Courageous conversations

Nigel Cassidy (NC): Breaking the silences that risk business success. How to have more courageous work conversations. I'm Nigel Cassidy and this is the CIPD podcast.

Now silence isn't golden. It builds in organisations when people choose to keep shtum. Maybe they don't get on with their manager, something's wrong or even unsafe with their work systems. Maybe they're overworked or stressed but think nothing will ever change. And there again, sometimes leaders and managers have to take courage and wade in. Leaving things be only normalises poor behaviour, it frustrates higher performers and quietly erodes performance and culture. But how do you get people to come clean and open up? Why can't you summon the courage to tackle things head on? These are core leadership skills and it's what we're addressing this month.

With me, the head of leadership practice at the 10Eighty Consultancy, Joan O'Connor, highly rates courage as a quality in leaders that she works with. I also know from her CV she shares my love of the music of Carlos Santana, but I think I'll pass on the Latin dancing and the vinyasa flow yoga, if that's okay. Hi Joan.

Joan O’Connor (JO’C): Hello Nigel, lovely to be here.

NC: And Jo Carlin is Chief People Officer at Effective Energy Group with a career spanning manufacturing, hospitality, life sciences and many other industries. Her dancing prowess is not disclosed, but I do know she's big on having high quality, meaningful work conversations, which bodes well for today. Hi Jo.

Jo Carlin (JC): Hey Nigel, thank you so much. And yeah, I can. I've been known to throw some shapes, Nigel, so.

NC: And a different take on the dynamics of tricky conversations and how to handle them better with an artistic theatre director turned business communications coach who's worked with numerous household name banks and institutions. From the Theatreworks programme at the National Theatre, no less, welcome Corinne Micaleff.

Corinne Micallef (CM): Well, thank you, Nigel.

NC: So we're all about conversations this month that may take courage to start, but can make a big impact. So I'd love to ask each of you if you can recall a single chat that changed things in your working or personal life.

JO’C: Yes, and I'm smiling as I get ready to share something I'm going to share with you, which was way back in my career, the first time I was told that some people found me scary.

NC: Oh

JO’C: Yes, indeed. And I thought I was all roses, and there, some people were experiencing me differently. So it was one of those moments that, it got me to stop and think, basically, and think about other people, their filters and their perceptions.

NC: So it's turned you into the pussycat that you are today.

JO’C: I'm still definitely a pussycat, really, but apparently I do have a roar when I need to.

NC: We may find out. Jo, what about you?

JC: I think I've had so many tricky conversations, Nigel, it's almost difficult to pinpoint one. But if I think about me personally, I think the first experience I had of it was when it was about me and I had to sit in front of my boss and try and convince them that I was ready for promotion. And I think, you know, that's a really difficult thing to do when you're not, you know, you're not used to doing that. I think having difficult conversations, me having a difficult conversation about someone else is kind of easier, gets easier.

So I learned that I needed to prepare better. I really didn't. I kind of went in all guns blazing and got shot down. I learned that what sometimes I need isn't necessarily what the organisation needs or wants. And I took that with me. And I think I'm, you know, I was a bit better prepared. But I did, it did help me think about, you know, when people are sitting in front of me as a HR leader, preparing themselves for these kind of conversations and how difficult it is to sit in that space.

NC: Absolutely. And of course, it's two ways. It's not only employer to employee, but unique courage to broach things in the other direction. Corinne.

CM: Well, the conversation that comes to mind is one that actually should have happened but did not. It was when I was running an organisation and I was working with a co-leader, and we had very different approaches and styles and very different perspectives on how to resolve the issues that the company was facing. And in actual fact, the relationship completely broke down. Probably because I should have had a much more direct and courageous conversation. But instead what I did was sort of avoid, manoeuvre, sort of just lean out of it and try to focus on a project, a topic, which obviously we were never going to see eye to eye on anyway. And it actually led us to needing mediation. The mediation didn't work in the sense, well, it worked in the sense that I left the organisation. And I learned a lot through that. It's probably why I'm doing what I'm doing now, because it began me on a path of how important it is to be able to have the courageous conversation and not skirt around the issue.

