Crucial Conversations Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High (7 page)

Throughout the remainder of the book we'll explore the tools people use to help create the conditions of dialogue. The focus is on how we think about problem situations and what we do to prepare for them. As we work on ourselves, watch for problems, examine our own thought processes, discover our own styles, and then catch problems before they get out of hand, everyone benefits. As you read on,
you will learn how to create conditions in yourself and others that make dialogue the path of least resistance
.

Next, we'll examine the tools for talking, listening, and acting together. This is what most people have in mind when they think of crucial conversations. How do I express delicate feedback? How do I speak persuasively, not abrasively? And how about listening?
Or better still, what can we do to get people to talk when they seem nervous? And how do we move from thought to action? As you read on,
you will learn the key skills of talking, listening, and acting together
.

Finally, we'll tie all of the theories and skills together by providing both a model and an extended example. Then, to see if you can really do what it takes, we provide seventeen situations that would give most of us fits—even people who are gifted at dialogue. As you read on,
you will master the tools for talking when stakes are high
.

It's time to turn to the
how
of dialogue. How do you encourage the flow of meaning in the face of differing opinions and strong emotions? Given the average person's track record, it can't be all that easy. In fact, given that most people's style is based on longstanding habits, it'll probably require a lot of effort. The truth is, people
can
change. In fact, we've trained these skills to millions around the world and have seen dramatic improvements in results and relationships. But it requires work. You can't simply drink a magic potion and walk away changed. Instead, you'll need to take a long, hard look at yourself.

In fact, this is the first principle of dialogue—Start with Heart. That is, your
own
heart. If you can't get yourself right, you'll have a hard time getting dialogue right. When conversations become
crucial, you'll resort to the forms of communication that you've grown up with—debate, silent treatment, manipulation, and so on.

Let's start with a true story. Two young sisters and their father scurry into their hotel room after spending a hot afternoon at Disneyland. Given the repressive heat, the girls have consumed enough soda pop to fill a small barrel. As the two bursting kids enter their room, they have but one thought—to head for the head.

Since the bathroom is a one-holer, it isn't long until a fight breaks out. Both of the desperate children start arguing, pushing, and name-calling as they dance around the tiny bathroom. Eventually one calls out to her father for help.

“Dad, I got here first!”

“I know, but I need to go worse!”

“How do you know? You're not in my body. I didn't even go before we left this morning!”

“You're so selfish.”

Dad proposes a plan. “Girls, I'm not going to solve this for you. You can stay in the bathroom and figure out who goes first and who goes second. There's only one rule. No hitting.”

As the two antsy kids begin their crucial conversation, Dad checks his watch. He wonders how long it'll take. As the minutes slowly tick away, he hears nothing more than an occasional outburst of sarcasm. Finally after twenty-five long minutes, the toilet flushes. One girl comes out. A minute later, another flush and out walks her sister. With both girls in the room, Dad asks, “Do you know how many times both of you could have gone to the bathroom in the time it took you to work that out?”

The idea had not occurred to the little scamps. Dad then probed further, “Why did it take so long for two of you to use the restroom?”

“Because she's always so selfish!”

“Listen to her. She's calling
me
names when
she
could have just waited. She always has to have her way!”

Both girls claimed what they wanted most was to go to the bathroom. Then they behaved in ways that ensured the bathroom was little more than a distant dream.

And that's the first problem we face in our crucial conversations. Our problem is not that our behavior degenerates. It's that our motives do—a fact that we usually miss.

So the first step to achieving the results we
really
want is to fix the problem of believing that others are the source of all that ails us. It's our dogmatic conviction that “if we could just fix those losers, all would go better” that keeps us from taking action that could lead to dialogue and progress. Which is why it's no surprise that those who are best at dialogue tend to turn this logic around. They believe the best way to work on “us” is to start with “me.”

Although it's true that there are times when we are merely bystanders in life's never ending stream of head-on collisions, rarely are we completely innocent. More often than not, we do something to contribute to the problems we're experiencing.

People who are best at dialogue understand this simple fact and turn it into the principle “Work on me first, us second.” They realize not only that they are likely to benefit by improving their own approach, but also that they're the only person they can work on anyway. As much as others may need to change, or we may
want
them to change, the only person we can continually inspire, prod, and shape—with any degree of success—is the person in the mirror.

There's a certain irony embedded in this fact. People who believe they need to start with themselves do just that. As they
work on themselves, they also become the most skilled at dialogue. So here's the irony. It's the
most
talented, not the least talented, who are continually trying to improve their dialogue skills. As is often the case, the rich get richer.

Okay, let's assume we need to work on our own personal dialogue skills. Instead of buying this book and then handing it to a loved one or coworker and saying: “You'll love this, especially the parts that
I've underlined
for you,” we'll try to figure out how we ourselves can benefit. But how? Where do we start? How can we stay clear of unhealthy games?

Although it's difficult to describe the specific order of events in an interaction as fluid as a crucial conversation, we do know one thing for certain: Skilled people Start with Heart. That is, they begin high-risk discussions with the right motives, and they stay focused no matter what happens.

