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Wouldn’t it be great if every time a knowledge worker and their manager talked about anything, both of them had a complete understanding of each other’s point-of-view?
What this is all about is finding common ground - that happy place where both worker and manager agree and are comfortable conversing. Over at Flying Solo, Kath O’Sullivan has written a valuable article about approaches that can be taken when that “you just don’t understand” frustration sets in.
As knowledge workers and evangelists for improved approaches in our workplaces, it’s frequently the case we feel others simply don’t get what we’re talking about and we can get defensive or disheartened. Equally, from a management point of view, there are often valid reasons for not changing practices and you can feel staff that are trying to drive change don’t understand the management point of view.
Kath argues that the best way to move toward mutual understanding is to move the conversation:
… onto the process and off the content, you are better able to explore new territory and find out what’s going on for the other person
In doing so, you draw focus away from the points of contention and highlight the fact that despite differences, the other person’s state of mind is important to you. This is a very high emotional intelligence approach and done well is likely to move more rapidly to a place where both of you can discuss any differences in a way where ultimate agreement, or a happy compromise are far more likely to be reached.
Try it.