NC: Well, so much for not dwelling on things, but clearly it was an important conversation and it set you up for the future.

Jo Carlin, why do we need these conversations? I just wonder why you rate high quality conversations so much because I mean some managers and leaders hate one-to-ones, don't they? They can always duck out and find some other way of getting feedback.

JC: Yeah, or worse still, they go into the one-to-ones armed with a tick box, of questions they just need to burn through in order to feel more comfortable. I think the first thing is silence isn't neutral, right? So if we're not having these conversations, it's not a neutral act. People are filling in the gaps, Nigel. Whether we like to admit that as a leader or not, they're always going to fill in. They're always going to make something up. And if we're being really honest, people learn to self-censor. So people learn to kind of go, oh, well, my manager's not having a conversation with me, so it must mean X. Or we build it up so much in our mind and we build it up so much in our working environment that actually what then happens is it starts to affect us personally, or it starts to affect the work that we do, us as a kind of whole human being.

And I think I don't know whether I'd call them courageous conversations or just better conversations, better discussions, because we all want to be connected, right? That's a basic human need is to feel connected to one another. And the easiest way to do that, the cheapest way, because it's free, is to actually sit and just have a discussion and find a path that gets us to a point that says, I get that we might be looking at this differently, but I think that we both want the same thing.

And I think that's why people don't have them because it's tough, isn't it? Just as much as it's difficult for the person hearing it, it's difficult for the person giving the message too.

NC: And picking up on that, Joan O'Connor, what is it about organisations collectively that inhibits people from being forthcoming about their work issues?

JO’C: Well, I think you said it in your introduction and Jo has mentioned a few things already, but it does come back so much to perceptions of what is acceptable? What is allowed? What will be rejected or ignored if you speak up?

You know, there's always in a courageous conversation, there's potentially a risk for saying something. And it's whether you as an individual are willing to take that risk, whatever it may be. And that's what can stop people.

If you've got the fear of being sacked because you're going to say something, you're going to think twice about whether you say it or not. If you think everybody else in the group is going to think differently and judge you harshly, you're going to think differently about whether to say it or not. So a lot of it is around your perception of everybody else plus whether the environment or the culture, if we want to call it, does allow these things to happen or not.

So they're certainly some of the things that will typically get in the way of people being willing to speak up.

NC: Okay, so what to do about it. Corinne, you were telling me beforehand about some of the work you do with people to help them understand the physical, the mental processes involved in having a challenging work conversation. And I suppose, of course, with your theatre background, we shouldn't be so surprised your approach is rooted in what an actor might go through on stage. Just talk us through that a bit.

CM: Yeah, absolutely. So really it's rooted in a physical and vocal experience of how we behave. So at the National Theatre in the Theatreworks programme, all the courses that we have designed is about what happens when you are under stress, when you are under pressure? What happens physiologically to you? And heart racing, palms sweaty, stumbling over words, all of those things are totally normal when talking in general in public. When you're adding on to that the nature of high stress situations, all sorts of responses can come out.

And what we do is really work on first of all, just getting people under control physically and vocally, which is about slowing down the heart rate, controlling the breathing in order that they may be able to say the message they actually want to say. Because when the mind is racing, heart is racing, other things take over completely.

So you can know what you want to say, but when you get into the spotlight of that hot seat, all sorts of other things derail you and actors have a training and a preparation which is how to, in the spotlight, in a moment of pressure, how to control nerves essentially.

NC: And I was quite surprised when you told me that even when doing an exercise, albeit a realistic one, people still don't say what they wanted to say. They don't name that thing.

