Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Facilitation Masterclass: Trust & Collaboration
26 Plays1 month ago
In this episode of Water Cooler Wisdom, hosts Jake Blocker and Rachael Grail explore the delicate art of authentic listening when tensions run high. With insights drawn from neuroscience and their own professional experiences, Jake and Rachael share practical strategies to help you stay present and collaborative, even in the most challenging discussions.
Learn how to manage your physiological responses, challenge your assumptions, and use mindfulness techniques like “rubbing your fingers together” to stay grounded. They also delve into the power of curiosity, the pitfalls of over-preparation, and how self-awareness can transform your workplace dynamics.
Whether you’re navigating tough conversations at work or striving to create a safe and inclusive team environment, this episode is packed with actionable tips and thought-provoking perspectives. Tune in for a conversation that will leave you better equipped to handle conflicts with clarity and care.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Podcast Format
00:00:06
Speaker
Well, welcome to another episode of water cooler wisdom. I am Jake Walker and I'm Rachel grail. And I feel like I say my name that way the same time, no matter how long it's passed when we record these sessions. I agree. ah Yeah. I think it is the exact, so I'm trying to think back to all the other episodes. I say it's like the same tone. Yeah. All of them.
00:00:27
Speaker
But all the good podcasters do that. It's like Kai Rizdahl from Marketplace. I'm Kai Rizdahl. So what you're seeing is we're experts. We've made it. We've made it. Yes. That's what all of our millions of subscribers will.
00:00:46
Speaker
Well, Rachel, it's another of our new format ones. This is three of four. So fun. Do you know that my favorite meal always is a lunch buffet? So I love that we have a few different things that that we're doing in the podcast. Lunch buffet, yeah. Yeah, just a little bit of this, a little bit of that. It's just so satisfying.
00:01:05
Speaker
Yeah. Well, this one is actually isn't new necessarily. We've done this before. We're just kind of like stapling it as one of the formats that we're that we're using. So we have inter-associates. We do a lot of webinars. All of our check them out, go to our website and check out our latest webinar.
00:01:24
Speaker
But ah we get we always ask for questions in advance. And we have literally hundreds of questions. We get so many great questions from our our collaborators, our participants. So, so many. So much that I was able to create a total of 16 episodes for our Q and&As just so far. And I still have enough for at least about 25 more episodes. So we got plenty of content for a very long time.
Audience Engagement and Questions
00:01:54
Speaker
And these are such great questions. They deserve to be answered. They deserve some. Absolutely. so Absolutely. So if you were someone who attends our webinar or webinars and ask questions, please continue to ask questions because we will be answering them. Um, and if you as a listener have questions, submit them. It doesn't have to be through a webinar. Just send them right to us. Send them our way. All right, Rachel. Are you ready to hop into these questions? I'm excited. Yeah.
00:02:18
Speaker
So this that we've themed all of our questions. We've organized them into general themes. And this first one is on trust and collaboration.
Authentic Listening and Conflict Management
00:02:28
Speaker
So the first question, how can we stay focused on authentic listening when the conversation gets tense? Way to kick it off with a banger.
00:02:40
Speaker
You know, I want to say on the front end, you know, I'm always doing prevention's caveats here because we are trying to keep these succinct so that you can listen to them when you're on the way to the grocery store. I may not give you an exhaustive you know, thesis on trust and collaboration. We know this is a deep well, but I do want to be able to touch in on one or two things for each of these questions. So i I think this is a great one. How do we stay focused on authentic listening when the conversation gets tense? I mean, this is exactly the great place to start because we know that our brains are hardwired to scan for threats.
00:03:23
Speaker
We also know that even though there isn't a tiger in the room with us, as is the often used analogy, our brains don't necessarily know that. So how do we um how do we stay in a place where we can actually listen, actually collaborate with people when we're getting triggered? um So really the first thing is to just,
00:03:50
Speaker
Understand that this is going to happen. This is bound to happen. um A lot of us have different responses to conflict or what we perceive as conflict that's based on just who we are, our personalities, our biographies, ah the power dynamics of the situation that we may be in, the way that we wanna protect our our jobs, our security in various ways. So there's all kinds of stuff that's gonna be flooding your intellectual system, your physical system,
00:04:24
Speaker
Recognizing that that's the reality, that's what we're hardwired to do, is is a great first step because then we can know, okay, this is this is to be expected, this is happening, I'm not going crazy. I don't have to go into this like reaction. um the The best thing that we can do is take a beat and try to have a a response rather than a reaction.
