Communication Break-Down

A few months ago I was driving to speak at an event I had titled “The Art of Being Out of Control.” As I sat waiting at a stoplight I reached into my purse and pulled out my MAC lipstick. I must have grabbed an old lipstick because I didn’t recognize the color right away. I turned the tube upside down to read the name:

High Strung.

This is funny if you know me even a little bit. Let’s just say that I am a “recovering” control freak. I had issues. Even my issues had issues.

I’m all better now, thank you for asking.

If we’re being honest though, I think we all have some control issues. Particularly around outcomes. My work is a great example: people often want to learn nonverbal “techniques” so they can get people to do what they want. In other words, they want a particular outcome.

What I’ve come to realize over the years is that the most effective communicators, leaders, etc, are people who switch from outcome-oriented thinking to option-oriented thinking. Instead of asking, “How do I get X to do Y?” they ask, “What are all the options here?” Nonverbal intelligence not only allows us to identify the various options available, it assists us in communicating effectively based on those options.

For example, if I need to fire someone, I can make up a story ahead of time about how I think they’ll react, how upset they’ll be, what a mess this is…. and boom! I walk into the meeting in fight or flight mode which my employee will naturally react to. If however, I focus on my breathing so that I remain calm, I can stay present to whatever happens. If my employee becomes angry, I can deal with it. But it might also be that they’re relieved, because they’d heard rumors, or perhaps they were dying to leave and are thrilled to be offered a severance package. The point is, I don’t know what will happen. But if I focus on one outcome–this person will become upset–I breathe high, cutting off oxygen to my brain and I lose all my resourcefulness. Instead, if I stay present and respond based on what is actually happening in the moment, I can better serve my employee, myself, and the needs of the situation.

Anyone can be “out of control.” The art of being out of control is letting go of our attachment to outcomes and instead opening ourselves up to possibility.

Perhaps you’ve heard the adage, “You can choose your friends, but not your family.” In an office environment, the same can be true for coworkers. Sometimes you must work closely with difficult people. And even if you love your coworkers like family, the more time you spend with someone, the chance for conflict to arise increases.

Over a month ago, I came across an online article titled “Office Conflict Resolution: 11 Communication Tips for a Healthy Workplace.” Tip #3 caught my attention: Depersonalize Conflicts. Immediately, I began writing a blog on the subject.

Why did it take a month to complete? Because it’s a huge topic, and can’t be covered in a single blog. Maybe not even in a series of blogs. At Nonverbal Solutions we offer an entire workshop on how to deliver negative information without becoming the bad guy (Don’t Shoot the Messenger) and another whole workshop on dealing with difficult personalities and behaviors (Cats & Dogs).

I can’t, however, just let the topic lie.

Though some personalities enjoy and invite conflict, most of us find it stressful to navigate. And despite our best efforts, a negative exchange can easily escalate into an ugly altercation. Why?

1. When we feel threatened, we go into a “fight-or-flight” response.
2. In fight-or-flight, the “thinking” part of our brain (the cortex) shuts down and the “emotional/survival” part of the brain (the limbic system) takes over. We react instinctively, instead of thinking rationally.
3. This hinders our ability to learn new things or creatively problem-solve.
4. More importantly (in terms of nonverbal communication), when we go into fight-or-flight we send the message that we are attached to the issue and take the disagreement personally.
5. The person we are in conflict with senses this and gears up for a defensive maneuver or battle.

How do we communicate that we’re in fight-or-flight? By rapid, shallow breathing. When we’re in state of stress, we breathe more quickly to get oxygen to our muscles so that we can—you guessed it!—fight or fly. And while most people won’t consciously notice breathing patterns in others, they will pick up on a general feeling of discomfort and anxiety. That in turn makes them uncomfortable and anxious. They, then, don’t feel safe. They also go into fight-or-flight. Now everyone in the room’s muscles are ready for action… and everyone’s brains are shut down.

B r e a t h e.

