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Joseph Grenny and his co-authors (2023) probe the styles each of us might have in tough conversations. They ask 30 questions of the reader about each of our unique styles (pp. 120-122). I answered each of the questions and found that I do many things in conflict conversations that are sometimes unhelpful and some other things that are virtually always counterproductive.
While I do some things that they advise (I would hope so, since this is the discipline in which I teach and write and practice), I found plenty of room for self-improvement--with their coaching. For instance, despite teaching deëscalation on the Portland Peace Team for years, and despite being certified as an expert in deëscalation by at least one judge, I flunked this question: "When I am very confident of my opinion, I don't like it when others push back" (p. 122). I may or may not say how much I don't like it, but this is a flashing red light to me. I need to get past this and I believe the best way is the self-talk I picked up from a National Public Radio podcast, an episode of Short Wave, their science podcast, on the neuroscience of disagreement[1]. That self-talk was highlighted by the researchers who studied our brains while agreeing and while disagreeing. They concluded that the most adaptive approach is to self-frame difficult conversations as our personal goal: learn, not win.
If I can make that my mantra in tough conversations I am confident I can respond to disagreement with me, even when I am certain I am right, with curiosity, and not curiosity about how the other person could be so stupid, but rather what they might be seeing that I am not. There is literally likely no topic on earth that I know categorically to be the unalterable, nuance-free case.
I revisited a conversation I had with three students when I heard one say something that was in disagreement with something I had given a great deal of thought to. I flared up, not in an abusive way, not in a snarky or attacking fashion, but definitely with emotion. Instead, I needed to inquire and then listen.
Note to self: next time someone hijacks my amygdala, go to the balcony, as William Ury advises[2], and remind myself that, aside from a snarling off-leash German Shephard charging me, no one can hijack my lizard brain and put it in control except for me.
References
Grenny, Joseph; Patterson, Kerry; McMillan, Ron; Switzler, Al; Gregory, Emily (2023). Crucial conversations: Tools for talking when stakes are high. 3rd ed. VitalSmarts.
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