This succinct and enlightening overview is a required reading for advanced graduate-level students. We hope you find this book useful in shaping your future career. New York: HarperBusiness, New York: Penguin, If you'll be on the scene in the ambulance for some time starting IVs and hooking up the patient to monitoring devices, verbalizing this to Over a relatively short space of time we had to improve tenfold.
I was cutting Hysteria to vinyl, Mutt would send the album up one track at a time and get that absolutely right ," says Steve Brown. It made a bit of vinyl perfect. Steps and routines my brothers could copy on first sight eluded me, sometimes for hours, even days at a time. If you want your workplace free of resignation, start by discovering where you are resigned. When a leader is resigned, it has a domino effect that kills the spirit of a lot of other people.
When leaders and managers are resigned, this is the death knell of an organization. Are you open to talking about this? Next, you ask if he or she is willing to talk. The question gives your listener time to process what you said and shift gears. By using the word I, you take personal account- The Key to the Kingdom 45 ability. Would you be willing to listen? You also provide a solution and ask for a commitment to listen.
Asking people if they are willing to listen is an acceptable request to most people. Talking to People Who Are Resigned and Skeptical Resigned people search for evidence to validate and support their beliefs. Unknowingly, you provide them with what they want.
But those who are resigned see it as a form of manipulation by you and other members of management. This underscores a fundamental element in resignation—people interpret everything you say to support their viewpoint. When you avoid dealing with resignation, it takes much longer to uncover the real issues. Trying to gloss over resignation with incentives and rewards often results in talented people leaving the organization or, worse, they stay and infect others. The only way to win is to deal with resignation directly.
Talking to people about how they feel and encouraging them to express their concerns bring issues to the surface where they can effectively be resolved. A straightforward approach is the only approach that will turn people around. The words and phrases you use have the ability to get people off the sidelines and back into the game. Start by dealing with the real problem—how people feel—and ignore the symptoms. When the actual problem is resolved, symptoms disappear on their own.
Read on to learn a simple three-step process to take the emotional charge out of a conversation. Step 2: Separate the symptoms from the problem. Step 3: Validate all feelings. He is not thinking about reorganization; he is thinking about a disturbing memo that you sent a few days ago. You forgot all about the memo; he has not. He seems uptight, a little clipped and abrupt. You chalk it up to stress and ignore it.
You begin the discussion and suddenly—Wham! Out of the blue, he charges and attacks your plan for reorganization. All you know at this point is that he is reacting. You do not know what is causing the reaction. You are at a critical juncture.
Do not take communication literally. It is frequently not the real issue. What should you do? Stop discussing the content the reorganization and talk about the process how you are communicating with one another. A process discussion includes talking about your relationship and any unexpressed thoughts, concerns, and feelings. It is seldom the REAL issue. Say It Right the First Time 48 Having a conversation about content on top of an emotional charge does not work. It taints the discussion, interferes with problem resolution, produces bad solutions, and, most predictably, results in arguing about the wrong issues.
Is it something I have said or done? This is a good idea since you notice the reaction of your direct report is out of proportion for the topic. By switching the conversation to the process of communication—how you are talking to one another— you can uncover the real issue.
They seldom work. This approach treats the symptoms, not the problems. People comply with what you want, The Key to the Kingdom 49 but continue to harbor resentment.
Compliance is not the same as alignment. People who comply—instead of committing and aligning with you—unconsciously erode your efforts at every opportunity. Remember the story of Brian at the beginning of this chapter? Instead of feeling inspired, he feels even more misunderstood. Which approach targets the symptoms and which focuses on the real issue? Maybe I can help. Attempting to solve symptoms only compounds the situation. People are frustrated because the problem is unresolved.
Brian needs his boss to listen to how he feels. What he receives instead is communication that is off-track. His boss ignores his resignation and focuses solely on performance. In the second approach, his boss focuses on a behavioral change she has noticed. Brian is normally focused and on time. Lately he has been preoccupied and is missing his deadlines.
By talking about these changes, Say It Right the First Time 50 the manager begins to search for the real problem. The second approach hits the target: The problem is resignation; the symptom is performance. Step 3: Validate All Feelings When people believe they are unfairly criticized or judged, they suppress their resentment and route it in unproductive directions such as talking to others.
