Hear what graduates are saying about the Stitt Feld Handy Group Virtual Instructor-Led Online Training. It is as effective, practical and fun as ever.
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.
Testimonials about our Live Online Training
Here’s the video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLKjutTtYkg&t=1s
{Transcript}
So, one of the best parts about the program was the interactive nature of the way in which we learned. We would have role plays, we would have different participants, and we would have a coach involved who would assist us throughout the role play—who would critique us, who would make suggestions—and it was a wonderful, wonderful way to learn. We took all of the courses online via Zoom, and I was very pleased with the quality of the course and the material.
I had the opportunity to attend both in person as well as virtually. What I found it to be was a lot more engaging than most of the other courses that I have ever taken in my life. There was the opportunity to practice the theoretical aspects, and it was an excellent medium. The Zoom platform techniques can be applied in real life as soon as you finish those courses.
We were constantly engaged. The speakers were asking us questions, and we were able to put in answers or questions in the chat, or we could raise our hand. There was a lot of variety in terms of different instructors at different times. The timing was very good, so I never felt that I was bored or that I was too fatigued. You actually saw everybody’s faces and reactions, as well as when the instructors were talking. You actually had the availability to put a question in a chat group. If you’re not the type of person that sits in a classroom and wants to put their hand up, you had that availability to put your question in a chat group, which allowed the instructor to address that question without actually feeling apprehensive or confused.
We had people from different parts of the world, so globally we all connected in one forum. The fact that you can go to the hub and download information, the fact that there are great breakout rooms and wonderful coaches—it’s a small group, and we’re interactive, and the coaches or trainers come into the room virtually from time to time just to see how we’re doing.
I found that with the coaches, it was awesome because they were able to turn off their cameras, where you had the availability to actually concentrate on your role and responsibility as a mediator and as a role play person. Afterwards, the coach would come back on and provide that feedback, which is comparable to when you’re actually sitting in person.
I have made significant sums of money utilizing the different tips and techniques that I’ve learned in this program, and it’s made me a better communicator, a better father, and a better lawyer. So, if you’re looking for a program to take, I would highly recommend this program. I felt it was a very high-quality course. I’ve used the skills already both at home and professionally.
So the ADR course—all six of them that I have done to complete this executive certificate—I would say have been professionally life-changing. I think it’s an amazing course. I have advised my colleagues that this is something you have to do. Not just “should”—you should have to do.
From a Stiff Field Handy perspective, absolutely the best program that I can recommend. It is money well spent.
Workplaces are starting to re-open and with these re-openings will come some difficult conversations about physical distancing, wearing masks and other issues related to COVID-19.
Do you have a strategy to address COVID-19 related difficult conversations? Do you and your staff know what to say to an employee, colleague, client or customer who is not complying with COVID-19 protocols? Are you confident in speaking up when your health or the health of others may be at risk?
Having the ability to manage difficult conversations has always been an important skill in the workplace. However, having to speak to a colleague who is not physically distancing, a client who is not wearing a mask, or a staff member who is resistant to new health & safety protocols, are conversations that can put you and your organization’s health at risk if not handled effectively. Therefore, as workplaces transition to the ‘new normal’, having the tools and techniques to have challenging conversations is now essential to successfully navigate the new high-risk environment.
During the webinar we:
Share the E.A.S.E model to conduct challenging conversations related to COVID 19 – with ease;
Provide practical tools that you can use right away to increase your success in difficult conversations;
Give you key words and phrases that you can use – in the moment, when difficult situations catch you off guard; and
Answer some questions.
This is an opportunity for you and your colleagues to share a learning experience and leave with a common language, tools, and techniques to enhance communication in your workplace.
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.
Webinar: Having Difficult Conversations Related to COVID-19
Here’s the video link for the transcript: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gk9d_HRx1M
{Transcript}
[Music] Hello everyone, my name is Oliver Martin, and welcome to Stitt Feld Handy Group’s Experts Corner. As I said, my name is Oliver Martin—I’m the Director of Training at the Stitt Feld Handy Group. In a little bit, you’re going to meet some of my other colleagues as panel members as we have a panel discussion on this topic.
I’m excited to join you today because, for those of you who are not familiar with the Stitt Feld Handy Group, our purpose is simple: it’s to help people live and work better together. For the last 25 years, we’ve been doing that by providing impactful and engaging learning experiences that transform the way people interact with each other. Specifically, we provide training on conflict resolution, negotiation, dealing with difficult people, how to have difficult conversations, and how to win over irate customers.
