It’s never easy to deliver bad news… own up to a mistake… or interact with those who become belligerent or defensive.
But it’s important to have these difficult conversations because when we do, problems get resolved and we can move ahead confidently with our lives. What’s more, not having these tough conversations can be a drain. For strategies on how to handle these conversations, High Energy for Life turned to Holly Weeks, speech consultant to the Urban Superintendents Doctoral Program at Harvard’s School of Education in Boston and author of Failure to Communicate: How Conversations Go Wrong and What You Can Do to Right Them (www.HollyWeeks.com). Here is her advice…
People often use diversionary tactics when they feel threatened during conversations, sometimes without realizing that they are doing so. These tactics could include threats, lies, counteraccusations, anger and/or crying.
Example: When a neighbor asks a man to clear a large amount of debris from his yard, the man inexplicably flies into a rage. Assuming that the neighbor’s request was polite and reasonable — and there was no existing bad blood between the neighbors — it’s likely that this outburst is not true anger, but just a diversion intended to make the neighbor back down.
What to do: Suppress your natural inclination to respond with shocked silence… a retreat… or inappropriate emotions and language of your own. Remind yourself that these responses are what this person wants to provoke.
Instead, take a moment to collect yourself… nod slowly in silent acknowledgment of what has been said… and make an accusation-free statement that refers to the diversionary ploy. Then redirect the conversation back to its intended destination. Keep your tone as neutral and emotion-free as possible.
Examples: “I know this is difficult, but the current situation isn’t working. What are we going to do to fix it?”… “We’ve been getting along fine and this is a necessary conversation, although it’s gone off track here, but I need to stay on the yard issue.” If the diversionary tactic pointed fingers at you or others, or raised other unrelated problems, try, “We can talk about the issues you raised next. Right now, we’re talking about getting rid of the debris in the yard.”
It’s normal to try to sugarcoat bad news, either by mixing good news in with the bad… or by trying to downplay the severity of the situation. We imagine that this sugarcoating cushions the blow. In fact, it mostly just makes it difficult for the person we’re speaking with to figure out what we are trying to say and how important it is to us.
Example: A boss offers extended praise to an employee before mentioning in passing a performance problem that he/she would like to see addressed. The boss subsequently becomes angry when the employee fails to immediately address the problem, but the sugarcoating really is to blame. The employee did not understand that this problem was the true message and that the praise was sugarcoating.
What to do: Deliver bad news in a straightforward manner, and the odds increase greatly that your message will be grasped. In many instances, it’s best to come right out and say what needs to be said at the very beginning of the conversation. Example: “Patrick, the promotion has gone to someone else.”
Use a neutral tone. Strive for the controlled voice of NASA communications — “Houston, we have a problem.” Attempts at sympathetic body language or tone of voice might feel like kindness, but they can distract listeners from the content of your message.
Select nonprovocative words. Straightforward doesn’t necessarily mean harsh or blunt. If your news itself is tough, loaded language will make it even harder for the person to take it in. Example: “Employees have complained that you act cocky and superior” is more likely to make a manager defensive than “Your recommendations would go down better if they were delivered in the style of one colleague helping another.”
We often see only the extreme options available to us when we’re embroiled in contentious conversations.
Examples: We might imagine that the only possible response to aggression is to either become aggressive or back off… that the only response to an accusation is to apologize, deny or make counteraccusations… that the only response to a raised voice is to become silent or to raise your own voice.
We fall into this polarized response trap because difficult conversations often feel like warfare, and battles usually have outcomes in which there is one winner and one loser or a stalemate. But difficult conversations are not wars, and we don’t need to follow someone onto the battlefield. There is a way to talk reasonably regardless of how the other side is handling the conversation. Unfortunately, this solution is unlikely to be reached when both parties see only the extreme options open to them.
What to do: During a contentious conversation, before each statement pause to consider whether what you are about to say is passive, aggressive or moderate. Passive responses include backing down, playing along or saying nothing even though you don’t agree. Aggressive responses include threats, accusations and attempts to mete out punishment.
Offering passive and aggressive responses can feel justified or even satisfying in the moment, but often-overlooked moderate responses are much more likely to steer difficult conversations toward productive outcomes.
Best: Familiarize yourself with a few widely applicable moderate responses before you engage in a potentially contentious conversation. That way you increase the odds that those responses will come to mind during the conversation, when emotions are running high. Moderate responses are best said in a neutral, emotion-free tone. Five possibilities…
When you’re embroiled in a contentious conversation, admitting a mistake can feel like an admission of weakness or even a concession of defeat. We tend to dig our heels in even deeper when we realize that we might be wrong. Unfortunately, this only makes difficult conversations even harder to resolve.
Admitting a mistake and conceding a point actually can make you seem reasonable and fair-minded — if it is handled properly. It also can help keep the conversation moving forward, which is to everyone’s benefit.
What to do: Remind yourself that admitting an error is not what diminishes you in the eyes of others. Responding immaturely or unproductively to an error is what diminishes you — and by denying an obvious error, you are doing exactly that. If you can see that you have made a mistake, others probably can, too.
Make a simple statement that concedes the point, then redirect the conversation back to the larger topic. Do this both when you have made a factual error and when you make the error of being overly aggressive during a difficult conversation. If you act as though conceding the point does not diminish you, then others are unlikely to see you as diminished, either.
Examples: “I had my facts wrong — you’re correct. Let’s see how that affects the plan.” “You know what? I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sorry.”
