Difficult Conversations - How to Discuss What Matters Most - Book Report/Review Example

Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most

Summary of the book

Having difficult conversations is not one of the things that are challenging in life. There are different topics that make difficult conversations and how successful one handles them determines the experience and relationships that they will have later. Therefore, people must know how to handle difficult conversations because everyone experiences them at a certain point in their lives. The book Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most is written by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton and Sheila Heen. These three authors explain in the book what makes various conversations difficult. It also explores why human beings avoid having conversations that are difficult and why they manage the difficult conversations unsuccessfully. The book presents people with techniques that can be used to have more successful and productive conversations. This paper is a book review of Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most and it specifically offers a summary, makes an analysis of the core ideas of the book, analyzes the key subject matter and offers a discussion on how the key points could be linked to other topics in real life situations.

Communication plays a major role in our daily lives. It is essential in both formal and informal situations. Having difficult conversations is a thing that most people do not want to indulge in. when a difficult conversation is happening, most people are usually reluctant to join in and open up. This is because they fear the consequences. In such a situation, the people involved feel and think much more than they in fact say (Chance, 2000).

The authors in the above book explain that in reality, every difficult conversation has three deeper underlying conversations. These conversations are namely What Happened? the Feelings conversation and the Identity conversation. The What happened conversation actually involves discrepancy over interpretations, perceptions and values. The situation is usually more difficult than what the parties involved can see. It tells what is important and who is at fault. The feelings conversation tells of the emotions of the parties involved and whether their feelings are valid. The identity conversation aids in letting the parties involved think about whom they are and how they see themselves. This is usually an internal conversation of what a situation tells a person about him or herself (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000, p. 916).

The book helps people to identify the common mistakes they make in these types of conversations. They learn that the key to having valuable and productive conversations is being able to recognize the existence of the above deeper conversations, steer clear of common mistakes and convert difficult conversations into learning ones (Chance, 2000).

The What happened conversation shows that people make their first mistakes about a situation by assuming that their analysis on the situation is right. They hold opposing views about the facts, what they mean and what is important. In order to learn from a conversation, the involved people must learn to shift from their convictions about facts and try understanding other people’s views on the matter. They must try to understand why other parties interpret matters the way they do. This can be made possible by adopting the authors “And Stance”, which helps in acknowledging both parties’ views (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000).

The second mistake people make concerns comprehending each other’s intentions. People generally assume they know the other parties intentions. Basing our assumptions on what we feel is often wrong. We believe the best of ourselves and think awful about other people. People can avoid this mistake by acknowledging how the other parties feel (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000). For one to achieve success in difficult conversations, he or she must be willing to listen and clearly understand another person’s feelings, point of view and intentions. It is important that one does not assume anything until he or she is sure that the other persons wants or intends to do something.

The third mistake people do is blaming other people. The authors clearly state that “focusing on blame is a bad idea because it inhibits our ability to learn what’s really causing the problem and to do anything meaningful to correct it” (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000 p 59). The remedy lies in acknowledging each party’s contribution, comprehending the causes, joining in responsibility and keeping away from future problems.

The feelings conversation shows that feelings play an important role in the difficult conversations. However, people feel that expressing their emotions in a difficult conversation is risky. Failing to express one’s feelings can make people get preoccupied so that they are not able to listen to the conversation. The solution for this problem is identifying one’s feelings, comprehending them, discussing them and sharing them visibly (Chance, 2000).

The identity conversation tells how difficult conversations make people lose their identity. It challenges a person’s competency, values and worth. Identity vulnerabilities in people contain the all or nothing syndrome. One can manage their internal identity by learning what matters are important in their identity and adapt their identity healthily. The solution for this lies in people maintaining their balanced sense of self by not controlling how people react and putting themselves in the other parties’ shoes or breaking away from the difficult conversations (Chance, 2000).

Difficult issues always arise, but sometimes it is just best to let go of them. Deciding which conversations to let go of requires a person’s comprehension of the matter at hand. The three goals that help in supporting a conversation include learning the other party’s story, being able to express one’s own views and feeling, and learning how to problem- solve. In case a party decides to raise the difficult conversation, the book provides four attitudes that can help one in letting go. First is that a person is not dependable for putting in place a situation; second is remembering that other people also have limitations; third is being able to separate a matter from one’s identity and; fourth is being able to recognize one can let go of a matter and still be concerned about it (Chance, 2000).

Learning conversations requires one to listen. Listening is a very important aspect when dealing with difficult conversations. This skill helps others understand the other party. One can be a good listener by asking questions, craving for information and acknowledging other people’s feelings. One should learn how to reframe, listen and raising discussions on behavior that seems questionable in the conversation (Chance, 2000).

Critique of the book

The book mainly comprises of two major segments namely Shift to a Learning Stance, which is basically analytical and Create a Learning Conversation, which plays the prescriptive role.

In the first segment, the authors hypothesize that there are three conversations that are within difficult conversations. In the what happened conversation, Stone, Patton and Heen propose that the involved parties should explore each other’s contributions, not focus on blaming each other and identifying how each party contributed to the matter. They in fact recommend that both parties should straighten out the impact and objective subjects. A good example of this is a child’s father being too busy with work, that he cannot be able to attend the child’s basketball game. The father does not intend to hurt the child, but when he does not attend the child’s game, the child might have feelings of rejection (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000 p 51). It is important to realize that through the “what happened” conversation, this situation shows the impact of the father not attending his child’s basketball game was to bring about rejection in the child even though this impact was not the objective of the father.

