think you're describing consensus. I think you're describing the benevolent dictator who listens to his peers and subordinates.
Or maybe we're using different definitions of consensus here. As the OWS and anarchist groups I've come into contact with used it, consensus means 100% agreement for something to move forward.
I have never myself seen true consensus work anywhere. It ends with a) one person caving and being resentful, or b) abandoning consensus because everyone realized for important things that it took too long or it never got done.
Even on small teams, it's been a goal, but often we have to say "ok, well you're outnumbered, so unfortunately we aren't taking that direction."