A caveat: Just because you do not hear about issues, concerns, or disappointments does not mean they do not exist. Since you are the last person to hear anything, never trust the obvious. You know better than this. Please tell me more. I just want to understand. Talk to me. It is important to validate how people feel without necessarily agreeing with their solutions. Feelings are not right or wrong, good or bad. They are internal sensations.
The best thing to do when dealing with an emotionally charged individual is to encourage the person to fully express. Then listen and validate. Do not judge and criticize. Your focus is to understand what the individual is feeling and not assess whether or not he or she should have these feelings. You can address the resignation by letting the individual know you recognize something is bothering him or her and you want to talk about it as soon as possible.
Do not ignore resignation or attempt to move past it by trying to cheer someone up. This results in the person not feeling heard or understood. Now you have two problems—resistance and resignation. I want to understand. How you are doing is important to me. Labels, accurate or not, tend to provoke reactions. Let the person know you do not have time to talk now, but you will make time. Recognize that how far out in time you schedule the meeting will tell the person how important the conversation is to you.
You need to get people off the sidelines and back into the game. And the way to do this is by using words that create possibility and expand thinking. You are the coach, the person who focuses efforts and raises spirits. Resignation and skepticism are a normal part of business life. People move out of the game and onto the sidelines, taking their enthusiasm with them. Resignation is not something that disappears forever.
It takes a dedicated coach who is willing to deal with the human side in order to engage people at top levels of performance. The spirit of an organization is contained in how much discretionary effort people are willing to give. Your willingness and skill in dealing with the real problem and not the symptoms allow you to get people back in the game, which will generate rewarding results. You hold the key to making the impossible happen by inspiring positive action in others.
Key Communication Principles Principle 1: Turn hallway conversations into public dialogues. You are the last person to hear about what is going on. Remember this, and you will not be surprised or blindsided. Private conversations, often referred to as underground or hallway discus- 54 Say It Right the First Time sions, occur all the time.
They are dialogues where selected others are excluded, usually management. People engage in these discussions with everyone except the person who can resolve the issue or concern. These exchanges can fester and grow into resignation. Be on the hunt for underground conversations. When you discover an underground conversation, talk about it in a constructive, open manner.
Principle 2: Do not take communication literally when talking with an emotionally charged person. Your job is to listen and understand until the emotional charge has dissipated. Then you can problem solve, not before. Observe your reaction to a person who is emotionally charged. Do you have an overwhelming urge to solve the problem? If you do, work on listening to understand. Avoid providing any solutions until the individual asks for your thoughts. Principle 3: Treat the problem and ignore the symptoms.
When you treat a symptom, the problem occurs over and over again. The Key to the Kingdom 55 A tip-off that you are dealing with symptoms and not the real issue is when numerous concerns are presented.
This will lead you into a maze. Action 1. It must be something very important to you. Feelings are valid and need to be respected. You cannot talk someone out of how he or she feels nor can you use logic to convince him or her to feel otherwise. The only solution is to validate feelings by listening and understanding.
Feelings are real for the person who has them. Serious relationship problems occur when people believe their feelings are minimized, judged, or invalidated. The key is to support an individual without agreeing with them. When someone tells you how he or she feels, immediately validate the feelings. Prompt the individual to express.
Please go on. Focus on the problem, not who caused it. People will help you solve a problem even when they are the problem as long as they are not the targets of blame. People do not want to let you down. Power must be the servant, not the master. Change your course 10 degrees south. The seaman quietly notes the arrogance of the captain and continues the conversation until the real situation is revealed.
Ultimately the captain looks foolish. He has been ordering a lighthouse to move— a visual image that is both ludicrous and comical. Of course, you could argue that the captain did not know it was a lighthouse, but this is precisely the point. Leaders are accountable for dealing with accurate information. Poor decisions are often the result of low-quality information and false assumptions. Did you notice the captain never asked a question? By using declarative statements to the exclusion of questions, it sends a message that the need to be right is stronger than the need to understand.