They maintain this focus in two ways. First, they're steely eyed smart when it comes to knowing what they want. Despite constant invitations to slip away from their goals, they stick with them. Second, skilled people don't make Fool's Choices (either/or choices). Unlike others who justify their unhealthy behavior by explaining that they had no choice but to fight or take flight, the dialogue-smart believe that dialogue, no matter the circumstances, is always an option.

Let's look at each of these important heart-based assumptions in turn.

To see how the desires of our hearts can affect our ability to stay in dialogue, let's take a look at a real-life example.
Greta, the CEO of a midsized corporation, is two hours into a rather tense meeting with her top leaders. For the past six months, she has been on a personal campaign to reduce costs. Little has been accomplished to date, so Greta calls the meeting. Surely people will tell her why they haven't started cutting costs. After all, she has taken great pains to foster candor.

Greta has just opened the meeting to questions when a manager haltingly rises to his feet, fidgets, stares at the floor, and then nervously asks if he can ask a very tough question. The way the fellow emphasizes the word
very
makes it sound as if he's about to accuse Greta of kidnapping the Lindbergh baby.

The frightened manager continues.

“Greta, you've been at us for six months to find ways to cut costs. I'd be lying if I said that we've given you much more than a lukewarm response. If you don't mind, I'd like to tell you about one thing that's making it tough for us to push for cost cuts.”

“Great. Fire away,” Greta says as she smiles in response.

“Well, while you've been asking us to use both sides of our paper and forgo improvements, you're having a second office built.”

Greta freezes and turns bright red. Everyone looks to see what will happen next. The manager plunges on ahead.

“The rumor is that the furniture alone will cost $150,000. Is that right?”

So there we have it. The conversation has just turned crucial. Someone has just poured a rather ugly tidbit into the pool of meaning. Will Greta continue to encourage honest feedback, or will she shut the fellow down?

We call this a crucial conversation because how Greta acts during the next few moments will not only set people's attitudes toward the proposed cost-cutting initiative, but will also have a huge impact on what the other leaders think about her. Does she walk the talk of openness and honesty? Or is she a raging hypocrite—like so many of the senior executives who came before her?

As we watch Greta, something quite subtle and yet very important takes place. It is lost on most of the people in the room—but with our front-row seat, it is practically palpable. Greta's jaw tightens. She leans forward and grips the left side of the rostrum hard enough that her knuckles turn white. She lifts her right hand, with the finger pointing at the questioner like a loaded weapon. She hasn't said anything yet, but it is clear where Greta is heading. Her motive has clearly changed from making the right choice to something far less noble.

Like most of us in similar circumstances, Greta is no longer focused on cost-cutting. Her attention is now turned to staff-cutting—beginning with one particular staff member.

When under attack, our heart can take a similarly sudden and unconscious turn. When faced with pressure and strong opinions, we often stop worrying about the goal of adding to the pool of meaning and start looking for ways to win, punish, or keep the peace.

Winning
. This particular dialogue killer sits at the top of many of our lists. Heaven only knows that we come by this deadly passion naturally enough. Half of the TV programs we watch make heroes out of people who win at sports or game shows. Ten minutes into kindergarten we learn that if we want to get the teacher's attention, we have to spout the right answer. That means we have to beat our fellow students at the same game. This desire to win is built into our very fiber before we're old enough to know what's going on.

Unfortunately, as we grow older, most of us don't realize that this desire to win is continually driving us away from healthy dialogue. We start out with the goal of resolving a problem, but as soon as someone raises the red flag of inaccuracy or challenges our correctness, we switch purposes in a heartbeat.

First, we correct the facts. We quibble over details and point out flaws in the other person's arguments.

“You're wrong! We're not spending anywhere near $150,000 on the furniture. It's the redesign of the office that's costing so much, not the furniture.”

Of course, as others push back, trying to prove their points, it's not long until we change our goal from correcting mistakes to winning.

If you doubt this simple allegation, think of the two antsy young girls as they stared each other down in the cramped bathroom. Their original goal was simple enough—relief. But soon, caught up in their own painful game, the two set their jaws and committed to doing whatever it took to win—even if it brought them a fair amount of personal discomfort.

Punishing
. Sometimes, as our anger increases, we move from wanting to win the point to wanting to harm the other person. Just ask Greta. “To heck with honest communication!” she thinks to herself. “I'll teach the moron not to attack me in public.” Eventually, as emotions reach their peak, our goal becomes completely perverted. We move so far away from adding meaning to the pool that now all we want is to see others suffer.

“I can't believe that you're accusing me of squandering good money on a perfectly fine office. Now, if nobody else has any intelligent questions, let's move on!”

Everyone immediately clams up and looks at the floor. The silence is deafening.

Keeping the peace
. Of course, we don't always fix mistakes, aggressively discredit others, or heartlessly try to make them suffer. Sometimes we choose personal safety over dialogue. Rather than add to the pool of meaning, and possibly make waves along the way, we go to silence. We're so uncomfortable with the immediate conflict that we accept the
certainty
of bad results to
avoid the
possibility
of uncomfortable conversation. We choose (at least in our minds) peace over conflict. Had this happened in Greta's case, nobody would have raised concerns over the new office, Greta never would have learned the real issue, and people would have continued to drag their feet.