Whether in a negotiation or a mediation, one should consider the psychology of persuading the other parties involved, rather than just plowing ahead with a rights-based focus. Coming up with a theory of the negotiation can hone one’s preparation and engagement in the negotiations in question.
To truly persuade someone to say ‘yes’, we need to tell a story that works consciously or subconsciously to move the other party to agreement. Most people compare a proposed deal to what they want, what they need, what they feel is fair, what they feel entitled to, or what they can do without us. So to get others to agree with us, we need to approach the negotiation in a way that persuades them on one or more of those fronts.
As negotiators, we can better organize our approach if we develop a theory of the negotiation that will convince the other party of one or more of the following points. You should agree with me because:
Creating a coherent theory of the negotiation can help identify where the challenges may lie in persuading the other side. For example, if we recognize that the other side has a great B.A.T.N.A (an alternative course of action they can take by walking away from a deal), it may do little good to prove to them that our proposal is ‘fair’. If their B.A.T.N.A gets them a result that is better than “fair”, fairness alone will be unpersuasive. We may need to show that a deal with us will meet their overall needs in a demonstrably better way than their B.A.T.N.A. The more levels on which we can persuade them, the more likely we will do well in the negotiation.
Having a theory of the negotiation also helps organize the search for legitimacy (external facts acting as proof and support of our views). We can identify what points we will need to prove, which hones the search for the relevant supporting facts. We can then think about how best to use those facts to persuade rather than simply to prove the other party is wrong (which would generate defensive pushback).
If we need to show the other party that a resolution is in their interest, our strategy will need to include good exploration of their goals and concerns in relation to the negotiation issues. With those in hand, we can generate a menu of possible solutions that meet their goals and ours, deal with their concerns and ours, and provide good value for all parties.
If on the other hand, they are truly focused on rights (e.g., contract requirements), we will need to focus on legitimacy, providing the factual evidence as to why our approach is “right” (while still understanding their interests and exploring options). If what matters to the other party is fairness, objective criteria can be used to demonstrate that the approach and resolution are fair.
Remember that we negotiate with human beings that need to say “yes”. Unlike in court, in a negotiation or mediation we can’t force a decision upon them. That human being needs to agree. Develop a theory of what will persuade them to say yes, and during the negotiation act on that theory, watching for clues that your theory is correct. If signs suggest otherwise, rethink your theory based on what you are hearing, and amend your approach accordingly. Identify what will persuade the other party and focus your efforts there.
To learn conflict resolution skills that you can use at work and in your personal life, please visit our Alternative Dispute Resolution Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To improve your negotiation skills and get the results you want while negotiating, please visit our Become a Powerful Negotiator Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To gain skills to handle difficult conversations and difficult people with confidence, please visit our Dealing With Difficult People Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To make better decisions, we need to understand how our mind takes shortcuts and how those shortcuts trick us into making bad decisions. If you understand how your mind works and when it fails you, you will make better decisions. To improve your decision-making skills, please visit our Effective Decision Making Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
In the workplace, like anywhere else in life, conflict between people is inevitable. As a manager, you should deal with it immediately and not just live in hope that it will somehow resolve itself. Conflict between employees can have a detrimental effect on the rest of your team. Over time, conflict can lower morale, even among your star performers, and result in lower productivity.
Examples of conflict are not always full-scale arguments or obvious cases of bullying, but can also be a creeping negativity and backbiting between people. These latter forms of conflict can be harder to spot, but are just as worthy of concern and swift resolution. Most people managers find conflict resolution hard to handle and would welcome some solid advice on the subject. Here are some strategies to help you deal with workplace conflict. You may find these strategies helpful in other contexts where conflict arises.
Get both sides of the story
It’s important for both sides to feel that they have an equal chance to be heard. Most people feel better after they have been allowed to air their views and explain what’s been happening. This storytelling session must occur in an environment where people feel safe to speak, without fear of judgement or future sanctions.