In addition, we are all mediators here, and we go into workplaces and mediate disputes between employees. So, workplace conflicts—we help transform teams so that they’re performing optimally. We also do one-on-one coaching.
Now, since March—since the pandemic—we’ve transferred all our programs and services to be delivered online. Our trainings are still engaging, and they’re done in a virtual instructor-led training format. In other words, it’s live online.
Experts Corner is simply another platform through which we help people live and work better together. Through the Experts Corner webinars, we’re able to take our 25 years of expertise around challenging conversations, negotiations, and conflict resolution, and relate them to topics relevant today.
Last month, we focused on the health and safety standards that may arise due to COVID in the workplace, and we had an expert join us to talk through that. If you missed that, it’s available on our YouTube channel.
This month, we’re going to leverage the expertise of our instructors to look at how we can have difficult conversations that may arise due to COVID-19. Now, my sense is many of you have had some of…
My first experience
These conversations already—and if you haven’t, believe me, you likely will. I know my first experience of this was back in March. So in March, in Ontario—where we’re broadcasting from because I know we have people from all around the world—we, in the middle of the month, kind of went into lockdown. This was when there was the run on toilet paper and so forth at the supermarkets.
And yes, I was one of them. I went to get my toilet paper—but really only because I didn’t want to be the last one left out. In any event, I remember going to the supermarket and getting my toilet paper and some other goodies. I’m standing in line with my cart in front of me, maintaining the appropriate physical distance. Then I remembered that my six-year-old had asked for some candies, and since we were going to be in lockdown probably for several weeks at that point, I said, “Let me get a treat.”
So I step out of line for a moment, leave my cart there, and just take about 20 steps to go and get the gummies—even some gummy bears or something he likes. As I’m walking back to my cart, I notice something: someone is walking in front of me towards my cart. Then I see them take my cart—with their bare hands—and move it out of the line so they can walk around it.
I froze for a second. I thought, “No—you don’t touch someone else’s cart with your bare hands during this time.” At least, that’s how I felt at the time. But by the time I could even formulate something to say, the person had already left the supermarket.
It was at that point that I realized: you know what? There are going to be some difficult, important conversations that need to be had during COVID-19 as a result of the pandemic. And based on my conversations with my colleagues—from stories I’ve heard, from people, and from the videos that have gone viral about some interactions in workplaces related to COVID-19—we felt that it was important for us to be able to share some skills and tools that you can use to help in those interactions.
So as a result, there’s this webinar. We also adapted a couple of our courses, which I’m going to speak to you about later. Our Winning Over Irate Customers workshop is going to have some special editions that are focused on COVID-19—having those types of challenging conversations for frontline workers. Also, there will be an Advanced Dealing with Difficult People workshop for those who have already taken our Dealing with Difficult People workshop. That’s going to focus on having those difficult conversations in the workplace.
Before I go any further, I do want to go through some logistics with you, so let me…
Logistics
Let me quickly review some logistics. I want to make something clear up front: we’ll be sharing a lot of information here in terms of skills and tools to have these conversations, but we’re by no means providing any legal advice. We recognize that, depending on where you’re watching this from, there are different bylaws, different legislations, and other protocols in place related to COVID-19. We would just offer that it’s best for you to check with your local experts on that. Our goal here is not to provide legal advice—instead, it’s to offer the skills and tools to have these conversations.
In terms of questions and answers, we do want to hear from you. There will be a point when I bring out my colleagues, and we’ll be taking some questions. So what I’d ask is that you use the Q&A button on your screen just below. You can easily click on that button and type in your question.
My colleague Mark Lawrence is standing by—he’s going to be watching the questions. When we get to the Q&A segment, he will be relaying the questions to us so we can answer them. I will note that he’s reviewing the questions, and when we respond, we might be addressing several at once. So, you may not hear your specific question verbatim, but do know that we’ll cover that question broadly. Due to time constraints, we can’t respond to each one individually, but we offer that you follow up with us by sending a quick email. We’ll be able to reach back out to you to answer any questions related to having the conversation—not legal bylaws or anything like that.
Once you’ve typed in your question, you can close the question box and focus back on the screen. Be assured that we’re going to address as many questions as possible. Our focus is on the challenging conversations that occur in the workplace related to COVID-19—whether that’s between employees or between managers and employees. So we’re really narrowing in, with the time we have today, on workplace conversations.
