A Quick Hack for Managing Defensiveness

We know what it’s like when a conversation or situation triggers our defences:

• We relive the conversation/situation again and again in our heads
• We start to build a case for the defence – why we were right and x was wrong
• We employ a righteous indignation tone of voice
• We start seeing and hearing everything someone says with an eye roll and a ‘typical of x’ lens

“We don’t have defences… they have us” Jim Tamm

In my favourite Ted Talk of the year Jim Tamm, former Judge and industrial relations mediator, illustrates brilliantly what happens when we get defensive. It’s a fantastic talk and an incredibly valuable way for you to spend 15 minutes so watch it now if you have a moment.  

 The key message is that when we get defensive we actually get less intelligent. Just like anger, fear or resentment, when we get defensive we trigger an Amygdala Hijack. Your chimp brain is responding to a perceived emotional or psychological threat by paralysing executive function and preparing you for a fight, flight or freeze response. (See Daniel Goleman & Richard Davidson’s ‘The Science of Meditation’ or Professor Steve Peters ‘The Chimp Paradox for more on this).

 No leader I know thinks it’s a good idea to be less intelligent, and none of us wants our inner chimp running the business – so how do we get out of defensiveness fast so we can show up as the leaders we want to be.

?Today’s leadership experiment

 This is straight from Jim Tamm’s talk so I take absolutely NO credit here!

 Step 1) Identify your early warning signs of defensiveness, for example:

• Withdrawing into deadly silence
• Playing poor me
• All of nothing thinking
• Wanting to be right
• Blaming or shaming others
• Confusion/slow thinking
• High charge of energy in the body
• Catastrophizing
• Wanting the last word
• Obsessive thinking
• Flooding with information to prove a point

He says if you think you don’t get defensive – go ask your family what your early warning systems are ;-)

Step 2) Create an action step directly related to your early warning sign.

For example: If you flooding with information.... be quiet for 10 minutes. If you get a high charge of energy in the body... take 10 rounds of deep breathing. If you withdraw into deadly silence... ask questions using a warm tone of voice. If you engage in catastrophic thinking... visualise a successful outcome

Step 3) Next time you notice your early warning signs experiment with Jim’s 5 step process for overcoming defensiveness:

1. Acknowledge it
2. Slow down (take a breath, take a walk)
3. Check negative self-talk (and say something supportive to yourself)
4. Practice your action step
5. Repeat

 Have fun and let me know what you discover.