Interpersonal Skills Development

Many situations today require skills in understanding and collaboration. These differ greatly from the more common skills in information sharing and advocacy.  Part of the reason we have difficulties is that we can not switch to the appropriate skills at the appropriate time.  And, part of the reason why our meetings as so often long and not productive is that the communication model we use focuses on discussion and expression rather than collaboration and decision making.  Both values and skills are responsible for these inadequacies.

Quality Interpersonal Communication

We often use mass communication style messages when we need interpersonal ones. Mass distributes or impersonal messages often create problems.  But even face-to-face communication is often more a simultaneous monologue among several people than a dialogue.  Even when there is a genuine effort to understand the other, where there is considerable trust and openness, without appropriate skills, dialogue cannot happen.  Here four skills will be highlighted: immediacy, concreteness, ownership, and acknowledgement. The discussion will be followed by a dialogue demonstrating the use of these skills.

Immediacy.  Immediacy refers to the sense of being present focusing on paying attention, listening, and the emotional content of messages. In many discussions people are not really present to the other, they are simply waiting for their turn to respond rather than understanding and being responsive.

A successful leader understands that most people have a fairly high need to be really heard and taken seriously.  Employees don’t want to hear your experiences, for you to fix their problems, or to be treated like a representative of a class of people.  They want their feelings and their immediate circumstances responded it. They want understanding and the power to act responsively and responsibly. Interaction characterized by immediacy involves much eye contact and supportive gestures.  It is patient and careful and filled with requests for further understanding.

Concreteness.  Concreteness refers to expressions that avoid abstractions by providing meaningful details.  An expression is abstract whenever it provides a generalized conclusion or evaluation without providing the descriptive information from which such a conclusion or evaluation was reached. 

Abstractions create problems because they (1) over-generalize making problems appear larger and more difficult to solve, (2) provide listeners with little information on which to base their own evaluations and responses, and (3) tend to evoke responses to the words themselves rather than to what the speaker has actually experienced.

A statement like, “John is irresponsible,” includes all these qualities.  The more concrete statement, “I was disappointed last month when John did not meet his quota,” provides a much better opportunity for dialogue whether the conversation is with John or others.

Concrete expressions help clarify the content of the interaction, provide more and more useful information, reduce emotional intensity, help align interpretations, and increase change options.  Abstractions are so natural to many people that mutual commitment to exploration and clarification may be necessary for improved communication.

Ownership.  Ownership is the process of explicitly assigning and expressing appropriate responsibility for feeling and actions.  Unowned statements shift responsibility either by taking on too much responsibility or too little leading to defensiveness, guilt and inability to correct. 

A statement like “You make me so angry” inappropriately shifts responsibility for feelings to the other.  While the other’s actions leading to feelings of anger are important and must be owned by the other, the person feeling anger contributes also.  Anger requires both the actions and the unmet hopes, desires, expectations and anticipations of the one having the feeling.  Both are appropriately open to discussion.

A lack of ownership is also often present in claims of objectivity and facts.  All claims and facts require agreed upon processes or procedures for their formation.  Even the accountant’s report requires the acceptance of “general accounting procedures” for its claims.  Often these processes and procedures remain implicit making discussion of them impossible and consideration of their products incomplete. Responsibility is pushed to some invisible realm.

Responsibility is also often shifted to rules and generic shoulds and oughts.  Questions like, “whose oughts?” “why are they applicable in this situation?” can be non-discussible.  Responsibility is shifted to an absent authority.

An owned message explicitly demonstrates responsibility for self, thoughts, feelings, knowledge claims, and actions.  They often begin with an explicit I think, I want, rather than without an origin.  To produce an owned message requires (1) knowing what you are really feeling, thinking or doing, (2) honestly determining what you have to value, anticipate or want to think or feel this way when confronted with the other’s statements and actions, and (3) determining which are the thoughts and feeling that you wish to share with the other.  Most owned statements begin to make explicit the deep values and assumptions that are embedded in an organization’s culture.

Acknowledgment.   Acknowledgment is the process of making explicit your understanding of the other person’s message prior to responding to it.  In the absence of acknowledgment the following sequence often results:  important messages from one or both are overlooked, denied or partly understood; participants respond to different messages as the interpretations misalign; a bogus issue arises on which the participation partly aligns thus justifying the heightened emotions; interactants leave the interaction feeling misunderstood, under-valued, and suspicious.

Acknowledgment can help draw out the underlying interpretations (the right hand dialogue) that is the real life of interaction and meaning assignment.  Acknowledgment increases the possibility of greater understanding, easier distinction between misunderstandings and genuine disagreements, and increases feelings of immediacy and trust.  Each participant is affirmed as valued and meanings are clarified.

An Example.   Mary is Bill’s supervisor.  Bill had turned in a lengthy report on a project being considered.  Working on it has put him behind on other duties.  Mary was quite disappointed with it and still has to prepare her presentation.