Get to the bottom of the problem
Active listening is essential. While the parties are telling their stories, you need to listen carefully to draw out the underlying issue or core problem of the dispute. Is it a personality clash or a disagreement over a particular project? If it is the latter, you might consider redistributing the work among members of the team. Getting to the bottom of the problem will help you and the parties to develop a win-win solution for both sides and the organization.
Encourage employees to appreciate their differences
Help the disputing parties understand that although they may not get along personally, they each bring important contributions to the organization. To do this successfully, ensure that both sides feel valued for their own unique talents. You might try to get them to realize the effect that their behaviour might have on the team as a whole.
Try to find some common ground
No matter how complex the conflict might seem, the parties are usually able to find some agreement on one or two key interests. For example, employees may disagree on the approach to take in tackling a particular project but agree on that project’s ultimate completion or success. Try to highlight any common goals or interests that the parties may have in settling the dispute and suggest that they try to achieve the goal or interest together.
Get both parties to buy into the solution
To ensure that the dispute doesn’t arise again, everyone needs to feel that they are happy with the suggested solution. Be patient because this may take some time. As the negotiation progresses, it may be useful to bring both parties together to do some joint problem solving. It will be easier for the parties to accept and take ownership of any resolution arising from the joint brainstorming session. Encouraging your employees to take part in finding the solution, improves your chance of implementing it, both initially and in the long-term.
Conflict resolution is a difficult process to manage, especially if you are dealing with clashing personalities, but you need to tackle the conflict head-on before the situation deteriorates.
Remember, if you feel the situation is too tough to handle on your own or you don’t have the expertise within your HR department, you can always seek help from a professional mediation organization. Bringing in an impartial and independent person can often encourage your employees to feel they are truly getting objective consideration and a fair resolution.
For more information on strategies for managing workplace conflicts, please contact us at contact@adr.ca.
To learn conflict resolution skills that you can use at work and in your personal life, please visit our Alternative Dispute Resolution Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To improve your negotiation skills and get the results you want while negotiating, please visit our Become a Powerful Negotiator Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To gain skills to handle difficult conversations and difficult people with confidence, please visit our Dealing With Difficult People Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To make better decisions, we need to understand how our mind takes shortcuts and how those shortcuts trick us into making bad decisions. If you understand how your mind works and when it fails you, you will make better decisions. To improve your decision-making skills, please visit our Effective Decision Making Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
We all know people who seem to be naturally good at negotiating. Maybe they’re convincing their boss to give them a raise, negotiating a great deal on their renovations or on a new car.
Should the rest of us give up and leave negotiating to the lucky few who seem to have naturally gotten the innate talent?
No! As with everything, negotiation is a skill that can be learned. Yes, some people might have a natural aptitude for it, but anyone can become a better negotiator with the right training.
Negotiation isn’t a far-out abstract concept; it’s a practical skill that everyone can get better at.
Here are three myths about negotiating, which might make you feel a bit better about the skills you already have, and help you to identify areas that you can improve!
It’s all about the money…
When we think about negotiating, we tend to associate it with getting the best price on something like a car, or a salesperson we have all met who pushes for the hard sell. Negotiation isn’t always about money; we all negotiate every day in many ways. Think about any time you’re trying to get someone to do something: it’s a negotiation. For example, managers are negotiating constantly they are trying to get the most for their employees and customers and trying to get the most out of their employees and customers. This can involve money, but as we all know it isn’t all about money. The end goal isn’t about money; it’s about getting the best out of their team.
It’s all about the hard sell…
In most situations, this is far from the truth. As a negotiator, you need to be an excellent listener, and have great people skills – these are the traits you also need to be successful in other areas of life. Think about some of the situations you encounter in your daily work life – resolving conflicts within your team, and making sure you get the right people, with the right skills, to do the right tasks. That’s not about hard selling; it’s about getting to know people, listening to them, and persuading them as to the right course of action for the team and the organization.