For those that may be interested in customer relations and those types of challenging conversations, do know that we’re going to share some resources at the end that you can leverage for those situations. We’ll also be providing you with some dates for courses in which we will spend time discussing those specific scenarios.
So, as I said…
Challenges
As workplaces are reopening, there are a lot of new health and safety protocols. Because of that, there will likely be some new and different challenging conversations that people will have to have—whether it’s around physical distancing, whether it’s around people not sanitizing shared spaces, or items being used in the office. It could also be about wearing masks.
Now, I know for some, when we say “wearing masks,” it might be as simple as just telling someone to put the mask on. And let’s be clear: in certain cases, it may be that simple. In other cases—and from what I’ve heard—it may not be all so clear-cut.
Let’s take the mask, for example. Someone’s wearing the mask… but maybe they’re wearing it like this—not covering their nose. So that’s an issue. Or maybe you’ve seen this one, where they’re wearing the mask kind of like an earring—or like a football player with a chin strap.
Now, I don’t mean to make light of it. What I’m saying is that there are different interpretations, different understandings. That may cause some of the difficulty when we have conversations around things like wearing masks or physical distancing.
So today, we’re going to provide you with a framework and phrases to help you ease into these challenging conversations regarding COVID-19. I’m going to say it again: today, we’re going to provide you with a framework and phrases to help you ease into those conversations related to COVID-19.
But right now, I want to hear from you. We want to hear from all the people who have joined us. I’m going to ask my colleague Elizabeth to share a poll so we can hear and get some of your thoughts.
In a moment, Elizabeth is going to put up a poll, and we just want to hear from you: what are your top two concerns about having challenging COVID-19-related conversations? Take a moment, click at least two of them, and let us know your thoughts.
Poll Results
At the result—yeah, making the situation worse. Look at that—47% of people listed that as one of their top concerns. One of their top concerns is, if we don’t get the conversation correct, it can make the situation worse. That can damage relationships. I see that as the next highest one, and of course, not knowing what to say.
See, when I see this, it’s clear why it’s important to have these conversations and to have the skills and tools necessary to have the conversation. Here’s what I see: I see a lot of attention—and rightfully so—being spent on, “Okay, people are coming into the workplace. Do we have the Plexiglas up? Are we going to manage how many people come into the office at the same time? And wearing masks—make sure people wear masks.” All these things are necessary for safe physical space.
But I ask you, are people spending the time equipping their staff—their colleagues—with the skills and tools to have the conversation when compliance is not met? I’m going to make a prediction here: there is going to be a time when someone is not complying, for some reason, and it’s going to be a challenging conversation.
So I ask you, are your colleagues prepared to have these conversations? Has there been attention on equipping them with the skills, tools, and phrases to have these conversations? That’s what we’re hoping to help you with at some point over the next 40 minutes.
So let me go to another poll question. Let’s get another poll question, and this poll question has to do with how you’re feeling about these conversations. So—which words best describe how you feel about having challenging COVID-related conversations? Give you a few moments to get in your thoughts…
All right—again, they’re coming in. All right, give you a few more—about 70% of people replying.
Okay—there we go. Elizabeth is sharing the poll results. So… anxious—yes, anxious and uncertain.
Anxious Uncertain
What can we expect? Of course, we’re going to be a bit uncertain about it because, again, it’s a new norm. It’s a new world—we might not be sure. I see there are some people, or at least one or two people, who feel happy about it. So that’s great to know that for some people, they might be looking forward to it. But I think the reality is, for a lot of us—or many of us—it could feel uncertain and create some anxiety.
I was reading an article by Julia Marcus—she is an epidemiologist and professor from Harvard Medical School—and she mentioned that the pandemic has people beaten down, run down from four or five months of physical distancing and, for some, isolation. Now our anxieties might be heightened. We might be a bit quicker to be triggered.
For some, when we tell people to wear a mask, it’s a reminder of, “Oh my gosh, not again.” It recalls all the work we’ve done up to this point and still, we’re not in the clear. It’s so uncertain for so many of us, and that’s creating some anxiety. For some, telling someone to cover their face feels like, “That’s my identity, and you’re telling me to cover it up.” Now, to be clear, for some people that’s fine—but it’s all these things and uncertainties that cause many of the emotions we’re feeling when it comes to having these challenging conversations. And that’s what we’re going to look at today.
So what I’d like to do is invite my colleagues to join me. They’re going to join me so we can have some discussions and provide you with the framework and phrases to ease into these conversations.
All right—look at that! I’m not alone now. I have Jason Stead and Eleanor Whitmore joining me.