Mary:  “Bill, I need you to do that report over.”

Bill:  “Really?”

Mary:  “Yeah, I need it back as soon as possible.”

Bill:  “What do you want?”

Mary:  “More development and more direct answers to their questions.”

Bill:  “I thought it was pretty good.”

Mary:  “Well, it doesn’t show any drive or initiative—that you have things under control.”

Bill:  “I know my stuff pretty well.”

Mary “Well, you have to show it if you want to get ahead.”

Bill:  “For some people, it’s all show.”

Mary:  “I don’t make the rules, just get the report in.”

The dialogue is not too lengthy or intense but shares characteristics with many attempts at dialogue that fail, often in a much grander way than this one.  The interaction grows more difficult and abstract.  By the end little understanding is present, the issues are bigger, neither party feels appreciated, and future interactions are likely to be less frequent and more difficult.  Bill doesn’t feel his situation is understood, Mary hides her own frustrations and lack of information in generalizations and blame.

Exercise

Identify places in the interaction where the statements lacked immediacy, concreteness, ownership or acknowledgement.

Rewrite portions of the interaction demonstrating more productive skills.

 The following is a hypothetical rewrite demonstrating interpersonal skills leading to a different end.

Mary:  “Bill, John needs more details on projected material costs and time requirements before he can consider approving the project.”

Bill:  “Ah!  I was hoping it was done. I’m so far behind.

Mary:  “Yeah, I know you have worked hard on the report at a bad time. But they will meet on Friday, for me to get my part done, I’ll need it Thursday afternoon, sooner if possible.”

Bill:  “You mentioned both the material costs and time requirements, do you know exactly what they need?”

Mary:  “I’m a little frustrated myself.  John was not very clear himself.  I know they want more on the specific timetable for each phase and some comparative figures for considering suppliers.  Maybe we should sit down together and talk it out in detail so that we know what we can say.  I’ll see if I can find out more.”

Bill:  “I hope a meeting won’t be necessary.  I appreciate your help, I want it to go well.  I think I know better what is needed but I may need some help to collect everything before Thursday without messing up the GS project.

Mary:  “I know you are pretty pushed, but this is important.  I need it to go well too. Maybe Joe can help on the GS project.

In the rewrite meaningful details are added.  Abstract, but concrete sounding terms like, “do it over,” “their questions,” “taking initiative,” and “showing it” are replaced by details of when and what and criteria for judgment.  Unowned feelings expressed as generic frustration and negative reactions become specified and owned.  And each feels better that they are understood as explicit attempts are made to play back an understanding of the bases for the feelings and thought of each.

Each of the interpersonal skills are more important when the continued relationship is important, information needs are high, change is desired or occurring, the issues are emotionally laden, and/or social and cultural differences are great.

An Orientation Toward Collaborative Problem Solving

Most organizations have lots of meetings.  Most probably have too many.  One of the fears of organizational members as more participative approaches are suggested is that the number of meetings will increase.  This need not be the case.  In fact, a reduction in the time in meetings is possible. 

Most meetings are filled with discussion but not dialogue.  Two key characteristics separate discussions from dialogues.  First, discussions tend to focus on the airing and advocacy of known positions rather than the exploration of unknown ones.  Second, discussions often focus on saying rather than doing.  At best they may end with a vote, but often the discussion ends with simply the need for more discussion.  Dialogue focuses on the reaching of a common understanding and mutual commitment to a decision.

From the standpoint of practice, various forms of collaborative decision making provide the context for dialogue.  Collaboration requires a different attitude going into meetings and a different form of interaction in meetings.  These differences are well characterized in the differences between adversarial and collaborative communication.

Adversarial

Members are adversaries.

Speaking comes from a position or preferred means of accomplishment.

Discussion becomes polarized around interests.

Discussion narrows options.

Facts are used to support positions.

Seeks winning arguments.

Definition of the problems is accomplished before meeting.

Final responsibility for the decision rests with others

Collaborative

Members are joint problem solvers.

Speaking comes from an outcome wished to be accomplished.

Dialogue focuses on complex underlying positions.

Dialogue broadens field of options.

Joint search is used to discover facts.

Seeks workable options.

Definition of the problem is a joint achievement.

Final responsibility for the decision rests with the group

Exercise

Describe a recent conflict situation you have experienced.  Identify instances of both adversarial and collaborative communication.

Think of a situation where two individuals appeared to be fighting over the same resource.  Identify why they wanted that resource, or the “end” for which this resource was a “means.”  Can you identify ways each could simultaneously achieve their ends without using that resource?

Discussion Questions_________________________________________________ 

-->·        -->What have been your experiences with participation and empowerment programs?  When have they succeeded and failed?  What might you do about the cynicism that frequently comes with these programs?

-->·        -->Do you feel people can significantly change interpersonal skills and their basic orientations to interaction with others?  Under what circumstances are such changes more likely?

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