You can’t learn how to negotiate, you’re born with it or you aren’t…
Hopefully, from reading so far, you’ve already realized that this is not true. Anyone can learn how to be better at negotiating. Preparing, understanding what you want to achieve, and listening to other points of view are all essential to negotiation, and can help you get the result that is best for you, and for the people you work and live with.
Luckily, there are lots of training courses to help you become better at negotiating, and that will dispel the myth that good negotiators are born rather than made. You already have the foundation in place; why not see how much you can improve?
Written by Jason Stitt, Instructor, Stitt Feld Handy Group.
To learn conflict resolution skills that you can use at work and in your personal life, please visit our Alternative Dispute Resolution Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To improve your negotiation skills and get the results you want while negotiating, please visit our Become a Powerful Negotiator Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To gain skills to handle difficult conversations and difficult people with confidence, please visit our Dealing With Difficult People Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To make better decisions, we need to understand how our mind takes shortcuts and how those shortcuts trick us into making bad decisions. If you understand how your mind works and when it fails you, you will make better decisions. To improve your decision-making skills, please visit our Effective Decision Making Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
We all know that email is convenient and comfortable. Many of us do our shopping, and even our banking online. So what’s wrong with a simple emailed conversation? Well, nothing—unless it is a difficult conversation. When one person is upset with someone else, email is suddenly the least favourable method of communication. This is especially important in the business context, where co-workers can grow accustomed to emailing each other to communicate, instead of having meetings or phone conversations.
Here are a handful of reasons why you should always strive to have a difficult conversation in person, and not via email:
1. Reduce Room for Interpretation: A large part of our communication as human beings is done through facial expression and body language. When we email instead of speaking to each other, we cannot convey sincerity, humour, and openness in the same way that we can when speaking face-to-face. This is especially true in conflicts, where the recipient of an email is usually reading it through a lens of anger or distrust. In these situations, sincerity and kindness can be read as sarcasm, and the problem will only get worse.
2. Don’t Allow the Issue Time to Fester: When you receive an email, there is no timer ticking as to when you have to respond. Time can be like gasoline on a flame for a simple conflict. Email allows parties to carefully craft their responses, which seems as though it would be helpful in conflict resolution; however, in most situations, time only lets the parties think of reasons why they should not budge in their position. Instead of resolving their differences, the parties become more entrenched in the conflict.
3. Restrict the Issue to the Parties at Hand: Face-to-face conversation between two adults is the best way of keeping focused on the issue, and not allowing any other parties to be involved. When two individuals are having a disagreement, there are often third parties that become involved to encourage the conflict, give advice, or gossip. When you have a sit-down conversation with someone, you are able to limit the influence that other parties can have on your conflict resolution process.
4. Allow for the Airing of Grievances: Sometimes, someone who is upset simply wants the opportunity to explain what they are feeling or why they are angry. Trying to resolve a conflict through email can sometimes make the other person feel as though they are not worth your time, which will further exacerbate the problem. Face-to-face meetings allow you to listen to what the other person has to say and to show that you are willing to work out a solution to your problems.
To learn conflict resolution skills that you can use at work and in your personal life, please visit our Alternative Dispute Resolution Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To improve your negotiation skills and get the results you want while negotiating, please visit our Become a Powerful Negotiator Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To gain skills to handle difficult conversations and difficult people with confidence, please visit our Dealing With Difficult People Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To make better decisions, we need to understand how our mind takes shortcuts and how those shortcuts trick us into making bad decisions. If you understand how your mind works and when it fails you, you will make better decisions. To improve your decision-making skills, please visit our Effective Decision Making Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
PODCAST on XLLEGAL
Link to podcast: https://exellegal.com/handling-difficult-people-with-jason-stitt/
Jason Stitt (link Jason’s name to his page) shares his expertise and advice about handling difficult people. Jason’s a “recovering” lawyer, mediator, and trainer who provides training in dispute resolution, negotiation and dealing with difficult people through the Stitt Feld Handy Group.