Power blinds people to the obvious. It is like an intoxicating drink, stimulating the senses while destroying the ability to think. Those with power do not usually understand what is happening to them. As a result, they are blindsided time and again.
Every time you talk, you are on a loudspeaker. With power comes responsibility. Whenever you speak you have an impact. Each memo, e-mail, and voice mail sends a message. When you least expect it, your words will be repeated, interpreted, and passed along to many others. As with accountable communication, power is energy that must be harnessed and directed.
Having direct reports or a fancy title is inconsequential. Whether you are humble or down-to-earth or come from simple roots is meaningless. If others perceive you as having an impact on their lives, then you have power.
The question is Do you have symbolic power or real power? To understand power, we need to begin with what real power is not. Real power is not a title, it is not a position, and it is not money.
Real power is not being in charge of a substantial operational unit nor is it name recognition or celebrity status. These are all symbols of authority: Signs that are used to designate those in charge.
Even the proximity to authority garners symbolic power. For instance, if a CEO uses an outside consultant as part of his or her inner circle, the consultant is given power. An assistant working closely with a leader, whether administrative or specialized, is often perceived as having authority. It is a grave mistake to underestimate the clout of an assistant. This relationship often involves daily, intimate exchanges of not only information but also observations and subjective judgments.
The opinion of an assistant can carry more weight than that of peers or direct reports. Symbols of power are often mistaken for real power, but they are not the same. People listened and responded because they had to, not because they were aligned. In the hallways, they made fun of him and laughed at his attempts to run meetings and provide direction. His symbols of authority made no difference because people did not give him power. How about the reverse situation?
At the same company as the COO mentioned above, there was an informal leader, an individual contributor with a technical title. The company was in the midst of a cultural change effort, and she took up the mantle for building a high-performance culture.
She was recognized for her commitment, accountability, and ability to partner with others. Her credibility and informal leadership continued to grow. People listened to what she said; they were energized by her enthusiasm. She was even invited to senior management meetings to provide input. She had tremendous power—real power not symbolic power.
Perception Is Reality If people believe you have power, you do. Power is not something you have: It is something others give to you. You cannot have power unless others grant it to you. Power does not exist in a vacuum. There are no leaders without followers, just as there are no captains without troops.
Power is the relationship between the one who has the power and those who acknowledge it. When they believe this, they give the other person power. When they stop believing this, the power disappears. His assumptions and arrogance were revealed during the exchange of messages.
After all he was the captain, the one in charge, the one who gave orders, the one that everyone looked to for direction. To him, it was logical that he gave orders and others quickly complied. The seaman in charge of the lighthouse did not recognize the power of the captain as supreme. Without this recognition, the captain had no power.
The belief people have in your ability to lead, to take care of them, and to provide superior direction is what gives you power, not the symbols of authority. Power is the result of the gifts of trust, loyalty, and support that others choose to give you.
Whether you believe you are powerful or not is immaterial. When your leadership inspires people, they give you discretionary effort. When they choose to let you lead, they grant you power. When people feel safe with you, they give you the gift of trust. Position and title do not come with automatic rights. Real power is the gift of trust and alignment that others choose to give to you. It is not enough to have power; leaders must transform symbolic authority into real power.
Spending years stumbling through one com- Your Power, Your Position, and Its Impact 63 munication problem after another is frustrating and unproductive.
A new way of thinking is required. Today, power comes from people and relationships. The traditional hierarchical model of status and command rights has been replaced by the new power source of relationships. Once you understand the difference between symbols of authority and real power, this becomes clear. These new insights underscore the need for leaders to gain trust and create authentic alignment.
What you earn. Power used effectively inspires positive action in others. Used ineffectively, it creates resignation. In a position of authority, you are accountable for your impact on others. Learning how to gain real power to nurture and restore the spirit of people will allow you to produce unprecedented results. It starts with learning the new language of inclusion and cooperation and letting go of the old language of directives and commands. Living in a Fishbowl To those who have it, power is not obvious.
It is something that simply exists. Accepting responsibility and making things happen is what you do every day no matter where you are. Your take-charge attitude and assertive personality naturally move you into positions of authority and status.