Let me do some brief introductions. Eleanor Whitmore is the Vice President of the Stitt Feld Handy Group. She has a lot of expertise in having challenging conversations and designed our initial Dealing with Difficult People course and workshop. A wealth of knowledge and expertise—I’m so glad to have her joining me here on this webinar.
Also, we have the esteemed Jason Stead. Jason is one of our instructors and also an adjunct professor at the University of Toronto. Again, a wealth of knowledge in having these conversations—how to negotiate these conversations and so much more. I’d like to welcome them both to join me here this morning—well, morning for me, maybe afternoon for some people.
So why don’t we get started? And Jason, why don’t you tell us about what I hinted at when I said “ease into the conversation”? What have I been alluding to by easing into the conversation? Jason, tell us about that.
The Ease Model
Sure. Thank you, Oliver, for the introduction and the ease into this conversation—a bit about having some difficult conversations during the time of COVID. We’re going to be talking about a model that is based on the letters E, A, S, and E. You should be able to see on your screens now the initial letters E, A, S, and E for the EASE model.
If we could go to the next slide, you can see what those letters will indicate. The first E is going to stand for Emotional check-in—we’re doing an emotional check-in on yourself. The next letter, A, is going to stand for Analyzing. Next, you’ll get to an S—Speak—but speak with a question mark: Should we be speaking? And then finally, the last E—Explain.
We’ll be going a bit more into detail on what those different letters and little lines mean. Thank you, Jason.
Safety
So that’s the framework we’re going to use to help you ease into these conversations. Now, I’m going to ask Eleanor in a moment to break down the “E” and the “A,” and what that really means. But before that, I just want to remind people that, before we ease into these conversations, what’s really critical is safety.
The first thing we have to think about is safety. Am I maintaining my safety in having these conversations? By that, I mean, perhaps you need to address physical distancing with someone in the workplace because you have that colleague who keeps standing right here. Well, safety might mean—before addressing how close they are to you—if possible, take a few steps back.
Safety might mean, if you have to address someone in the workplace around wearing a mask and you think it may be at risk of escalating, perhaps safety is having a couple of other colleagues on standby in case you need some extra support. Safety could mean, “Okay, I need to have this conversation about someone not wearing a mask—maybe I need to do it over the phone instead of being too close to them.”
So, we want you to keep that in mind: it starts with safety, and then we can ease into the conversation.
Eleanor, why don’t you tell us about the first “E,” which is Emotional Check-in?
Emotional Check-In
Yeah, so thanks, Oliver. I was thinking that people might be wondering why our first step of the template is emotional check-in, although anybody who’s taken any training with me knows how much I love dealing with emotion—so maybe not surprising. But I think the reason why we started with an emotional check-in is because, if a conversation has a lot of unprocessed emotional content, it’s going to make the conversation more difficult. Health and safety issues—and COVID is clearly an example of one—tend to bring up a lot of emotional content for people.
So, if you’re heading into a conversation—and we’ve heard people say they’re feeling anxious, or they’re feeling scared, or uncertain, or angry, or frustrated—if that emotional content is present but hasn’t really been processed, the risk is that the content is going to leak out in the conversation. That’s going to have the potential to impact the way in which the message is delivered.
If I’m going into a conversation and perhaps I’m very anxious or uncertain, or I’m angry, the other person may, first of all, just pick up on the emotional content. If it hasn’t been processed, they’ll pick up on it and may simply shut down. They may not hear anything. They may get concerned themselves or afraid, and they just shut down. Or, they may only pick up on the emotional content. They might be thinking, “Gosh, she’s really angry,” or “She’s super frustrated,” and they get the emotional content—but they don’t get the message I’m trying to deliver. Certainly, they may not get the nuances or subtleties of it.
So I want to process the emotional content so that I can deliver the message in a way that increases the likelihood of it being received the way I want it to be received—and also so I don’t regret how I delivered it. So I don’t think afterward, “Oh, I got too mad,” or “I was too upset.” I don’t regret the delivery.
So I think that’s why we think it’s a good place to start.
Okay, so thank you for that, Eleanor. You’ve said a lot there, so let me ask you this: What would…
Managing Emotions
Be your advice in terms of being able to handle and address emotions—I mean, how to do the check-in. How to do the check-in. Yes, so I think the advice would be very similar to the advice that we provide generally around managing emotional content, but I’ll just, you know, in a nutshell…
I think the first thing is: just pay attention to the emotional content. So make sure that you check in with yourself—”How am I feeling?” And maybe do a little bit of a deeper dive on that. So maybe at first, you think you’re angry about having to have the conversation, but then you really realize, “It’s not that I’m so angry, it’s that I’m afraid or I’m uncertain.” So first of all, just pay attention to it.