Topics discussed include:
Most people dread having to confront a conflict at work or at home. Unfortunately, ignoring the conflict will not cause it to disappear. At some point the conflict will need to be addressed to allow people to work and live together well and to avoid permanently damaging the relationship. Determining when to raise and issue or confront a problem, or when not to confront a problem, is a challenging question.
Conflict of interest
Different people will be in the same job for entirely different reasons—some for the money, some out of personal interest, some for career advancement, and some for a temporary learning experience. In any of these circumstances, it is possible that one’s personal interests may interfere with the common interests of the team and create a conflict. Should that become the case, addressing the conflict may become necessary.
Conflict of attitude
Different people have different approaches to their work and to tasks in general. For example, one person may focus in on the details and another colleague may be more of a big-picture thinker. These differences in approaches may cause tension between the co-workers particularly if one person’s attitude is that his or her approach is the best or only way to do a good job. Although it is difficult to change one’s natural approach, it is possible to have a respectful and positive attitude towards people who have different approaches. A decision to confront a person with an undesirable attitude may be wise only if that person’s behaviour has negatively impacted the work environment. If their negative attitude affects the morale and productivity of the team, trying to address that issue as soon as possible is likely necessary.
Conflict of goals
Getting the job done on time is an important goal in the workplace. Some people achieve that goal by working methodically right from the start of a project while others may get the work done on time through a last-minute rush. These differences in how one reaches one’s goals may become a source of conflict and stress among team members. As the team’s ability to meet their overall goals may be impacted by how individuals on the team meet their individual goals, having a discussion that explores how to handle these conflicting ways to meet the team goals may be in the interest of all team members.
Conflict of ethics
In determining when one needs to confront a conflict that may arise concerning an aspect of a colleague’s ethical behaviour, reference to Peter Bregman’s “rule of three” theory may be useful. According to Bregman, if an issue concerning one’s ethical behaviour is noticed at least three times then confrontation is warranted. If a co-worker’s actions seem to be deliberate, and are repeated, making the choice to confront that person may be appropriate as otherwise the concerning behaviour could develop into an unwelcome habit.
If you’re in doubt about confronting an issue, consult these five circumstances that likely warrant confrontation:
1. When you believe that addressing the issue upfront will lead to positive change.
2. When a person’s actions or attitude negatively affects others.
3. When there is a chance that the matter will get out of control if not confronted.
4. When not confronting the issue will likely be costlier than the unpleasantness of confronting it.
5. When you continue to feel uncomfortable and realize that addressing the issue may be the best way to ease your concerns.
To learn conflict resolution skills that you can use at work and in your personal life, please visit our Alternative Dispute Resolution Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To improve your negotiation skills and get the results you want while negotiating, please visit our Become a Powerful Negotiator Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To gain skills to handle difficult conversations and difficult people with confidence, please visit our Dealing With Difficult People Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To make better decisions, we need to understand how our mind takes shortcuts and how those shortcuts trick us into making bad decisions. If you understand how your mind works and when it fails you, you will make better decisions. To improve your decision-making skills, please visit our Effective Decision Making Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
Conflict in the workplace is often seen as a negative force, something to be avoided or quickly resolved. However, when managed correctly, conflict can be incredibly productive, fostering innovation, improving relationships, and driving better decision-making. Understanding how to harness the power of productive conflict is essential for any organization aiming to thrive in today’s competitive environment. One major understanding from increasing diversity in workplaces is that everyone always having the same ideas, and getting along, doesn’t always lead to the best ideas.
What is Productive Conflict?
Productive conflict occurs when differences in opinions, ideas, or approaches lead to discussions that drive progress and improvement. Unlike destructive conflict, which can result in hostility and a breakdown in communication, productive conflict is characterized by mutual respect and a focus on finding solutions.
The Benefits of Productive Conflict
Strategies for Harnessing Productive Conflict
Conclusion
Understanding and using productive conflict can transform challenges into opportunities for growth and improvement. By fostering a culture of open communication, setting clear guidelines, focusing on issues rather than individuals, encouraging active listening, seeking common ground, embracing constructive criticism, and providing training, organizations can harness the power of conflict to drive innovation, strengthen relationships, and improve decision-making. Remember, conflict is not inherently negative; it’s how we manage it that determines its impact.