CM: Absolutely. So I think we don't, people hate the term role play. We rather prefer to say rehearsal. What we do in our sessions is we will rehearse conversations, i.e. practice, because when you're in front of your manager, your board, your client, you don't have the chance to do another take. You have to get it right on the spot. So what we do in our workshops is have that rehearsal period. And what we'll do is we'll ask someone what's the stressful situation or the conflict situation or the courageous conversation you want to have. They'll tell us what the context is and then they will practice it. And in that moment, they'll say, right, what I really want to say is I don't feel valued and I want to be considered for whatever promotion.

And in actual fact, even though it's completely artificial with not the exact people who they're living the problem with, they still don't say. They don't say directly, here's what I need from you or here's what I'm experiencing. Again, they just sort of deviate and they get themselves tied up in linguistic knots.

NC: And I guess that works with senior managers talking to people that they employ as well, that they don't get to the heart of something.

I just want to turn to Jo now. I mean, if you're talking to somebody, say, about facing redundancy, now you could say that's a difficult conversation. It's certainly not a pleasant one to have, but it does follow a set formula, doesn't it? So I suppose that might be fundamentally different from a more open-ended, a probing kind of meeting. Which will also raise hopes of a positive response from one of the parties.

JC: Yeah, I mean, look, you're right. There is a, sometimes it's easier when you have a set, you know, a set thing that you follow and you must follow that. But humans have a tendency to be human and they don't behave in a way that, you know, you perhaps rehearsed or you've practiced. And certainly when I'm coaching and mentoring more junior people in the team. You know, we do, and I love the idea of rehearsal, we do quite a lot of that, so talk to me about what that person might say back to get them to be much more confident and just more relaxed going into that setting. Because actually people will say what they say and what you expect them to say isn't necessarily what they'll say.

So the way I look at it is in all of those settings, I will say to people, make sure you're asking what questions, not why questions. And that's a really nice little technique that I found over the years that I'd already work so that people get embedded in something which is the here and now, rather than getting broiled in a really well difficult, I'm doing this because and then it's all about why someone's doing it and not actually what can be done about the situation. It's much more difficult where you are in a moment and you have found that perhaps, you need to go and tackle something.

The perfect example of this is managers having to go into more performance related conversations because that's really difficult to script for. And I think that's really difficult on both sides. And one of the things that we need to do really is test our own assumptions in that setting and not be too scripted. And that's a tough ask, right? Because you're saying, yeah, go in, have these conversations with people, make sure that you do all of these things, give them space, give them opportunity to talk. And then it all starts to unravel in the middle.

So I find that it's not necessarily the framework that you need to teach. It's the how do you manage the unravelling messy bit that is going to happen in the middle of those discussions.

NC: I'm not sure about this word courageous, courage. It's just a bit HR-y, isn't it? I mean, Joan, we're looking here at, say, the ability of a people manager or a leader to break the silence, to winkle out hard truths. Why is that courageous? I mean, if the boss is doing the rounds to get to the bottom of poor systems or a toxic work culture, where's the courage in that? That's his job or her job.

JO’C: I think, a number of things. One, many managers just don't like to have those kind of conversations. We've all got imaginations and many managers and leaders imagine the worst outcome. It links back a lot with what Corinne was saying around what happens. They can go into a state of stress and anxiety and therefore they imagine all sorts of bad things. So actually, it does take some courage to be willing to go, okay, I'm putting my big pants on here and I'm going to have the conversation.

There's a book title from years ago which was called Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway. And I think if we're feeling that element of fear, it's about, yes, and I am going to go through it. But I think that's one of the reasons people don't do it.

The other reasons might be because they don't feel that they are confident in having that conversation. Maybe they don't feel they've got the right skill sets and therefore they may hold themselves back because they believe they're going to mix it up. So there's a bit of a theme around what they're believing going on and often it's the, the worst outcome that we tend to think about first, not how it could go well, for example.

So there are a couple of things around why it does take some courage to put yourself into that situation. And you don't know how it's going to be received because you are imagining the worst. As Corinne said earlier, you can plan for what you think people are going to say, but then any reaction can happen. We all have our own reactive systems and what happens in the moment happens in the moment. And again, lots of managers don't feel comfortable and confident to manage that in the moment.

