It’s official, we are going on tour. Fantasies about tour buses and wild nights aside, we can’t wait to visit a growing list of towns over the coming months.
As part of our mission to enable leaders and managers to get more out of their teams we were asked what we would do if we were given a day to talk about difficult conversations in the workplace. We put together a proposal and the tour was born. With dates in towns ranging from Lanark to Swindon we are going to be putting in the miles.
Whether they are with a client or a colleague we all dread those difficult conversations. We feel awkward about the topic and we worry ourselves about the potential response.
There is, of course, no silver bullet that will make every conversation easy. No blue pill exists that will enable you to wake up and discover that it was all just a bad dream. The good news is that a little time spent understanding yourself and others can go a long way to quiet your nerves and increase the likelihood of a good outcome.
Nerves aside, surveys suggest that the majority of people handle difficult conversations well. We approach them thoughtfully and in a collaborative frame of mind. It seems, even the people we are dreading talking to are, on the whole, wanting a positive and productive conversation.
Thinking about what the other person in a difficult conversation wants is possibly the most common thing people miss out when preparing for the dreaded talk. This shows up in the survey when it turns out that if you are the most senior person in a conversation you are significantly more likely to leave the conversation satisfied that it went well. That suggests that, when it comes to difficult conversations, the way we measure success is quite self-centred. Perhaps we’re often just glad we survived.
Hopefully, you would agree that, whilst survival is always desirable, we ought to be aiming higher when it comes to measuring the success of difficult conversations. How can you make sure that when you walk away from a difficult conversation you have achieved more than simply continuing to breathe?
Here are some tips that will help you get the best possible outcomes for everyone involved:
- Be self-aware enough to understand your intent and your emotional state.
- Respect those you disagree with.
- Commit to listening with the intent of understanding.
- Adapt your communication style to enable others to understand what you have to say.
- Where appropriate be clear on policy and procedure.
- Understand your professional and personal boundaries.
The upcoming “Difficult Conversations” days that are taking place at venues around the country are an opportunity to explore the skills that help make difficult conversations more successful. Whether it is chasing debt or a challenging conversation with a colleague the day has been designed to enable you to think through your own style and how to get the best out of others.
If you would like our tour to take in your town or have teams that would benefit from a day or half day thinking about how to have difficult conversations more effectively then get in touch and we would be glad to add some more dates to our tour.