To learn conflict resolution skills that you can use at work and in your personal life, please visit our Alternative Dispute Resolution Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To improve your negotiation skills and get the results you want while negotiating, please visit our Become a Powerful Negotiator Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To gain skills to handle difficult conversations and difficult people with confidence, please visit our Dealing With Difficult People Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To make better decisions, we need to understand how our mind takes shortcuts and how those shortcuts trick us into making bad decisions. If you understand how your mind works and when it fails you, you will make better decisions. To improve your decision-making skills, please visit our Effective Decision Making Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing various aspects of the workplace, and performance feedback is no exception. With its ability to analyze vast amounts of data and provide unbiased insights, AI is transforming how organizations evaluate and develop their employees. Embracing AI in performance feedback can lead to more accurate assessments, personalized development plans, and ultimately, a more engaged and productive workforce.
The Benefits of AI in Performance Feedback
How to Implement AI in Performance Feedback
Potential Challenges and How to Overcome Them
Conclusion
AI is transforming performance feedback by providing theoretically objective evaluations, real-time insights, personalized development plans, and data-driven decision-making. By integrating AI tools with existing systems, educating employees and managers, setting clear goals, and encouraging continuous feedback, organizations can harness the power of AI to improve performance management. While there are challenges to overcome, the benefits of AI in performance feedback are undeniable, making it a valuable tool for enhancing employee development and organizational success.
To learn conflict resolution skills that you can use at work and in your personal life, please visit our Alternative Dispute Resolution Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To improve your negotiation skills and get the results you want while negotiating, please visit our Become a Powerful Negotiator Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To gain skills to handle difficult conversations and difficult people with confidence, please visit our Dealing With Difficult People Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To make better decisions, we need to understand how our mind takes shortcuts and how those shortcuts trick us into making bad decisions. If you understand how your mind works and when it fails you, you will make better decisions. To improve your decision-making skills, please visit our Effective Decision Making Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
By Helen Burnett
Law Times, April 21, 2008
Alternative dispute resolution is reportedly catching on in Ethiopia-and it has a Canadian connection. Toronto’s Stitt Feld Handy Group and the Ethiopian Arbitration and Conciliation Centre have recently become partners to run training sessions in the East African country. So far in 2008, two have already been complete.
In February, the Canadian group traveled to Ethiopia to run a course to train members of the ombudsman’s office there, followed in March by a session for a human rights group. In July, the group is returning to teach people how to be arbitrators.
The partnership between the EACC, an independent body established by a group of Ethiopian lawyers, and the Stitt Feld Handy Group began with the EACC wanting to do a course in ADR, says Allan Stitt, president of the Stitt Feld Handy Group and ADR Chambers. The EACC visited the Canadian embassy in Ethiopia, who had heard of the Stitt Feld Handy training, and contacted the group, who then went there to do a few courses for them.
Following these first few training sessions, the group brought the EACC’s executive director, Woubshet Ayele, to Toronto a year and a half ago to show him how they run things at ADR Chambers and to help him with the administration of the centre. A document was then drawn up; with the two groups agreeing that they would work together as joint-venture partners to try to bring ADR to Ethiopia.
The group has also run courses in Trinidad, Barbados, the Bahamas, the U.K., Australia, Hong Kong, the Philippines, and around North America.
People from diverse occupations attend the courses, says Stitt, including lawyers, engineers, architects, construction people, women’s-rights advocates, social workers, family dispute resolution people, and union representatives. “A very wide-ranging people who are extremely keen and know that in other parts of the world there are new and different ways that people are finding dispute resolution processes that work, and they are extremely keen to become leading-edge and to lean what’s going on elsewhere,” he says.
“The groups that I’ve been involved in teaching there are the most respectful, most interesting, fun to be with, keen in the sense of wanting to learn, and enjoyable groups that I teach anywhere in the world,” he says.