CM: I think that fear of getting it wrong, fear of how you'll be perceived as a leader, the fear of or they might think I'm unkind, mean, aggressive, insert whatever adjective you want. And also the fear of upsetting others and managing, trying to manage other people's feelings. And beyond that fear of damaging a relationship, that's ultimately not what they want to do.

What I found is people [do] not say exactly what it is that needs to be said. And that's where the courage comes in. Because although, yes, I get your point, Nigel. It's just kind of, it's just part of the job. You know, why is it courageous? It comes back to Joan's point about risk. It takes a risk to be honest and say what is truthfully happening, not the story you have invented around it or your beliefs, but the actual facts of the situation are hard to say because you're worried about a number of different things.

NC: So Jo, when you identified that there isn't enough proper talking going on when these issues are bubbling under the surface, when things need to be said, what sort of things do you do in your coaching, in your general work as a senior people leader to improve how people do it?

JC: I mean, the first thing I would say is that I will often lead with don't beat yourself up. It's not an easy thing to do and it's not an easy thing to practice. And for some people, it's much easier, right? For some people, it's a much more natural reaction to something to sit in the moment and have the discussion. But for many in loads of different types of organisations, it's not and it's just not part of their DNA.

The organisations I've been the HR leader of, I tend to have a bit of a, you know, a normal cadence. And the first thing usually is to start with helping both employees and managers understand a little bit more about themselves. Because if they can understand a little bit more about themselves, they can understand where that fear centre is coming from and actually what is it that's difficult about getting over the line in some things and actually having to have some conversations with positive intent, because I think helping teams understand what's your red line in this, right? There will be stuff that bugs you. Of course there will, but is that really impacting and affecting the relationship and what's that tipping point? Because if we're not careful, then what happens is that we create an environment where everybody's saying everything and that's not great either. Because actually some of that isn't with positive intent, and it's not there to make the relationship better or make the situation better. It's just something that's annoying somebody and it can be hurtful and impactful to the other person in a way that perhaps hasn't been thought about.

And part of that is then to understand as an organisation, what are the things that fit within the house of our culture? And I know that word is like thrown about quite a lot, but what's the stuff that really is, are things that we won't accept? And then where does my belief sit within that?

And all of that sounds really good, and I've worked with individuals who perhaps this isn't normal, this isn't part of their daily life. So I don't tend, I know what you're saying, Joan, about courageous, and I don't necessarily disagree, but I don't call it that in the organisations I'm leading. I would much rather go in and say, how do we get the best out of this relationship? So how do we improve relationships? How do we understand each other better to get a better outcome? And then how do we get the best out of our team?

I tend to use profiling, whatever, whatever right, whatever helps individuals and helps teams have a language that feels safe, that doesn't feel risky. And that doesn't take a lot, right? But it takes time, right? You can't suddenly flick a switch and expect everybody to behave in a certain way. That's why I usually balk when managers say, oh, we just need we just need a framework for the one-to-ones. If we could just have a framework for the one-to-ones, that would be great. We'd get on with it. But that's not fixing the problem. That's like, you know, sticky plaster over the Grand Canyon type. What it will do is it will make difficult conversations even more difficult because you're just going through a lady burning through the list. So, and that's kind of worked. I mean, obviously in lots of organisations, you tweak it a little bit here and there, but I'm firmly rooted in you start with actually understanding yourself better, and understanding what your lines are.

And, you know, I practice this thing in teams called a too difficult box. Which basically is, it's a, it doesn't exist, right? It's in your imagination. But we go through a routine that says, right, get everything out that's in your too difficult box and let's unpack it in a safe space and see what's in there. Because I, a bit like Joan, I, you did this. And then one day somebody said to me, well, you're in my too difficult box, Jo. And I was shocked. Shocked and stunned, Nigel. But equally, it took me back a bit. And I thought, well, of course I am, right? I'm a leader of a team. Of course, I'm going to be in someone's too difficult box. And that was a kind of a sobering thought, but it was nice that the team had got to that point where they felt that they could tell me that they had unpacked their box and I was in it.