You are not afraid to take risks, challenge the status quo, and go where no one has gone before. This is what you do, and you are good at it. But consider how you got to where you are. You grew into this position—you did not just arrive there. But to others you have always had power. Many people did not see your rise up. They just see where you are now. Despite your attempts to convince them that you are just like them, they have a different perspective.
To them you came, you arrived, and you have power. From your viewpoint, there has been a logical progression to your development as a leader. You are the same person you have always been. Position, authority, and status have not changed who you are. Your Power, Your Position, and Its Impact 65 Your core values have remained the same, your beliefs have not altered, and your personality has not changed.
You are just doing what you do best—making things happen. In your mind, you think you are like everyone else—just one of the gang working hard to produce results. But you are not like everyone else. As a leader you are judged by different standards, and no one has ever told you what those standards are.
Walk out of a meeting and talk to people in an abrupt manner, and conclusions are immediately drawn. People decide whether you are in a good or bad mood. Their conclusion, accurate or inaccurate, is passed on to others affecting focus, productivity, and morale. You are not one of the gang and you never will be again. You are being watched at all times. In effect, no amount of hard work or visionary ability will make your dreams a reality until you learn how to achieve real power.
The only way out of this maze is to understand and be accountable for how your power impacts others. How you say something is dissected, examined, and scrutinized at the most detailed level.
You are in the spotlight and nothing you say or do will take you out of it. From your point of view, communication should be easy. But that is not what they hear. Your power, position, and authority color everything. You think you are saying the right thing, using the right words, and then Wham! Suddenly and inexplicably you are in trouble.
Someone reacts to what you said or did not say, how you said it, the words you used, or the images your words created. Whatever you said is gone from your mind. Although you have moved on, others have not. They are replaying your words over and over again in their minds. And it is true that bad news travels fast—very, very fast. You now have a dilemma. As a leader, your job is to create a compelling future and bring new realities into existence.
Yet how you speak often leaves people immobilized and locked in the past. Instead of inspiring people, your words can paralyze them and stop the action. But that would require that you live on another planet. Your job is to produce results through people, not in spite of them. To achieve real power, there are three undeniable truths that leaders must understand: Your Power, Your Position, and Its Impact 67 1.
You have power. You underestimate your power. You are not in control of your power. The sooner you realize you are not in control, the faster you can get out of your own way. How others perceive and experience you determines your future. Try it and you will fail. This is one reality you cannot escape unless you work alone, report to no one, and retreat to your cave at the end of each day. The Invisible Cloak: How You Wear Power There are three typical ways in which leaders don the cloak of power: They reduce power, amplify power, or respect power.
How do you respond to having power? Minimizing or reducing power by using an overabundance of deferring statements, hedges, and softeners. Response 2: Leaders Who Amplify Power Using exclusive language, directives, commands, and parental language when speaking. Talking and speaking with little or no awareness of their impact on others. Speaking to connect with people and gain their trust by using the language of inclusion and cooperation. To downplay their newly acquired position and demonstrate to others that they have not changed, they often defer decisions to others, allowing consensus to dominate decision-making.
On the surface, this looks good. Those who love power tend to use directives and exclusionary and parental language. Since the earliest association with power is by and large the parent-child relationship, it is understandable why people revert to language learned in the home. Parental, directive language is appropriate and necessary for the safety and well-being of children. As a child grows into an adult, this language is typically replaced with words that provide choice rather than command statements.
Adults do not like being told what they should and should not do. One of the most pressing problems revealed in employee surveys is that people do not feel safe to speak up. When managers and leaders send a message telling others their input is not needed or valued, people become resigned and shrink the game. Say good-bye to discretionary effort. Change it now. This is not what I asked for. Leaders who fall in love with power speak as if they are the center of the universe with everyone else revolving around them.
It takes into account how power impacts people. When a leader respects power—rather than minimizing power or resorting to control—people feel included, valued, and personally connected to the leader.
People respond by giving trust, experiencing authentic alignment, and acting as owners. Collaborating and working together is fun and easy. Morale goes up as people feel that they are a valued part of the team, group, or organization. Leaders who have a healthy respect for power create an environment of collaboration and trust. People feel connected, included, and valued. They are not alone; they are part of a larger group, and the leader is right in there with them.