00:04:49
Speaker
And so I think one of the first things to do for that is to just, A, know that that's going to happen. This is like baseline EQ, having an awareness. What's going on with me? How do I manage myself? What's going on with the other person so that I can listen to them? So noticing that it's happening and then doing some kind of moderating activity, some deep breaths, some some moment of recognition that the reaction, the the the trigger has occurred so that you can recognize maybe I need to take my own temperature down a notch.
00:05:23
Speaker
Breathing is the thing that lots of people say to do. I think there's lots of other things you can do to get curious where you just have a ah moment of mindfulness. One thing I like to do is just rub my fingers together ever so gently and try to focus in on the physical sensation of that. That gets the brain out of this reactive state and into kind of a more mindful moment.
00:05:47
Speaker
So there's that whole physical piece. Do what works for you for that. I'm sure you've been exposed to ways to calm yourself down, but that's the first thing to do. Yeah. The next thing is to go into once we've managed the physical response, we need to understand the intellectual trigger response. The intellectual trigger response is the way that our minds make meaning out of things. And if you haven't studied the ladder of inference, go check it out. It's a great one.
00:06:16
Speaker
So it's so brilliant. It's just like that that we make assumptions based on the filters that we have and and we just like, boop, boop, boop, boop. We've come to conclusions really quickly and then we move on. And that doesn't allow us to have authentic listening. So recognizing, oh, I might be making some assumptions here. I might be assuming that this person means this or wants that or is as demanding this.
00:06:43
Speaker
And so checking checking our assumptions and then trying to get into a place where we can be curious rather than judgmental. Yeah. The filters thing is something that resonates with me and you know, that's something we talked about in some of our training too. That's that was stuck with me. I remember specifically during the training, we we were asked to list out what are your filters? What do you, what do you see as your filters? What's something that, uh, and by that is like, you know, everything that you interact with that comes to you, goes through your filter, whatever that is. you know White male living in middle class, that's me plus many other filters. and I'd even challenge people ah other people to do that for themselves. like Don't wait until a situation happens to do this. Do this in advance like on your own. You don't need to share this with anyone. This is just a self-check of what are my filters? What are things that
00:07:43
Speaker
has to, the, my brain has to process through to actually get, so I know what they are. So when I am, when I face this tense situation, I know why that's happening and I can run.
00:07:58
Speaker
Yeah, I love that and I think that's a great call to action. It all happens really fast. it does So sometimes you can't do it in the moment really as as good as you'd like to and you need to when you're getting a habit, you you can do it retroactively and think, Oh, what was that? Well, how did I make that assumption? Where was I making an assumption?
00:08:17
Speaker
um But also, if you know you're going into a conversation that could get tense, you can think about what are the filters? What are the power dynamics? What might I be assuming about what I think this person is going to want or is going to say? We kind of know a lot about how we're entering a conversation, and it can be really important to check on that on the front end as well.
00:08:39
Speaker
Yeah. i would yeah i The only thing I would... might push This isn't pushback. This is a something I recognize for myself. that and I've done that. I know what I'm meeting with. I know all of this. Sometimes I'll go to the point of over preparation.
00:08:54
Speaker
And it is more damaging than helpful. And so I basically script it instead of just kind of an awareness of what I'm doing, the script. And then when it goes off script, I am not ready and in the way. So just be cautious of how much you think before just from someone who's dealt with that in the past.
00:09:18
Speaker
Oh, full disclosure. My ex-boyfriend used to say that. I feel like everything when we have a hard talk, it's like perfectly prepared. And I was like, I'm just trying my best. it's I mean, that is, yeah I do the same thing. It's part of my personality. and I've talked, I've talked to a therapist about that. I'm just the overthinking my, I have to yeah watch myself from the overthinking. And you know, here's the, like, if all else fails,
00:09:47
Speaker
And the the bare minimum that you can do is focus on asking questions from an open place. Like, make understanding the other person your primary priority.
Building Trust in Teams
00:10:00
Speaker
Even if you don't agree, even if you're not sure you're ever gonna agree, just fall, you can always fall back to asking questions and seeking understanding. And that's, again, a deep well, um but I i think that that's probably enough of a start.