So I think that's, finding things that people find easy to understand in what can feel like a really complex setting if you're not careful.

NC: So Joan, can you add anything about what you do in your practice to get these conversations going?

JO’C: Yeah, look, and building on what Jo just said, it is about helping individuals, leaders, managers, whoever I'm working with to start to create that space to have those kind of conversations.

So, Jo talks about the too difficult box. It's about creating a space that's, ask those questions about, what have we not thought of? Build it into the routines of the meetings that you're having. Make it okay to do a constructive challenge. What have we not thought about? What else could we do? What have we liked? What have we not liked about what we've heard so far today? If you start building that into your conversations at a safe level, it starts to give the sense of it is okay to do some kind of challenge or say things that might not be the same as everybody else. And you can build from that. So I absolutely encourage teams to be building that into what they're doing.

JC: I think one of the big things, and it was a build from your point, Joan, is that getting managers to understand that automatic agreement isn't success. Success is something different. And it's not necessarily everybody walking out of that conversation. The manager is feeling like everybody's agreed with me. And that's quite a big psychological hurdle to get over for those managers, because that's something they might have been used to. Sorry I've picked, see, we have started something there now, Nigel.

NC: Absolutely. Something else that strikes me, Corinne, how much people can change? I mean, we know a great actor can be somebody else. They get paid to be somebody else, don't they? But would you say that a businesswoman or a man, I don't know, say without natural empathy, could change their spots or somebody who fights shy of speaking their mind can play against type?

CM: I mean I would say as a leader it's kind of essential for you to be able to flex your style. I think it's not about changing the person that you are or your preferences, but it is about how can I, I mean, often what I find most difficult is people go, I've always done this one thing and I developed these set of habits and some of those habits have served people really well and then some of them completely don't get them the outcome that they want. So I guess it's about expanding your range and going, okay, what else is possible? And I'm not in a box. I'm not one certain type. I'm not one style.

And obviously the people I lead and manage, they have their own set of preferences and styles. So can I as a leader flex to meet the demands of my team? Is really what it is.

But I wanted to add one other thing that Jo said about don't get a consensus, something about the yes. Yes, isn't necessarily what you're going for. And it reminded me of Chris Voss, the FBI negotiator. I don't know if you've come across him, but he says that often when you're going into a negotiation, you're trying to get to a yes. And he said that's the wrong approach. And actually, the first thing you want is to get your counterpart to say no. Because by doing that, they have exercised their autonomy. And that is kind of one of the core things that human being needs is one of the reasons why as children, that's one of the first words they learn, right? No.

NC: So Joan, is this skill a must have when change is happening? How important would you rank the frequency and quality of work conversations in the overall success, say, of a restructuring or a business change?

JO’C: I'd say it's a must have in any situation in organisational life. It's definitely really important if there's a restructuring or change going on.

And if I may, I really want to make a plea for anybody who listens to this. Please practice your listening skills. Because at the heart of a lot of the reasons why things are difficult or people have to be courageous is because people don't take enough time to really listen to what is being said before they react or respond and particularly in restructuring or change, situations. Listening is just so, so important.

And again, it's that sense of giving space to others and autonomy to others. Feeling heard as human beings, we want to be felt that we've been heard. And if we don't, we can create all sorts of issues, whether consciously or unconsciously.

Just to summarise, it is a must have and certainly in those situations, because if you want people to move through a situation, they have to feel that they have been heard as a minimum, I would say.

CM: Yes, I totally agree. I think it's what makes you stand out as an exceptional leader because people listen to respond, to reply. They don't actually listen to understand. I think it was Covey that said that.

I think one of the skills that we practice when thinking about those skills that are transferred from the stage into business at Theatreworks is when we talked about stressful situations, one of the first things to go is listening. When you're under stress and panic, you instantly feel like You need to have a comeback with a response. And actually silence is one of the things people are so uncomfortable with. And that just ability to listen, digest and wait, have a pause and really reflect on something.