While each course is different, says Stitt, the standard EACC course covers how to resolve conflict in an interest-based way, such as how to work with people, how to understand what they’re saying, and how to listen effectively. The general courses that Stitt Feld Handy Group runs for the EACC in negotiation and conflict resolution are usually two one-week sessions with two members of the Canadian group going over to lead the program. People who take the course want the skills for different reasons, says Stitt. “There are some people who are going into the smaller towns to help resolve disputes there and some people who are working in the construction industry right in Addis Ababa,” he says.
The courses are similar to those the group teaches in other countries as well, but Stitt notes that every country has cultural differences. For example, he notes that the challenges around domestic violence issues are “immense” in Ethiopia, and figuring out how to do family law ADR is quite different.
“You adapt what you’re doing to the situation, but the theories are basically the same,” he says. The group hears through the EACC that people are really taking the skills learned through the courses to heart and using them, and they are making a difference. “It’s starting to infiltrate the courts system, and I don’t mean that in a negative way. I mean that in a positive way,” he says. At the last course he attended, the country’s associate chief justice was there and spoke about how people are starting to use ADR skills to resolve disputes, and he certainly sees it as a “wave of the future” in Ethiopia. “It’s being used, I think, both in everyday life and as part of the formal litigation system. It’s really starting to take hold, starting to catch on,” he says.
“The good thing about being able to do the courses is that we get some advocates for the process who are starting to spread the word among people in Ethiopia.” The issue isn’t demand, in terms of people who want the skills, says Stitt, but an enormous challenge is that Ethiopia is the fourth poorest country in the world and many can’t afford to get training. “The only way that the training can happen is if we can get someone to basically, by and large, fund our experts to get there and stay there,” he says.
There is a local businessman in Ethiopia who is involved with the EACC and who funds the group’s accommodation when they are there, says Stitt, and there are various government programs that the centre is able to access to get funding for airfare. The Stitt Feld Handy Group donates its time. The EACC receives funding from the Canadian International Development Agency, as well as the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, as well as from Initiative Africa, the French Embassy (on a project basis), and recently from Japan’s embassy.
While the training continues, there may one day be other projects on the horizon for this partnership. Stitt says that his dream and the dream of the executive director of the EACC, a former lawyer, is to somehow figure out how to get the funding to establish a new law school in Ethiopia that teaches the rule of the law.
To learn conflict resolution skills that you can use at work and in your personal life, please visit our Alternative Dispute Resolution Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To improve your negotiation skills and get the results you want while negotiating, please visit our Become a Powerful Negotiator Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To gain skills to handle difficult conversations and difficult people with confidence, please visit our Dealing With Difficult People Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To make better decisions, we need to understand how our mind takes shortcuts and how those shortcuts trick us into making bad decisions. If you understand how your mind works and when it fails you, you will make better decisions. To improve your decision-making skills, please visit our Effective Decision Making Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
Sarah Treleaven, Financial Post
Published: Saturday, March 15, 2008
Sarah Treleaven, Financial Post Published: Saturday, March 15, 2008
If meetings are widely considered a waste of time, that’s because, well, they can be a waste of time. Paul Godin, a mediator with Stitt Feld Handy Group in Toronto, says that too often meetings have no clear purpose, plan or outcome. “People are happy to talk about what’s wrong, what could be done, what should be done, but without ever committing themselves to a plan of action moving forward. Meetings can be hijacked by verbal chaos that makes people feel like pulling their hair out.”
Jeff Gibson is vice-president of consulting for the Table Group, a California-based company. He’s heard more than his fair share of hyperbolic statements about workplace meetings. “People often say to us that they’d really love their job if they didn’t have to go to meetings and manage people, which is really a little tragic. If you think about it, at a certain point in your career, what else do you do?”
According to Andrew, a Web designer, we get sucked into the system early in life. “When you’re a little kid they make you gather on the carpet to listen to a story and then in university you have three-hour lectures. This is all to train human beings to keep their mouths shut and look interested.”
