Communication within a conflict.

To communicate when the situation or the context isn’t pleasant or involves conflict, can be very challenging, but having the skills to do it, to be able to handle conflict and communicate effectively, and kindly, and keep things calm is required for leadership.

Have you heard before the quote that claims?

“Between what I think, what I want to say, what I believe I say, what I say, what you want to hear, what you believe to hear, what you hear, what you want to understand, what you think you understand, what you understand...There are ten possibilities that we might have some problem communicating. But let's try anyway…”

So, what do you think? Communicating can be hard, thrilling, and helpful. What we think is that it takes practice, for sure. So we’ve chosen 3 pillars as the first steps into the amazing communication framework. Serve yourself!

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• 1. Identify what your filter is and say it. 

"It’s powerful to be able to identify what your filter is at any given moment and talk about it.”

Saying, “I’m in a negative headspace right now”, helps others better understand you, interpret your actions, and maybe even lend support.

This applies to any aspect of your life. Saying to someone you live with “today I’m in bad mood” it’s valuable information for the other person to choose how to talk to you that day or even how to receive what you give. 

At work, for example, this could be a great practice for the scrums at the beginning of the week: everyone telling how is feeling, and what’s their mood, provides a better understanding and team support. 

On the other hand, understanding the feelings you have as a filter through which you see reality can be very helpful, especially when this filter is blocking your ability to find positive perspectives and solutions. 

• 2. Asking for help when needed.

Learning to delegate, relinquish a certain amount of control, or recognize when we're overwhelmed, can be challenging steps that drive us to learn to ask for help when needed. Know that it doesn’t make you less capable, but it does make you realistic and a team-working person.

When managing a team, this can be even harder because you feel the responsibility of accomplishing and being able to handle everything. But even if you can be a superhero, see that every person in your team wants to give the best of themselves and they probably would be very happy to help, to take ownership of what they’re doing.

Neverminding what your role is, at some point you’ll need help. Learning to ask for help before being too upset or stressed about it, can be game-changing. 

• 3. Non violent communication.   

This is a book and also a great study and perspective on the way we communicate.

NVC guides us in reframing how we express ourselves and hear others. Instead of habitual, automatic reactions, our words become conscious responses based firmly on awareness of what we are perceiving, feeling, and wanting. 

“Yes, I can handle your telling me what I did or didn’t do, 

And I can handle your interpretations, but please don’t mix the two.”

Marshall Rosenberg.

We are led to express ourselves with honesty and clarity, while simultaneously paying others respectful and empathic attention. In any exchange, we come to hear our own deeper needs and those of others. This is why we say communicating requires practice: training ourselves to observe carefully and to be able to specify behaviors and conditions that are affecting us, we learn to identify and clearly articulate what we are concretely wanting in any given situation.

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Resourceful and effective communication is essential to every human relationship and to build a healthy work environment. As well, in the context of what we do every day like being in contact with our customers, and developing products, this soft skill among other many virtues, end helping us to humanize a product or to provide a satisfactory customer journey.