NC: It's always taught in media training, isn't it? That normally, of course, in broadcasting, you've got to keep talking. You don't want the transmissors to switch off. But actually, if you stop, then quite often people, if you wait long enough, people will, well, sometimes even admit something or say something that they weren't planning to say. So they train people to be careful of silences.

CM: And you then have a chance to get to what is people's deeper need, essentially. Jo was talking about it earlier, the what question. You get a chance if you're really, truly listening to get much deeper. Because obviously what people say on the surface is just a fragment of actually what is going on underneath. We want to get to the underneath.

NC: Because Jo, it's funny, isn't it? This ability to converse and communicate well was always previously labelled as a soft skill. But I mean, from what we've heard today, I'd say it's a lot harder.

JC: I think it's one of the, frankly, the hardest things that we can do as leaders. I think it's much easier to, learn a technical ability. I don't think, depending on what your technical ability prowess is, but actually to sit and practice some of this stuff. I think, as Corinne said, to sit in the discomfort of silence because silence is not comfortable for everybody, particularly not leaders, or some leaders or some employees and they want to fill the space.

And I don't know, I don't think it's an optional soft skill at all. I don't think it's soft. I think when I look at leaders that I've worked with, some of the best leaders I've worked with haven't necessarily been the ones with the better technical skill. You know, they've had to rely on others to fill in that gap. So they've had to really work on some of the other stuff, which would be classified in, you know, days gone by as a soft skill. I mean, I hope that's changing. Now, certainly that seems to have been changing.

But, and to me, that's where I kind of push back against the courageous label a little bit. I think because courage and soft skill, they're a bit of an oxymoron, right? I think people struggle to marry the two up.

So I think in all leadership, in all the leadership programs, I certainly am responsible for compiling and then delivering the whole point around having good conversation, getting the best out of people, listening. And I think going back to everyone's point, that whole piece around how do we truly listen to understand and how do we switch our own monologue off? But again, that goes back to understanding ourselves, right? Because often most people, the vast majority of people are listening to respond. You know, they're waiting to end the conversation with their own points.

So it's trying to find that balance so that everyone could be heard in a safe space. So yeah, it's not a soft skill and I could probably wax lyrical about that for the remainder of the podcast, but I won't.

NC: Well, you've been pretty lyrical. I'm coming to the end of our time. Let's just have a final thought from each of you. I mean, if you really will push for a single tip to boost the quality of conversation and feedback that you get from it.

JO’C: I'm going to come back to the ask open questions, really listen and engage with what you're hearing from the others that you are talking to. Pause, breathe, think, then speak.

CM: My tip would be to name the thing directly. So whatever the situation is or the thing that you're feeling or the resistance you're noticing in the other person, whatever the actual situation is, I say just name the thing. As simple as that. Often people, that's the thing that people don't do because they're too uncomfortable. And just to come back to your other question, it made me think of these things are all simple, doesn't mean they're easy. Very simple to say, very hard to do in practice.

JC: It's a tough one because I think I echo the, it's not an easy thing to do, hence why it's not, you know, it's not a soft skill. But the best thing we can do is make it okay to not be good at this stuff at the beginning, and not to be too hard on ourselves when we're in practice mode, but to create practice mode and to give support to one another, be a bit kinder in this space. But above all, find something that helps create a common language throughout the organisation so that employees have the same skill as leaders, in having these conversations because when it falls on the shoulders of one and one only, that becomes very difficult and it can create some toxicity in those environments.

NC: Great, thanks for that. Jo Carlin of Effective Energy Group. We also heard from Joan O'Connor from 10Eighty and Corinne Micaleff from Theatreworks, the National Theatre. More next month. Obviously, our theme has been conversation, so I hope you've enjoyed the quality of our conversation. Until next time, from me, Nigel Cassidy and the CIPD podcast team, it's goodbye.