Physiologically, breathing gets oxygen to your brain so you can think more clearly. Nonverbally, it communicates that you are safe, unattached, and capable of rational thought. It tells others that they are safe with you; this isn’t personal. Numerous other tips—such as effective use of visual information, timely use of eye contact, and proper body positioning—will help too, but only when paired with deep, slow, relaxed breathing. 

So take a nice, deep breath the next time you’re facing a difficult situation—you’ll think better, you’ll feel better, and so will everyone else.

This past weekend I attended a dinner party along with several deaf guests. In addition to speech-reading, they signed; so I dug up from the recesses of my brain some American Sign Language I learned back in high school. One of the women asked about my siblings. As I signed my reply, I remembered the importance of using location in ASL. When I spoke of myself, of course, I pointed to myself. But my sister and brother weren’t present. I “set up” locations that would stand for them: I pointed to a specific spot on my left to represent my sister and a spot on my right to represent my brother. From then on, I simply pointed to “the spot” and everyone knew who I was talking about.

Even if you don’t sign, you know that location holds memory. One morning, over a decade ago, I reached into the back of my lower kitchen cupboard and pulled out a pie pan, only to discover an ENORMOUS spider running around inside of it. (It was “THIS BIG.”) Even now, after years and years of spider-free pie pan fetching, I anxiously hold my breath every time I get it, remembering that once it contained a terrifying arachnid.

Effectively using location helps us communicate more clearly and consistently. Nonverbally, we can help people remember what we want them to remember and help them compartmentalize (forget) negative news or interactions.

For example, last week as I rehearsed parts of the Nonverbal Classroom Management workshop for Sari, she would sometimes call out, “You’re telling a story! Move to your story spot!” By delivering content in a different physical location from where I gave illustrations, participants knew to tune-in to the subject matter when I stood in the “teaching” spot and to access the right side of their brains when I moved to the “story” spot. They were able to switch mental gears and remember more when I was systematic in my use of location.

We can do this on a daily basis in our offices, courtrooms, classrooms, or wherever we are. To make a strong point, detach negative information from productive work space, change subjects, or “mark off” any part of our message, we can move or shift location to create a separation.

The pie pan in the back of my lower cupboard will forever be associated in my mind with that giant spider. If I can find a place in an upper cupboard to store the dish, I will likely forget the whole incident.

Off to rearrange my kitchen cupboards…

1. Talking too loud. We’re more in-tune with a person’s voice than any other nonverbal. This means we affect people by curling our voice up or down, speaking fast or slow, and yes, speaking softly or loudly. Loud talkers are rarely aware that they’re so anno…I mean, loud, so if you don’t think this is you, let’s check, shall we? Here’s a short quiz: Do most of your cubemates wear headphones? Do people back away as you stand in the hall chatting? Do most people take the seats in the back of the room at your presentations? If you answered yes to even one of those questions, you’re a loud talker. Reduce your volume and watch how differently people react to you. (Hint: they’ll stop wearing ear muffs at meetings.)

2. Talking too fast. I suffer from this myself. Visual learners speak quickly because we literally cannot get the thoughts out of our heads as fast as we “see” them. Slow yourself down by adding a pause between sentences. To assist this, close your lips during the pause. It looks more intelligent.

3. Talking too much. Since I speak for a living, I always have a lot to say. It gets me in trouble. I’m sure if I had co-workers, I’d annoy them. I already annoy my friend Rachel with my constant email blather. Talking too much means people will eventually tune you out. You risk becoming the Charlie Brown teacher. “Mwa mwa mwa mwa mwa.” You too can utilize the pause to help cut down on the never-ending chatter, but focus also on getting rid of “filler” phrases such as, “now we’re going to,” or “so as you can see” etc. Think before you speak. Oh. And listen more. Listening = good. Being the never-ending bore = bad.

4. Talking incongruently. Perhaps you curl your voice up when giving someone bad news to soften the blow. Or you curl it down when asking for input. In either case, using an incongruent voice pattern won’t get you the results you’re looking for and will annoy the heck out of your co-workers. Curl your voice up when seeking information, and down when sending information.