I think the second thing is: a lot of people benefit from doing something to manage the physical response to the emotional content. So remembering to breathe and to try to slow down their breathing. Or some people might want to go for a walk around the block if they can before they have the conversation. Or they might want to stand up and shake it out—like sort of do something to get physically grounded.
And then, I think, process the emotion. And how you do that is going to depend on your personality and the circumstances. So it may be that you want to talk it through with a colleague and just explain how frustrated you are that you have to have this conversation. Or you may want to do some self-talk and process it internally. You may want to write out some notes—just something that helps you manage the emotional content.
You may decide that, in the conversation, you actually want to describe the emotional content. So you might want to say, “You know, I’m quite concerned about this situation,” or “I’m kind of frustrated that we’ve had to have this conversation a couple of times now.” So you may want to describe it—and if you’re going to describe it, you need to know what it is and think about how you’re going to say it.
So I think that would be another piece. I think the other thing is—particularly these days—I really try to keep in mind that I just think everybody is having a hard time. I think it is really hard for people out there—to varying and lesser degrees and for different reasons—but I think nobody is having a good time. And that means you can anticipate that the other person is going to have a lot of emotional content too—that they may just be upset or concerned or scared or frustrated, anxious, quite apart from this conversation.
So just being mindful of that, I think, is important as part of the check-in piece.
Yeah, so thank you for that—a lot there. And part of it depends…
Analyzing
On different strategies—so I like that there are a lot of strategies because, depending on the person and their style, they have different strategies and tools to be able to do that emotional check-in. That’s a great point: a lot of people are going through this. You know, when I watch the viral videos of people being triggered in a supermarket or other public places, there’s just so much emotion going on. So I think it’s important for all of us to kind of start with that check-in.
Then what about the “A”? Talk to us about the “A,” Amis. So I think the “A” stands for Analyze, and what we’re trying to do is remind people that you really increase the likelihood of the conversation being effective if you do some analyzing in advance—of the situation, the context, and what you’re trying to achieve.
I was thinking it might be helpful to share a couple of questions that could help people analyze the situation. I want to be clear: these questions aren’t necessarily in a specific order because I think they’re more interconnected than sequenced. But some questions that people might want to think about include:
First and foremost—what’s the goal of having the conversation? That may seem like a surprising question, but in some cases, the goal may simply be “I need that person to change their behavior right now,” and it’s a one-off—like the person who put their hands on your grocery cart. In other cases, it may be that you’re really trying to educate the person and/or persuade them to change their behavior. So it’s good to be clear about the goal.
Some of that ties into what you think might be behind the behavior—you can never be sure. What I mean by that is, on those days when we’re back in the office and I’m in the parking lot, I may see a colleague getting out of the car not wearing a mask, even though I know he’s committed to wearing one. I might think, “Oh gosh, he’s forgotten,” and just say, “Hey, I think you forgot your mask.” Because we’re going to be in situations where we might forget.
Is the person not wearing a mask because they forgot? Is it because of, for lack of a better word, ignorance—they don’t know any better yet? Or is it that I know they’ve participated in protests against mask-wearing, so I think it’s a more determined behavior? I’m going to want to try to figure out what’s behind it.
I also need to consider the fact that I may have multiple goals in the conversation. I noticed in the earlier poll that people said one of their concerns was damaging relationships. So, I may want to change the person’s behavior and maintain the relationship. Or, I may want to change the behavior but not negatively impact productivity, because if they’re mad at me, they might sabotage our project. So there may be several goals at play.
People might want to ask themselves: “Do I have an obligation to have this conversation?” If so, you’ll have to go ahead. There may be certain people in the workplace who have a legal or procedural obligation to ensure health and safety standards are met. In other cases, it may not be an obligation, but an opportunity—so you could choose to speak to your colleague about it.
Do I have the authority to require compliance? That might influence how I structure the conversation. What facts might I be missing? I know I’ve seen people not wearing masks, and I might feel concerned, but I may not realize they have an underlying medical condition. For example, my father has a health issue that prevents him from wearing a mask—his breathing is quite labored.
So it may be something like that. Stay open to the idea that you might be reacting without all the facts. I think that’s the key—ask yourself, “Do I have all the information?” Also, am I the right person to have the conversation? It may be that this is a conversation your manager should be having, and you might want to speak with them instead.
