Posts Tagged ‘family’

Today, I read two really good posts concerning the work of Albert Mehrabian. I enjoyed reading and comparing the two interpretations of Mehrabian’s work by both Bert Decker and Olivia Mitchell.

There seems to be some good-natured contention about what his research actually indicates, and I don’t know enough about the details of the research to add my two cents to the discussion. I do want to draw attention to both his research and the discussion about it from a workplace conflict resolution standpoint.

When we are in conflict with people close to us (at work, at church, at school, or in our family), we generally have ample opportunity to observe them in all sorts of situations. Over time, we start to pick-up on little non-verbal clues emanating from their body language.

Here’s what I draw from the discussion about Mehrabian’s work with regard to its application to resolving conflict in teams: the non-verbal message conveys a significant portion of the emotional message communicated.

I won’t even begin to discuss what percentage of the communication it represents. I’m not going to offer any interpretation of whether his study represents the listener’s feelings about the speaker, the listener’s thoughts about the speaker’s feelings, or the listener’s feelings about the speaker’s feelings. I haven’t read the actual study. I’ve just read other people’s interpretations of his findings.

Here is one point that seems to be pretty well accepted (I think), when non-verbal messages and verbal messages are inconsistent (or perceived to be inconsistent), the non-verbal message trumps the verbal message.

I’m sure that all of us have been on the receiving end of an “I’m just fine” said with a sarcastic tone and a roll of the eyes. In those moments, most of us realize that “I’m just fine” actually means “I’m really irritated, but I don’t want to tell you that.”

So, my thought for workplace and family conflict resolution is this: watch your non-verbal messages. People have a sense for your real emotional state no matter what words you use in an attempt to cover it up.

Instead of insinuating your true emotions with non-verbal clues, develop good conflict communication habits that honestly express your thoughts and feelings so that you don’t leave them open to interpretation (or misinterpretation) by others. Learn to use assertive communication techniques that clarify emotions in place of passive or aggressive communication techniques that tend to escalate rather than resolve the conflict.

Photo courtesy of www.sxc.hu

Yesterday, my wife had an interchange with my oldest daughter that did not go very well. I only heard part of it, but I heard enough to know that they experienced a brief conflict.

As I took my daughter to school, I managed to “unpack” her frustration so that we could solve the problem. Through discussion with my daughter, I learned that my wife had offered a solution to a situation at school that my daughter heard as critical of her actions. Please catch this key point: my wife offered a solution, my daughter heard a criticism.

Neither one of them wanted a conflict. Both of them wanted the day to start smoothly. In the rush of getting out the door early in the morning, their communication wires got crossed. No bad intentions were involved. It was just a case of poor communication.

One person thinks and speaks in a direct, bottom-line, “solve the problem” fashion (my wife). The other person thinks and speaks in an indirect, step-by-step, process oriented fashion (my oldest daughter). Both of them want the relationship to work. And both of them have moments of frustration with the other. It’s just a normal, everyday situation.

When I returned home from taking my daughters to school, I discussed the situation with my wife. She openly embraced my observations about our daughter’s perspective without becoming defensive, and she took action to correct the miscommunication as soon as she saw our daughter in the afternoon. My wife took responsibility for the communication breakdown rather than blaming my daughter.

This learning point ties directly to this Monday’s Momentum Message where I asked you to question yourself and your results. My wife did not get the result she wanted, and she immediately questioned her perspective. She looked for ways under her control to correct the situation. As a result, she is building positive momentum into her relationship with our daughter.

Thought for Thursday: Identify the areas in your interactions with others where you subtly (maybe even unintentionally) blame them for problems between you. Then, take the responsibility for fixing the breakdown.

     I am pretty reserved and definitely task-oriented. I care about people, but I expect people to behave logically.  When I work, I focus very intently on the work in front of me. Distractions and interruptions frustrate and annoy me.

     My wife is outgoing and more task-oriented than people-oriented. She likes to move fast. She tends to make decisions on-the-fly and to work in a stream-of-consciousness fashion. She finds it easy to jump from topic to topic or from task to task.

     My oldest daughter is much like me with a female perspective. She is a bit more sensitive than I am, but not much. She recently told me that she often does not like people because they do things that do not make sense. We have a running joke between us that one of us hurt the other’s feeling. (Yes, feeling is singular and not plural.)

     My youngest daughter is a lot like my wife. She moves fast, talks fast, and decides fast. She is different from my wife in that she tends a little more towards the people-oriented side of life. She loves to laugh, have fun, and play. She often leaves clothes on the floor or dishes on the counter because she “forgot” about them in moving on to the next thing.

     I struggle with understanding the three female perspectives on life that live in the same house with me. I struggle to shift mental gears when either my wife or my youngest daughter makes a request of me with an “oh, by the way…” start while I’m working on a project that requires focus.

     My wife struggles to find ways to communicate with me that respect my need to stay focused on my current task-at-hand without interruption. She struggles to slow down and allow my oldest daughter the time she needs to process requests before answering. She also struggles to restrain her frustration when my youngest daughter fails to follow-through on a task.

     My oldest daughter struggles to understand and value her sister’s more light-hearted perspective on life. She has to guard against her own perfectionism when she comments on her sister’s singing. She also struggles with her mother’s intensity and drive when tasks need to be finished in a short period of time. To her, her mother looks angry, and she often responds accordingly by withdrawing from rather than engaging with her mother.

     My youngest daughter struggles to allow me to work without interruption. She finds it difficult to stay quiet or to work without music when I am working on business matters. She can run afoul of her mother with her occasionally too quick wit and mouth. She really gets frustrated with her sister’s performance expectations.

     In a nutshell, that is my team, my family, my work unit. And somehow we have to find a way to make this work.

     We all understand the DISC model of human behavior. We all work to understand each other’s perspective. We work (almost) every day to apply what I have learned professionally to our family dynamic. It’s still hard work.

     How different are we from your family or your business team?

     I would guess, not very.

     We are all similar, and yet we are different. We have different levels of maturity, different levels of knowledge, different levels of skill, and different perspectives on the “right” way to do things.

     Still, we have to find a way to make this work.

     All the knowledge and skills in the world won’t make a difference in the functioning of a family or a team without a desire and willingness to make it work. As one of my mentors taught me, “commitment and compatibility are two different things.”

     As you move forward in your business and personal life, I encourage you to focus more on commitment than on compatibility.

     After all, we have to find a way to make this work.

     Guy Harris, The Recovering Engineer