00:10:17
Speaker
Great, love it. All right, question number two. How can I build trust quickly to create a safe and collaborative environment? so Yeah, what a good question. um i i I feel like i I have met leaders that are really thinking about this. So I love it when people are thinking about this. can The first thing that we can do to build a safe and collaborative environment is to be clear. As Brene Brown says, clear is kind. Again, going back to like our our brain's preferences are like for um things that feel orderly and predictable. And like we can know what's coming. So we can be clear about roles.
00:11:02
Speaker
um so that people know how they're going to be invited to contribute. We can be clear about participation guidelines and and preventions if we know that um we're going to be having a certain kind of conversation that might be challenging. um For example, like you're bringing up and ah an initiative that people have some concerns about. You can let them know on the front end where and when in the conversation they'll have an opportunity to to air their concerns. So our minds can relax when things are orderly and and we can lay out the process in a way that people can understand how it's going to go, how they're meant to contribute.
00:11:44
Speaker
And then, um and I think also in part of that is being willing to, if if you're trying to be the one to hold the environment, like you're the leader of the meeting or you're the facilitator of the meeting, um whether it's a one-on-one or a more complex meeting, to have as part of those roles a clear, dedicated facilitator. um Someone who isn't necessarily responsible for the decision and isn't necessarily the subject matter expert, but someone says, I will be managing the process. And then that person is enabled to jump in if things start to go off the rails a little bit. And and people are like, okay, this person's got us. And I think that that that sets up ah the ability for people to feel safe when they're collaborating.
00:12:39
Speaker
I like that a lot. you know ah Something a little shout out I'll give is something we talked about in some past episodes around desired outcomes in meetings. So when I look through, the night before, whatever it is, I look at the my next day's meetings and I see like, okay, I have to do this. This is something we we model very, very well of what we teach. in our own organization, but if I can see this is what's expected of me in these meetings, it just kind of gives me like, okay, I need to make sure I'm prepared for this and make sure I do this so I can leave some time before this meeting to do this. i'm I come in mentally prepared to face whatever my meeting, feel a little bit more safe.
00:13:21
Speaker
I love that. I love that. I think we want everyone to feel like they can contribute in a way that is meaningful, ideally. And when when they know what it is that's expected or with when people know what the goal is, that helps them understand how they can contribute to it.
00:13:38
Speaker
Absolutely. yeah and's I will say like the most successful meetings I've had have been at this Interaction Associates because we know how to do these meetings. That's weird when I you know will meet with someone outside of our company and get a meeting invite that's just the title. What is this? I don't know what to do. Who's driving this bus and where is it going?
Navigating Differing Opinions in Teams
00:13:59
Speaker
I don't know. This is very stressful.
00:14:01
Speaker
yeah All right, Rachel, last question. Great. Or this one. What are the best strategies for working with team members who have strong and differing opinions? That never happens though, right? No. Everyone agrees.
00:14:19
Speaker
Well, this is great because we want people to have strong and differing opinions. Ultimately, that's going to get that's going to get the best results. I mean, we're not looking for, um you know, conflict for conflict's sake, but artificial harmony is equally as destructive. And so I mean, if you're working on a team where that that is happening, like, congratulations, you're probably getting to better results than yeah and maybe otherwise. And it is important to have some guardrails so that people can contribute um and and feel that sense of safety and not
00:14:59
Speaker
not damage the relationships in service of their opinions. So I would refer back to what I mentioned, setting up preventions. So making sure there is a facilitator, sometimes it might be more of a referee, you know, but um having someone who can set up process guidelines for how and when people are going to share um making sure that everyone has an opportunity to be heard, and and just making sure that there's like some barometer for the etiquette that that works for the team. like Some people have a of more ah greater level of comfort,
00:15:37
Speaker
with volume or heated debate. than others Some people are like, Oh, injury. And so ideally, if if you're that facilitator, you have an understanding of that team, you you have a sense of the personalities and what's going to have everybody feel like they can contribute.
00:15:57
Speaker
I will say this to to go on, it's hard for people to come to agreement when there's like one fixed position versus another fixed position. Like sure, sometimes you can facilitate a compromise, um but a compromise isn't necessarily the best solution. A compromise is like you win some, you lose some. yeah And so that that's on like a an idea that there's a fixed amount of solution. and If you're working with a ah ah bright dynamic team, ideally you might be able to come up with something that is beyond a compromise, that is actually a win-win, but it's it's more out of the box. So the way that we find that is by getting off of those fixed positions and asking questions or encouraging other people to ask questions that get below the surface of, this is my opinion, this is my fixed position,
00:16:53
Speaker
and down into, well, what's important about this? What are my concerns? What are my fears? What are my hopes for this initiative or project or whatever it is that I feel really strongly about? That's where you can start to find some really creative solutions, some common ground. Absolutely. Yeah, one one little shout out I'll give to the preventions or ground rules.