Lastly, give some thought to the process. As you said before—are you doing it over the phone? In person? Over Zoom? And what’s the right timing for the conversation?
If you consider those—and other—questions to analyze the context and your goals, you increase the likelihood of having an effective conversation.
Thank you for that, Eleanor—very detailed, with a lot for us to think about. One of the things that comes to mind, and I’m curious for your thoughts, Jason—if you have any thoughts as well—what if you want to have the conversation but realize that you don’t have the authority? For example, they don’t report to you. Does that change anything? Any thoughts on that?
Well, I think for me it’s one question to ask myself. But again, if I’m talking to a colleague I like and have a good relationship with, and I think they’ve forgotten their mask, I may have no authority to make them comply—but I don’t need authority because I think they’ll comply. I think they just forgot.
But if it’s somebody who—maybe I’ve spoken to them and they haven’t changed their behavior—or I know they have a stance against mask-wearing, then there may be circumstances where I think, “I’m not going to be able to influence them. I’m not going to be able to persuade them.” Authority may be required. And if I don’t have the authority, then I may need to go to the person who does have the authority.
Thank you for that—and just a note…
QA
Couple things when I just look at the Q&A: if you have some questions, feel free to put them in the Q&A. Some people are asking, “Will you get a copy of the slides?” Yes, we’ll be sending out a copy of the slides and the extra resources.
Just to touch back on that again, Eleanor, there’s a part of it where I’m kind of hearing that—at least at first pass—it might be about giving people the benefit of the doubt. Like, is there some information that I’m missing? Do we have different understandings of what’s going on?
I’m reminded of getting my hair cut. So I went to get my hair cut and the barber was great, had his mask on. He told me, “Oliver, it might be warm because it just came out of the dryer.” He was wearing his mask and everything. And although he was wearing his mask because there were some other people around and he didn’t want them to hear what he was saying to me, all of a sudden I see him and his face is like right here—whispering something to me.
There’s a part where, okay, yes, you have a mask, but there’s also a distance as well. Again, people may just have different visions. This person obviously was familiar with all the standards but had a different thought—or just forgot in the moment. Just because you wear a mask, you don’t have to whisper in my hair like that.
So thank you. It’s okay. Let’s move on to the “S.” Tell us about the “S” in EASE.
Sure. So the “S” is for Speak—and “Speak” with a question mark. Is this an appropriate time to speak? Is this a conversation that’s better to have now or better to have later?
Going back to the poll question about some of the biggest concerns from the group, I noted that the top ones were making the situation worse and damaging the relationship. Those are real things to take into account when you’re deciding whether now is an appropriate time to speak.
I think we’ve all experienced times where we’re in a situation and there’s something we may want to say—a conversation we may want to have. You want to get the point out to the other person, but you realize on some level that, if I speak now, that has the potential to make the situation worse. Maybe, if I had this conversation tomorrow—or maybe it’s not even a conversation that needs to be had at all—that might be a better way to think about it.
That applies in this context too. With respect to damaging the relationship, you want to think about: Would speaking now damage the relationship? And then the flip side: Would not speaking now damage the relationship?
COVID has left open a lot of situations where, say in Eleanor’s case, there’s a colleague who’s not wearing their mask. You don’t know why. You think, “I’m not going to speak to them; I don’t want to have this conversation. They’re probably someone who protests wearing masks.” So you distance yourself and avoid dealing with them. But potentially, it’s just, “I slipped my mind. I totally forgot. I’m so used to coming into the office and not wearing a mask.” Just having that conversation can help build and maintain the relationship. Avoiding it could actually damage the relationship.
So it works on both ends. You’re asking yourself, “Should I speak? What’s going to be better for the relationship? Am I going to make the situation worse?”
Thank you—I like that, because I think we don’t always consider the impacts. We think about the impacts of speaking, but not always about the impacts of not speaking. So thank you for making that very clear, and it speaks to why we have that question mark—because there’s something to think about in terms of speaking or not speaking.
What about the final “E,” Jason?
So the final “E” is getting into Explain. This is where you’re talking to the other person, assuming you’ve made the decision in the “Speak” step that yes, you are going to speak.
So if you’re going to speak, you’re going to explain some things to the other person. You want to explain how the behavior is impacting you. You may want to ask them to stop the behavior. You may want to offer a reminder. You may want to ask them questions about what’s happening—why they’re not complying, why they’re doing what they’re doing, and where that’s coming from.