Bear in mind that people want to contribute and make a difference. It is up to the leader to foster an environment of cooperation and partnership. The language of inclusion extends to words and phrases that elicit the feeling of being valued and included as part of a winning team.
Real power is both respecting your power and being accountable for how it affects others. The shift from symbolic authority to real power unlocks the ability of people to be extraordinary leaders.
Compliance Is Not Alignment You cannot use authority, control, or power to manipulate or control people without grave consequences. Leaders who consciously or unconsciously use their power forcefully face serious repercussions. People will comply only to protect their jobs and careers.
But compliance is not alignment. Compliance is a temporary accommodation to meet the requirements of the person in charge. On the surface, compliance appears to be agreement. Below the surface, it frequently erupts into passive-aggressive behavior: people doing and saying things that are in direct contradiction with what you think they agreed to. Compliance leads to hallway conspiracies, people privately conferring and disagreeing with you while publicly complying with what you want.
Alignment, on the other hand, is when people set aside their personal preferences and own the decision or direction as if they were the authors of it. Because alignment is an authentic choice, people talk and behave as owners. When leaders use their power as force they get compliance; when leaders are accountable for their use of power they get alignment. The way in which you speak creates a reaction in others. Language that generates alignment acknowledges your authority while simultaneously including others.
This language produces authentic alignment where words and behavior are consistent, makes people feel safe to speak up, and inspires people to make things happen. Phrases that result in compliance are, in effect, control statements.
These types of statements shut people down so they do not speak up; produce compliance, a false sense of alignment, and hallway conspiracies; and create negative reactions. Your thoughts are valuable to me. This has to be a decision we make together. I may not always agree, but I will always listen. So please ask me to clarify whatever is on your mind. When you have compliance instead of alignment, people give minimum effort and do only what they need to do.
Under the reign or terror of command and control, morale and performance suffer. Additionally, people do not feel connected with a leader who is exclusionary and directive.
The need for an authentic relationship with a leader is strong. People want to feel included, inspired, and connected to their leaders. People want leaders to lead. What people want is for leaders to lead, not win a popularity contest. This means being willing to take a stand, go out on a limb, or take an unpopular position. Trying to be one of the gang minimizes your ability to lead and annoys others.
People already know you are not one of the gang. They know that you have power and authority over them. You can be collaborative and be a strong leader without resorting to command-andcontrol tactics.
If you have a tendency to minimize your power, practice using declarative statements rather than questions to express your point of view. Principle 2: You are the last person to hear about what is really going on.
Once you are a leader, information goes underground. You are the last person to hear what is going on. Hallway conspiracies and the grapevine replace direct communication to you.
Practice giving people explicit permission to ask questions, give you feedback, and coach you. The more you do this, the more you will receive direct communication. All behavior communicates. You cannot not communicate—there is no such thing. No response is a response. Your words, tone of voice, silence, and behavior communicate a message.
Everything you do or do not do communicates. Principle 4: Real power is what others give you: the gifts of their trust, alignment, and support. Symbolic power—the symbols of title, authority, and status—are not the same as real power.
Real power is what others choose to give you. You cannot have a leader without followers. You get your power from others. They give you the gifts of trust, alignment, and support. Do one thing each day that allows people to connect with you. This might include encouraging someone, including someone, or asking a person for his or her input. Demonstrate that others are important.
The best way to really enter minds that hate complexity and confusion is to oversimplify your message. The lesson here is not to try and tell your entire story. Just focus on one powerful attribute and drive it into the mind. Six months later I discover nothing has been implemented. They actually think they are giving me what I want. All this time and work and nothing sticks. Major organizational initiatives, such as total quality management, reengineering, and high performance, result in little or no action.
Or a project report that was due on your desk Monday morning is still not there by Thursday. But my communication is clear and direct, you argue. It may be in your mind but not to others. You think you send clear messages. Then you are blindsided by a complete and utter misunderstanding of what you think you said.
