Hi folks,
One of the advantages of riding my bike to work is that I’m mostly unimpacted by traffic. Well, except when I’m in the fallout zone of some drivers yelling at each other.
That was true earlier this week. A line of cars were stopped at a light, waiting to turn left. The light was green, but the traffic wasn’t moving. A few cars back in line, a driver was using his horn, voice, and gestures to let the world know he was displeased with the lack of progress. And not in a gentle “greetings, fellow human being, you may not have noticed that the light is green” kind of way.
What the driver couldn’t see is that there was nowhere for the cars in front of him to go. Traffic was completely stopped, so instead of blocking the box, the cars in front were staying put – as they should – to avoid making the whole situation worse.
We’ve all been that metaphorical angry driver before – shouting at the world because it’s not doing what we expect, all the while ignorant to the underlying reasons for the upsetting behavior.
I recently attended a weeklong course on communications. The sessions had a heavy focus on 1:1 communications and we worked through a series of role playing scenarios during which we were handed a page worth’s of information on our character’s perspective. Despite explicit instructions to follow a formula of “listen, inquire, give feedback”, most of us initially jumped straight to “let me tell you what I think” mode. Even in pretend scenarios, we were so anxious to make our perspective heard, we neglected the perspectives of others.
With some practice, we all improved and were able to improve the outcome of the scenarios by simply shutting up and listening before rushing to give our opinions. But it’s something that we all need to practice – especially when we’re dealing with colleagues or clients we consider difficult. By listening instead of talking, we can often find the elusive common ground from which we can start building positive, productive relationships.
Rex