The authors scrutinize the significance of the feelings conversation. Feelings are the main core of difficult conversations. However, most of the time, people ignore them. The parties involved normally try to keep their feelings out of a difficult conversation. These kept feelings usually find a way out and they burst and leak into conversations, which then hinder the involved parties from listening. This usually results in crumbling relationships and influences one’s self- esteem. For instance, if Liam has been annoyed by his wife Tracy, it makes it difficult to have a productive conversation between them until Liam recognizes that he is annoyed.

The identity conversation is broadly explained by the three authors. In the book, the authors state that “the bigger the gap between what we hope is true and what we fear is true, the easier it is for us to lose our balance” (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000 p 115). A famous example of how issues with identity can thwart a difficult conversation is the story of Moses in the Bible. When Moses is instructed by God to go to Pharaoh and tell him to free the Israelites from Egypt, Moses says “Who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?” He goes on to say “O my Lord, I am not eloquent…..but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue” (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000, p. 115).

Based on the above analysis, the three authors provide a prescriptive advice for the matters. They emphasize on generating a learning conversation. In this conversation, the parties involved have to work for mutual understanding. In order to understand each party’s conversations, the authors suggest instigating the conversation from the third person perspective, which means understanding how an unbiased person will view their conversation (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000 p 149- 155). More often than not, many people initiate difficult conversations through their own views, for example “I hate how you criticize all of my cooking” or from the other party’s views “I am aware that your work is to be a chef, and you most likely think that if I cannot handle the heat, I shouldn’t be a cook” (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000). The three authors advocate that the parties should commence from the vantage view of an unbiased person. An example is “It looks like we have a persistent issue between us. I do not like getting comments from the head chef on meals that I have spent weeks correcting you, and I know that you are not fond of how I criticize your cooking. I would like to have a discussion on this with you, listen to your thoughts and see how we can come up with a problem- solution that will be beneficial to both of us”. The situation proves that a neutral frame is important in making a solution to a problem rather than blaming each other.

Strengths of the book

Difficult conversations is a book that reverberates with common sense. However, it is simple to fail to see how incredible the book is. The main success of this book is being able to recognize that difficult conversations are an observable fact. Many people are faced with the problem of making difficult conservations productive. Recognizing a problem is just about half solving it. The authors make this book very noteworthy by recognizing that difficult conversations do exist and by trying to provide solutions for that problem.

Stone, Patton and Heen provide vast approaches in solving the problem of difficult conversations. They offer a proposition of the “three conversations”, illustrating with a detailed chart at the end, which is rather useful (p 218- 219). They hit the nail on the head with their prescriptive objective of including a learning conversation. This book is very educative and helpful for people who become absorbed in difficult conversations (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000).

Another accomplishment of the book is that the authors do not perpetrate the Panglossian error of presuming that the other people involved in a difficult conversation will involuntarily play along. They tackle with the reality that other people can be resistant in having a learning conversation. The authors offer guidelines that aid in tackling such resistance. They state, “you can reframe anything the other person says to move toward a learning conversation” (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000 p 204). The authors are keen and their acknowledgement that there may be a resistance from the other party to engage in a learning conversation.

The weaknesses of the book

There are a few minor objections to the book. Firstly, the book is directed in giving advice to people who are planning to start a difficult conversation. Many people do not choose to start a difficult conversation; they just find themselves in the middle of it. An easy conversation can effortlessly turn into a difficult conversation or another person can bring up a difficult conversation (Sanderson, 2013). The many skills offered in the book do not advise people who find themselves in reactive conversations. The authors only insist on how to “create a learning conversation” for the parties who find themselves in reactive conversations (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000 p 154). However, the authors’ advice on proactive difficult conversations is really valuable.

The second objection to the book is a substantive one. The authors dispute that intense emotions are common in most difficult conversations. So does this mean that many people possess more proficiency in conversation management or in emotional detachment? Even though the authors say that the intense emotions are common, they also somewhat advise people to disconnect from such emotions and instead take action constructively (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000). A good illustration of this is found in the book in the conversation between Jill and Jason. It is not realistically possible for many people to hold back their emotions in order to provide a second response. Many people do not have the capacity to provide constructive responses when they are emotionally detached (Sanderson, 2013).

The book also implies that many people have a high level of proficiency in conversation management, which I believe many are not capable of unless they have sufficient training. To help in demonstrating this, there is a conversation at the end of the book between Jack and his Coach. In that conversation, the authors show that an actual conversation can merely be started over again when it has gone off course and that the online Coach can be consulted promptly (Stone, Patton & Heen, 2000). This is not really practical.

The book shows that parties involved in a difficult conversation require high levels of ability. This is because they are supposed to listen to the other party and at the same time listen in from the “third position”. To view a conversation from a disconnected vantage point and scrutinize how to get involved in a constructive manner is tough when playing the role of a mediator and a participant (Sanderson, 2013).

Conclusion

Through difficult conversations, people can learn that it takes two parties to agree. Problem solving is very important for people who find themselves in difficult situations. When people find themselves involved in a difficult situation and they cannot find a mutual solution, they must decide if a lesser solution will be accepted, or acknowledge the consequences that come from disagreeing and walk away. If the person decides to walk away from a difficult situation, they should be capable of explaining why they did it, explain their feelings, interests and choices. The book is a path- breaking venture into difficult conversations.