Andrew points out that while he doesn’t mind attending the occasional meeting –”a meeting for me can sometimes be a little mini-recess” — he doesn’t envy his boss’s meeting schedule. “My boss spends 85% of her day in meetings. While I have the desire for more power, prestige and money, I don’t want to spend all of my time in meetings.”
Not everyone hates meetings as much as they claim. Steven Rogelberg, professor of organizational science at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, has studied feelings about meetings.
He argues that face-to-face meetings are typically effective — even if they have yet to realize their full potential. “You could have an hour-long meeting, and people could believe that they got something done, but they also believe that they could have got that done in a half an hour. It’s not that people see it as a complete waste of time; it’s that they haven’t maximized the time.”
Part of the problem, says Prof. Rogelberg, is that everyone believes they have an innate ability to lead a meeting. “I generally believe that individual effectiveness in meetings is a blind spot. If you look at organizational systems — performance-appraisal systems, feedback systems, employee surveys — there is nothing about meetings. As a result, people don’t have the awareness and they don’t have the ability to make positive change.”
Mr. Godin recommends four simple guidelines to more effective meetings:
1. All participants should be clear on the purpose of the meeting.
2. Only the necessary people should be present.
3. Streamline the process through pre-circulated agendas, an effective facilitator, timing guidelines and by distributing materials in advance by e-mail.
4. Enter the meeting with some sense of the desired outcome and leave with a concrete action plan.
Andrew concedes that meetings do sometimes help him do his job better, but says a strong leader is necessary to avoid the pitfalls of the collective brain.
“When people are all in a room together, there usually has to be someone who says, ‘OK, we’re wasting too much time listening to Andrew make barnyard animal noises — we’ve got to get some work done.’ “
To learn conflict resolution skills that you can use at work and in your personal life, please visit our Alternative Dispute Resolution Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To improve your negotiation skills and get the results you want while negotiating, please visit our Become a Powerful Negotiator Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To gain skills to handle difficult conversations and difficult people with confidence, please visit our Dealing With Difficult People Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To make better decisions, we need to understand how our mind takes shortcuts and how those shortcuts trick us into making bad decisions. If you understand how your mind works and when it fails you, you will make better decisions. To improve your decision-making skills, please visit our Effective Decision Making Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
A Dedication Part 2 to Peter Dreyer & Nayla Mitha
By Tonia Robinson – Oct. 5, 2007
It’s good to be great!
It’s even better to feel great!
But when you meet two people who are
Exceptional at doing both
And teaching others to do the same
Where life has serious rules in its game
I tell you I must on behalf of us
Say to them thank you by name
So a heart-felt thank you to Peter & Nayla
The Advanced ADR will have you on your feet
With many a challenge for you to meet
Exciting role plays, not taking anything personal
But rather focusing on how the principled process flows
If the room is getting heated and emotions are running high
Call a caucus and not a knife
What are your interests? Listen to mine!
What are the issues keeping us behind?
Vision 20/20, first world status?
Must include an ADR Program preferably
By Stitt Feld & Handy to resolve
Unnecessary conflict and sometimes family feuds
Life need not be impossible or hard or even sad
Just remember what Peter said in the Basic ADR
That happiness is not the absence of conflict
But the ability to deal with it effectively
This Peter and Nayla strategically
Taught you and taught me
To learn conflict resolution skills that you can use at work and in your personal life, please visit our Alternative Dispute Resolution Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To improve your negotiation skills and get the results you want while negotiating, please visit our Become a Powerful Negotiator Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To gain skills to handle difficult conversations and difficult people with confidence, please visit our Dealing With Difficult People Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
To make better decisions, we need to understand how our mind takes shortcuts and how those shortcuts trick us into making bad decisions. If you understand how your mind works and when it fails you, you will make better decisions. To improve your decision-making skills, please visit our Effective Decision Making Workshop page to learn more about upcoming in-person and instructor-led online sessions.
