Disagree better

The outset of a difficult conversation often feels like a back-and-forth trading of position and perspective with little common ground. Here’s how to use the psychology of agreement to begin shifting that kind of positional debate to collaborative problem solving.

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It feels productive to toss out ideas for a solution and demonstrate how much we want to help. But it’s usually unproductive if we haven’t done something essential first: Make sure we understand the problem from their frame of reference.

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When we’re overwhelmed by a difficult conversation, one reason can be that we’re too focused on the horizon and not focused enough on the very next step. A very helpful mindset in moments like this is to “do the next right thing.”

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When we listen well, sometimes others hog air time and just keep talking. It’s an inadvertent, and often unwelcome, side effect of good listening. Here’s a way I like to handle long-winded talkers that’s both effective and kind.

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When confronting difficult behavior, we typically focus on what we want the other person to stop doing. Sometimes this works. But too often, we create a “behavior vacuum” with this approach, making it harder for them to stop the difficult behavior. Here’s how to avoid this common misstep.

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When we want to control emotions better in the midst of a difficult conversation, we may try to ignore the unwelcome emotion or try the opposite, indulge it. These approaches don’t work very well in the face of incapacitating emotions. But something else does: Give the emotion a name.

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Blame vs contribution — the differences are straightforward to grasp intellectually, yet sometimes tricky to employ effectively in conflict situations. Here are a few ways to shift a conversation from blame to contribution without appearing to blame the victim.

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