Perhaps it is a report, a review of project results, or something as simple as distributing a memo to a select group. How in the world did they come up with this after you were explicit and spoke directly to the point?
You feel enormously let down and aggravated with their incompetence. Stop and listen carefully: What you said is not what they heard. They do not. Words are symbolic, and people attach their own private interpretation to what you say.
For example, a disgruntled leader walked into a meeting with his direct reports. He told them in no uncertain The Black Hole 81 terms they were failing miserably in demonstrating their commitment to the high-performance initiative, and he wanted this situation corrected fast.
The leader envisioned his direct reports setting up discussions and meetings where they could talk face-to-face with their subordinates. But his direct reports had a different interpretation. They moved fast, sending memos and e-mails to their subordinates. Same words—different meaning. When a leader fails to clearly communicate his or her expectations, problems occur. Unmet expectations lead to disappointments— lots of them.
The operational word is think. Without clarity, focus, and direction, the probability of accurate message transmission is low. There is a great distance between what you say and what they hear.
Bridging this distance to ensure controlled meaning and understanding of your messages is the purpose of this chapter. Entering the Black Hole What causes the gap between your direction and their implementation and execution? They travel to the black hole: the place in the mind where all messages end up for interpreting, sorting, storing, or deleting.
Noise and competing stimuli are coming from all directions. Your message journeys into minds that are inundated and overwhelmed with too much information, changes, confusion, and uncertainty. Every time you speak, numerous factors affect how your words are interpreted and acted upon.
It is not surprising that messages become scrambled or lost altogether. Numerous outside forces affect what people hear, but there is only one force you can control: you. Focusing on changing others does not solve the problem. Sometimes it is they, and you are dealing with a competency issue.
However, you must carefully discern if the failure to execute is a competency or communication issue. A competency issue tells you the person is in the wrong job. A communication issue reveals the need for greater clarity and precision. Organizations lose many talented people by incorrectly diagnosing this important distinction. To produce a different outcome, she could 1 hire new people, 2 change the behavior of others, or 3 change what she is doing.
It takes more time, money, and effort to attempt to alter the behavior of people. Plus the success ratio is quite low when it comes to changing others. Instead of expecting or hoping that others will understand, you can steer the conversation in the direction you want it to go.
It starts with having the right focus. A great deal of time is wasted when leaders travel down the ineffective path of trying to change others. Question 1: How can I get others to listen better? Or Question 2: How can I say what I want them to hear? The question implies that others are responsible for how they listen. Of course it is true: People are responsible for how they listen, but that is a subject for another book.
The focus of this book is how to alter the way in which you communicate to dramatically increase results. The second question emphasizes your accountability and places full emphasis on what you say. Once again, you are in control. You can always change your own behavior. The problem with communication is that we use words and phrases without recognizing that they mean different things to different people. Most likely they hear your disappointment in them. When private meanings are assigned to shared words, the result is confusion, anxiety, and chaos.
Anyone heard you. Anyone heard you correctly. Anyone cares. A typical response of the speaker is to talk louder and repeat the message using the exact same words. Increasing volume or duplicating a message does not magically make people understand. Instead, it annoys them. Do not confuse using the same words with the need to repeat your message using multiple communication channels for example, electronic, verbal, or written. The key to understanding and retention is to deliver the same message or theme in different ways.
Anyone is moving. Anyone is moving fast. Anyone is moving in the right direction. The Black Hole 85 How a leader communicates expectations makes all the difference. A message about working harder, for example, can create an uproar in an organization when words are misunderstood. In one company, the head of a business unit, in a moment of frustration, said she did not want to see the parking lot empty at 5 p.
She was making a point, not being literal. But too late. Her words created a reaction. They stayed until after 5 p. We have a lot more work. What You Say: This new initiative focuses on our quality efforts. This new initiative focuses on blah, blah, blah. Everything is urgent. Start looking for another job. Why is your message often misinterpreted? How can people possibly be confused after you have delivered a clear, straightforward statement?
How can one word or phrase spoken by you create so much commotion? How many times do you have to repeat the same message for people to get it? Why is communication such a challenge?