5. Talking at all. Sometimes, we should really just shut up all together. For example, I have the tendency to ask questions in workshops and then answer them myself. If you suffer from talking-too-much syndrome, and people have already tuned you out, try not talking at all or very little during the next meeting. When you do pipe up the next time, people will be more apt to listen since they haven’t heard your voice in awhile.

This has been a public service announcement from annoyed co-workers everywhere.

I recently had an x-ray on my back. When I sat down with my doctor to hear the results, she said the x-ray had incidentally shown that I had vascular calcification on my carotid artery. This meant I could have a stroke at any minute. She looked me straight in the eye and said, “this is serious.” And then she walked out the door.

As it was a Friday, I had to wait until Monday to get the ultrasound done on my neck to see how blocked the artery was. I don’t exaggerate when I say that was one of the longest weekends of my life. I had the ultrasound and found she had misread the x-ray. I was relieved, yet furious. I have since found a new doctor.

I don’t blame her for misreading my x-ray. What I do blame her for is how she communicated the information. With that in mind, here are my top three tips for medical professionals:

Communicate both your position and your person. We patients are pretty darn vulnerable sitting in a waiting room, usually without the benefit of our clothes. We need to feel that you care about us personally, but we also want to believe you know what you’re doing. You need to communicate both empathy and expertise. To communicate your person (empathy), use eye contact, curl the voice up at the ends of statements, smile, and use more relaxed body language. To communicate your position (expertise), straighten your posture, curl the voice down, and focus your eyes on the matter at hand.

Don’t look at the patient when delivering bad news. Ever hear the phrase, “don’t shoot the messenger?” Oftentimes it isn’t what we say that causes us to be “shot” it’s how we say it. Eye contact is the number one way to attach information to yourself. To separate yourself from the message, look at something else. In my case, the x-ray would have been helpful. This is true for those who work in medical offices as well. When discussing a bill with a patient, look at the bill. Where we look is where the responsibility lies. It wasn’t my doctor’s fault that there was a shadow on my x-ray. So look at the x-ray. This doesn’t mean we never look at people. It just means we’re systematic about when we look and when we look at something else.

Separate the problem from the solution. After looking at the x-ray together, she could have looked at me to discuss solutions. For example, -looking at the x-ray- “if you’ll notice this shadowy area here, that’s what we’re concerned about. It appears as though you may have some vascular calcification on your carotid artery.” Looking at me she might say, -”Now, the way we’ll find out for sure is to have an ultrasound done on your neck.” Turning back to the x-ray- “If it does turn out that there is calcifcation,”- turning back to me, “here are our options.” Then she could go on to list them. By using eye contact in a systematic way, she associates the problem with the x-ray, and the solution with her. Looking at the x-ray = problem. Looking at me = solution.

I know she meant well, even if she didn’t get her message across. Which just shows how difficult it is to communicate what we really mean sometimes. Increasing our nonverbal intelligence will assist us in clarifying the intent of our message, especially when that message is negative.

My friend’s husband had a birthday last month. She spent the entire day cleaning the house and preparing a special meal. Ten minutes before her husband was due home she took the garbage out to the curb. When she walked back inside the house, two walls -which a few minutes prior were crayon free- were now covered in crayon. She burst into tears. As she sat sobbing on the floor her two-year old walked over, put her face right up to hers and said, “Mama, are you breathing?”

Funny how it sometimes takes a two-year old to identify what’s really important.

It’s the same question we ask participants in our Don’t Shoot the Messenger workshop. Giving bad news is a difficult thing to do, because we inadvertently become associated in the mind of the listener with the news. So not only are we giving bad news, we become the bad guy. And as horrible as it feels to deliver a negative message, the situation only gets worse when the person receiving it goes on the attack.

