Common Communication Failures  (and ways to avoid them!)

Common Communication Failures (and ways to avoid them!)

Benjamin Mitchell@benjaminm

Partner, Equal Experts

What does being wrong feel like?

Source: Kathryn Schulz “On Being Wrong”

How we think we act and

How we tell others we act

≠

How we actually act

No, no, don’t say it like that!

Feedback

“Your feedback to the team member was poor because:It did not focus on any positive actions and it didn’t use any examples“

Measuring Transparency

Transformation Coaches wanted to increase teams’ level of transparency

To measure their impact they stood with a clip board and secretly scored the transparency of each team member in meetings

https://vimeo.com/43256388

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Top 6 Communication Failures1. Framing the problem as “the other(s)”2. Hoping that data will speak for itself3. Pushing “the one right approach” (yours)4. Trying to persuade someone by arguing with

them5. Ignoring how you or others feel – just being

rational6. Trying to make changes in one giant leap

WAYS TO AVOID COMMUNICATION FAILURES

IF YOU’RE NOT PART OF THE PROBLEM, YOU CAN’T BE PART OF THE SOLUTION

Practise under realistic conditions

Left Hand Right Hand Case Study

What I thought but did not sayWhat we are doing is crazy!

Use humour so I don’t offend them

Uh oh, they feel criticised. Better stop.

It looks like we’ll never really address this point now … I feel really disappointed

What was saidMe: (Joking) I think this may be the best graph I ever done [explain detail]. I thought it might be interesting to review here.Sponsor: This graph shows how well the technical team has done and how badly we have made business decisions.[all laugh]

Left Hand Right Hand Case Study

What I thought but did not sayWhat we are doing is crazy!

Use humour so I don’t offend them

Uh oh, they feel criticised. Better stop.

It looks like we’ll never really address this point now … I feel really disappointed

What was saidMe: (Joking) I think this may be the best graph I ever done [explain detail]. I thought it might be interesting to review here.Sponsor: This graph shows how well the technical team has done and how badly we have made business decisions.[all laugh]

Easing inNot sharing all relevant information Unilaterally

looking after their feelings

Untested assumption

Untested assumption

Lack of joint design

Not sharing all relevant information

Issues People|

Frame

ReframingIndividual FrameOne the Issues:There is one right answerI’m right, you are wrongYou don’t get itOn the People:Your are mad or badYou alone are to blameYou must change for this to work

Relational FrameOne the Issues:

We each see things the other missesTo find common ground, explore our differencesComplex, ambiguous issues can be frustratingOn the People:

We are doing doing the best we can and need each other’s helpWe are both responsible

Learn from Improvisational Theatre:Make offers and be good to work with

Make it easy and safe to surface

problems

Wasted Time Area Sum of Team Time WastedInternal 457

Desktop PC 98Development Technology 82Builds 72Process Issue 51Technical Debt 36Merging 25Team Technology 15Specifications 15

External Team 420Pricing Engine A 145Document Generation Team 81Pricing Engine B 41Single Sign On 39Pricing Engine C 33Oracle Database 24XML Data Architecture 17Pricing Engine D 10

Common Environment 56Jira 18Wiki 16

Grand Total 935

Wasted Time Sources

The ‘two hand rule’

Communication Preferences

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The Ladder of Inference

Select

Describe

Explain

Evaluate

Propose Actions

Source: Based on the work of Schwarz, Argyris & Schon, Noonan and Action Design Partners

Assumptions

Practising with the Ladder of Inference

Say what you see [at the Describe Level]

Say what you think it means.

Show, don’t tell:Negotiate based on visible data

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Practice asking more (genuine, open)

questions

KEEP IN MIND HOW HUMANS DEAL WITH POTENTIAL EMBARRASSMENT AND THREAT

“PEOPLE ARE ALL FOR THE TRUTH, AS LONG AS THE TRUTH IS NOT EMBARRASSING OR THREATENING”

CHRIS ARGYRIS

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NEGOTIATE (SMALL) STEPS TO IMPROVE

Make progress with imperfect tools

Innovation can create embarrassment and threat

Our A/B Testing Algorithm

÷ 2

Avoiding Communication Failures1. Get curious: how might you be contributing to the

problem?2. Make offers and be good to work with3. Use the Ladder of Inference to ask better questions4. Use tools to create psychological safety5. Negotiate: jointly design (small) ways forward

Any questions?

Books to read• The Skilled Facilitator by Roger

Schwarz• Getting More by Stuart Diamond• Difficult Conversations by Stone,

Patton & Heen

Contact me:

[email protected]

twitter.com/benjaminm

equalexperts.com/blog