The reason: We are not speaking the same language. Just because we use the same verbal communication system within a culture does not mean we are speaking the same language. It is as if one person is speaking Spanish and the other French. Leaders are deluded into believing that everyone speaks the same language and therefore has the same meanings for words. Your words are translated and interpreted.
If a manager, for instance, has a high regard for an employee, he or she will adjust all information to support this view. The rest is discarded. There was a well-liked farmer who was accused of stealing a pig from a rancher who was disliked by everyone.
He instructed the jurors to leave and not return until they had a verdict that made sense. The jurors left the room, and their loud voices could be heard down the hall. Or said another way, meanings are in people, not in words.
People want to know they are on the right track and that what they are doing supports the larger efforts of the organization. Communicating to Both Minds There is hope. You can maximize understanding and reduce confusion by communicating to two minds, not one.
To inspire positive action, both the conscious and unconscious mind must be engaged. If you want your message to be understood, talk to the conscious mind left brain ; if you want it to be remembered, communicate to the unconscious mind right brain.
The conscious mind wants structure and order whereas the unconscious mind remembers feelings and subjective experiences. Further, the conscious mind has limited storage capacity, which explains why people can easily forget information especially when there is a lot of it. In contrast, the unconscious mind has unlimited memory and storage capacity. It is essential to leave people with positive experiences because when everything else fades, they still remember how you made them feel.
Long after people forget what you said, they remember how you made them feel. Most leaders do not understand the difference between the two minds. Their information-loaded messages often miss the mark as The Black Hole 89 they present facts, logic, and details to the conscious mind while ignoring the subjective feelings and experiences recorded by the unconscious.
The consequence? How people feel when they walk away from a discussion or meeting is stored in the unconscious. This takes place in the conscious mind. If you fail to clarify the outcome for a sensitive discussion, for example, the listener will search for your agenda rather than attending to the message.
What happens when you communicate exclusively to one side of the brain? If you communicate only to the conscious mind, you may get your point across, but in the end there will be little enthusiasm and only intellectual buy-in. On the other hand, when you communicate only to the unconscious mind, people experience positive feelings and are inspired, but there is no action.
The short version is that the conscious mind needs structure and order; the unconscious records feelings and experiences. When you fail to provide positive experiences, people withhold their energy and Say It Right the First Time 90 commitment. The mission is to communicate to the two minds. Maximize understanding, reduce confusion, and ensure retention by providing organization for the conscious mind, and creating positive experiences for the unconscious.
Keep it outcomes: State your simple and straightforward. Example: I want you to Example: Our outcome is to champion this initiative. Keep it bite-size. Example: I want a written plan by Tuesday. Why it works: When you provide order and structure for the conscious mind, people listen to what you are saying, rather than search for your agenda.
Example: Your leadership makes a tremendous difference. I appreciate your energy and commitment. Why it works: When you provide an encouraging focus and leave people with positive feelings, it raises spirits and morale. People want to feel good. Solving the Right Problem One of the most common communication breakdowns is trying to solve a problem before understanding it.
The mere act of mutually agreeing on the outcome or problem forces critical thinking and analysis. A lot of time is wasted when people are solving different problems or the wrong problem.
Outcomes provide direction for the conscious mind. When you start a discussion or meeting, tell people what you want or ask everyone to mutually agree on the outcome. The purpose of starting with your outcome is to orient participants in the Say It Right the First Time 92 discussion. It also allows the conscious mind to stop searching for the agenda. In turn, people relax and message receptivity increases. What do you see as the issue? Now, what happened. Conversely, having no outcome or solving the wrong problem produces uncertainty and confusion and wastes time.
Once the outcome or desired results are mutually agreed upon, then generating solutions makes sense. As you engage in the conver- The Black Hole 93 sation, periodically check to make sure all parties are focused on the same outcome or problem. This is exceptionally useful in meetings where conversations have a way of wandering off to topics unrelated to solving the problem.
Communicating Priorities People cannot read your mind. If you have a preference for how and when something is to be done, say it; do not imply it.
Otherwise, you will be disappointed when your employees do not deliver what you want. Managers frequently assume people know what to do and then are disappointed with the results.
To avoid disappointment, clearly articulate your expectations.
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