One thing that’s really important with Explain is to be mindful of how you’re communicating. Over the last few months, a lot has changed with how we communicate. There’s a lot that’s different about how I’m communicating right now compared to how I would be if we were all in person together.
Another thing that’s different is wearing a mask. If I’m wearing a mask and my mouth and face are covered, you can’t tell if I’m smiling. You can’t really tell what I’m trying to portray. It’s a lot harder to read tone—even body language—through a mask. It’s harder to read nonverbal cues.
So when you’re talking, it’s important to be clear. You may need to be more expressive about your tone than you normally would be. You may also need to mention some things explicitly. You may need to say, “It’s so nice to see you,” or something similar to convey happiness. If you’re trying to convey seriousness, you may need to say something to communicate that tone directly.
There’s additional work that needs to be done, and we need to be really mindful of our tone—because people are going to have a harder time picking up on the nonverbal cues that are usually easy to detect when you’re interacting with someone in person.
Great. Thank you for that, Jason. Lots to think about with Explain. So let me just recap…
Recap
When we talk about easing into some of these challenging COVID-related conversations, what we’re saying is: only through being mindful of your safety can we begin. First, let’s do the emotional check-in. Let’s analyze what’s going on—maybe it’s giving someone the benefit of the doubt if it’s the first time—but there are some questions to guide us in analyzing it. Then, let’s determine if we are going to say something or not. Remember, even not saying anything does send a message. Then, as Jason just said, let’s explain. That is a framework that could be helpful in easing into some of these challenging conversations.
Now, the framework is not to determine what the outcome is going to be. After that, I’d say, we have to listen. So once you’ve done the explanation, let’s pause, let’s listen, and then let’s engage in further dialogue as necessary.
Now, here’s the thing I think some people are thinking—and I saw it as a question that popped up—is: we need to explain, Jason, we need to explain this stuff… but what do I say? What do I say? What are your thoughts, and what are some language and phrasing that could be helpful for us?
For sure. Part of it is dependent on the different situations. In your different contexts, you’re going to be using some different language. In terms of a couple of different ideas, one possibility is using what we call “standards of legitimacy.” What you could say is, “Our company policy is to wear a mask. Is there any reason you’re not wearing one?” That’s just putting the question to them, while referring back to something concrete. You didn’t come up with the company policy—you’re just referring to something outside of your relationship and outside of this conversation to try to be persuasive.
Another possible approach you might take in terms of explaining is taking some of the blame on yourself. You may say something like, “I have a family member who’s very vulnerable, so I have to be extra cautious.” Or you might say something like, “Maybe I’m overreacting, but if you stand back a few steps it would help me to feel more comfortable.” By not putting it on the other person, and avoiding blame or attack, they may be more likely to hear you out and listen to what you’re saying.
Let me jump in there because one of the questions that came up was, “Oliver, what did you do in that situation?”—the situation being the barber kind of right in my ear. Well, when that happened, I mostly went with the nonverbal. He saw a little flinch—but I couldn’t flinch too much, because as you can imagine, there’s a sharp object in my hair, and I didn’t want to mess up the fade. But then I took some time to think about it and said, “You know what, if he does come back to do that again,” in my mind it was going to be essentially what you were saying there, Jason: “Maybe I’m overreacting… if you can just refrain from whispering, it’s going to help me feel a bit more comfortable getting my hair cut.”
So that’s that. And I’m not sure if you could tell—the approach I took was not to get a haircut in the first place. I avoided the situation altogether—safety first, right? Just a point to steep in.
Got you. Eleanor, did you want to add one or two phrases?
I did actually, because I was remembering—thank goodness we’re all in the learning phase about how to do this—and one of the very first times I went for a walk with a friend of mine, we were going to maintain physical distance. We were out at a big park, and we started out six feet apart, but I noticed he was getting closer—because it’s just natural, right? It’s still new for us. So he was coming toward me, and I was feeling a bit awkward. I didn’t want to criticize him or anything. So then I said, “I think we’re supposed to keep the distance a little further,” and I could see that it landed a little badly.
He said, “Do you think I haven’t been careful or something?” And what I tried there—and I’ve been working on it ever since—is to be clear to people that for me, it’s as much about protecting them as it is protecting me. So absolutely, I’m hoping not to get it, but now that we know that people may be asymptomatic, I also want not to give it to somebody.
So what came up for me was just sort of saying, “I would feel terrible if I ended up giving it to you.” It’s both ways. That was one thing for me.