00:17:19
Speaker
v part of preventions and even yeah in our, I always go back to our workshops because it's what comes to mind. yeah um But something we do at the very start of it is we have our ground rules and we have them listed in the in the workshop.
00:17:33
Speaker
And it's something just, yeah again, knowing your audience, knowing who you're dealing with, knowing the stakes of the meeting. It could be worth having, you know, maybe it's a slide, maybe it's something specific that has your list of ground rules that you agree upon at the very, at the start of the meeting. Say this is the ground rules for today. Maybe it's like we're going to hear out everyone's opinions or whatever those need to be and making sure everyone agrees to it. Build agreement, refer to an older episode, another episode. and build those agreements with them. And then during the meeting, if, you know, it starts to get tense, there starts to be something that people are getting uncomfortable. Refer back, say, Hey, remember these ground rules. We set this at the beginning. So let's, let's be respectful for of that and then go on.
00:18:19
Speaker
Yeah. And ground rules are not just about how we're going to behave, but it's about, you can also set up like this is the process that we're going to, we're going to flow through. We're going to first hear what everybody, everyone's position. And before we get into like knocking it down and telling this person while, why that will never work, yeah we're then going to spend some time understanding um what's below the surface of their fixed position into their interests, their needs, their concerns, their values. so yeah and And so people can understand, oh, that's the the process is going to support exploration and discovery into something beyond where where I'm coming from. So I don't have to feel like it's a one and done, and and we're never going to agree, and yeah that person's a moron or whatever it I have an example that I wasn't sure I was going to share with you on this or not, but maybe if you We were recently
00:19:16
Speaker
and We're in an election year. We recently had an election. and um Before the election, I had a conversation with my father about politics. and We both have some differing positions yeah there and ah really, really and intense. right and I've got so many reasons why my position to me feels like the right position. And so we spent some time arguing the the policies and different things and and and approaches. Naturally, we didn't get very far. But then we got to a place where we got deeper and deeper and deeper, like, what's the fears? What's the experience? And we got to a place where we recognize that all sides of the political spectrum are having a shared experience of feeling like this was
00:20:09
Speaker
a existential election. Like everyone's feeling like the stakes are high. yeah And so what can we learn from that shared experience? So I know this might be like a hot button topic. We might need to edit this out for that reason. But I thought it was really fascinating because it allowed me an opportunity to have some level of, I mean, I still feel the way that I
Finding Common Ground Through Personal Stories
00:20:37
Speaker
feel. let's not be I won't be shy about that. I'm not going to change minds, yeah. But um to recognize that there is a shared experience in the midst of this huge chasm, this just intractable, seemingly divide.
00:20:52
Speaker
um And that I thought was really powerful. And I think that that's that's the opportunity that can happen because hopefully in your business settings, you're not dealing with things as intractable as the current state of our political spectrum. And so you can find a common ground um in terms of experience, values, goals, hopes, fears.
00:21:13
Speaker
when you are willing to get below the surface and get curious. yeah But that takes that takes some listening skills. We've got lots of other resources about that. That takes some you know understanding your own ladder of inference, which we talked about earlier. It takes some self-management and it takes some process management.
00:21:33
Speaker
And, um, but I think the juice is worth the squeeze ultimately. Agreed. Well, Rachel, I think that was great. That's a good one to end on there. Uh, that was solid Q and a session. And I feel like I just learned a little bit, uh, even though I know a lot of the stuff. Well, I, I'm always learning more from, from all the people that I interact with as well. So if you have some thing to add to the conversation, please drop us a line. We're always happy to hear from you.
00:22:01
Speaker
Yeah. Well, until next time. Thanks so much. See you at the water cooler. Thanks for listening to Water Cooler Wisdom. This podcast is brought to you by Interaction Associates, a leading professional development and leadership training organization whose mission is to help people work better together. If you'd like to learn more, visit interactionassociates.com. If you have questions, comments, or are interested in collaborating with this podcast, you can email us at watercoolerwisdom at interactionassociates dot.com.