When an interaction becomes volatile, we tend to hold our breath, and frantically think of what we can say to defend ourselves. We somehow get the crazy idea that we’ll be able to talk our way out of the mess we’ve unwittingly created.

It reminds me of brainstorming ideas for our company tagline. My husband said, “What about this? Keep talking, let’s see where that gets you.” I laughed at the time, but it’s actually quite apt. Oftentimes we think, “if I just keep talking I can talk my way out of this.” And yet talking often makes things worse.

What we fail to realize is that when we get upset our breathing becomes very shallow -many of us actually hold our breath. This cuts off oxygen to the brain, and instead of being responsive, we become reactive. The longer we continue to breathe high (shallow), the more upset we become.

When someone gets angry or upset, the first thing -the ONLY thing- to ask yourself is, “how am I breathing?” Because if you’re breathing low (deep), two things will happen. One, you’ll be able think more clearly and choose an appropriate response, because your brain will receive the oxygen it desperately needs to function in a conflict situation. Two, the very act of breathing will force the other person to also breathe. People take their breathing cues from us. It’s like yawning- when you see someone do it, you have an irresistible urge to do it yourself. You almost can’t help yourself.

So the next time you find yourself under attack, stop, check in with your breathing, and take a deep breath. You’ll find the interaction will go much smoother when you can answer “yes” to the question, “are you breathing?”

Of all the bad advice I encounter in my work -never turn your back to the audience, move around a lot when speaking, always be friendly- the advice to always maintain eye contact has to be the worst.

We have very deeply held beliefs -especially here in the States- about the role of eye contact. We’ve been taught that eye contact equals respect, and that avoiding eye contact is tantamount to disrespecting the person you are engaging with.

This is bad advice and can really get us into trouble.

Eye contact does equal respect when you are in relationship. But there are times -delivering negative information for example- when we want to separate the relationship from the message.

There are three things to remember about the use of eye contact.

1. Go visual with information, especially if it is negative.

You must have the negative information on some sort of visual if you hope to have the person receive it and not attach the negative message to you. If you are working one-on-one, the visual will be small -a piece of paper, report, fax, or memo- if you are delivering negative information to a group the visual will be larger -a PowerPoint presentation, flip chart, or white board. Those in the medical field will also want to adhere to this rule. Although medical personnel almost always have an x-ray, lab report, or diagram handy they rarely use them effectively. A doctor often looks at a patient when saying, “You have cancer.” By looking at the person while delivering this information what he or she is really saying is, “You are cancer.” When the doctor uses direct eye contact the patient has a more difficult time absorbing the information. The patient may -understandably- become upset, volatile, or breakdown. This can be avoided using the next step.

2. Avoid eye contact if the information is negative. Use eye contact if the information is positive.

If a doctor -instead of looking at the patient- looks at the x-ray and says, “The x-ray shows that cancer is present,” the patient is more apt to breathe, take the information in and assimilate it without becoming as upset. The doctor can then turn to the patient and with eye contact say, “Now here is what we’re going to do.” By using eye contact in a systematic way the doctor nonverbally separates the problem (x-ray) from the solution (doctor and patient working together.) This works in the business world as well. When you have to lay people off or tell a group that there is a salary freeze, look at the information (which should be displayed visually) not the person/group.

3. People follow your eyes, not your hands.

These skills are only effective if you understand that people follow your eyes, not your hands. Oftentimes we point to a visual but maintain eye contact with the listener. This is ineffective. Think about it: when you’re sitting having coffee across from someone and they look over your shoulder and towards the door, what do you do? You also turn and look. We’re programmed to follow someone’s eyes, and rarely look where someone is pointing unless they are also looking there. When using a visual to give sensitive or difficult information be sure to look at the visual as well as point to it. This will cause the listener to look where you want them to look.

Nonverbal intelligence is all about having more than one approach. Sometimes we’ll want to maintain eye contact (when the information is positive) and other times we’ll want to look at something else (when the information is negative.) Train yourself to be systematic with your eye contact and you’ll have an easier time separating yourself from the message.