Then I’m also a big fan—when I can—of helping other people to save face. Again, I think for many of us, we’re going to forget, we’re going to make mistakes. This is new to us—especially when we go back to the office. It’s been a while since we’ve had to behave this way in the workplace. So I might say, “Gosh, things have changed so much since we were last in the office. It’s easy to forget your mask—I think you may have just forgotten,” or just say, “Things keep changing; it’s a lot to keep up with. I think we’re supposed to stick six feet apart,” to give them a chance to save face.
Alright, so thank you for that, Eleanor. And just so you know, we have a few more of these phrases that we’re going to share with you in our follow-up resources—which you’ll likely get tomorrow at some point. So do check that out, because you’ll see some other wording and various options that may apply to your specific situation.
I find it helpful to just have them. These conversations will happen—you just don’t know when. So by having some kind of stock phrases or wording, that can be helpful in the moment.
I’m going to go to the Q&A, but what I’m hoping at this point is that you’re starting to see how having a framework and phrases can help you ease into these conversations.
I just want to share with you a couple of other things we’re doing to help in this initiative or to help share the knowledge. We have a couple of workshops coming up—one of them is called Winning Over Irate Customers—and that’s focused…
Upcoming Workshops
For frontline staff who have to have some of these challenging COVID-related conversations with customers—whether it’s people working in retail or in a front-facing administrative role—I think back to other workshops where it could be someone in a municipality who deals with external clients over the phone. As we know, the anxiety there leads to some simple requests escalating. This is meant for that group. It’s called Winning Over Irate Customers, with a COVID-19 focus. We’re going to have a one-day session from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on August 24th. For those who prefer the half-day or can only allow their staff to attend for a half-day, it will be held on September 15th and 16th.
The other course that we’re offering is what I’d call an Advanced Dealing with Difficult People course—a one-day course for those who already took our Dealing with Difficult People workshop. This is now focused on difficult conversations related to COVID in the workplace—for managers, HR staff, and so forth. It’s an enhancement of the three-day workshop you would have taken before. You’re going to get details on this in the follow-up email, but I just wanted to announce it to you on the webinar today because you’re going to have first access to register. We’re not going to be releasing this to the public until Friday afternoon, so now is your window. The investment is $425, which I think is a good investment for one full day or two half-days.
Okay, let’s look at the Q&A. We have a couple of minutes, so for those who have to head out at 11:45, that’s fine—feel free to say goodbye. You’re going to get some follow-up resources. We will take a couple of questions for those who sent some in. I know we’ve answered some along the way.
One of the questions for the panelists is: How does one keep their emotions in check and not get angry in the moment? Since Eleanor, you spoke about emotions, I’m going to put that question to you.
Yeah, so I guess I would say it’s really hard to do. I think the best thing you can do is try to anticipate if you’re going to get angry. As I said, figure out what’s going to work for you to manage that emotional content. It may be, sometimes, that you need to articulate it—to just say to the person, “I’m finding myself getting a bit angry here.” Sometimes even saying it aloud will help release it a little. There may be other times when you just say, “I think we’re going to have to continue this conversation later.” So you may not be able to continue the conversation.
I think it’s okay to have the emotional content. It’s about whether you can process it to the degree that you are still able to have the conversation effectively. Sometimes, the emotional content is important feedback for people. The fact that you’re angry is important for them to know and understand—you just don’t want to deliver it in an extremely angry way. That’s where we get into trouble. So those would be some top-of-mind thoughts.
All right, thank you for that, Eleanor. A couple more questions—in the framework, can this be used to also identify whether you should speak or communicate in other ways, such as writing? Jason, why don’t I put that to you?
Yeah, so given that the “Speak” part of EASE includes a question mark, I think it’s a good question. The answer doesn’t necessarily mean “Yes, I want to speak out loud.” The answer could be, “Maybe this conversation is better to have over video,” where you’re speaking but not in person—maybe because there’s a safety concern. Maybe there are reasons why it would be better to answer in writing. Maybe it’s better to say something to them in writing. And again, going back to the earlier comment about authority, maybe it’s better to bring it up to somebody else.
Those are all considerations you want to think about in terms of “Should I be speaking?” or “What approach should I be taking?” What’s important to keep in mind is: whatever approach you’re taking, that’s an approach. That’s a decision you’re making to do something. Deciding not to do anything is still a decision. Deciding to do something by writing is still a decision.
All right, thank you for that, Jason. I realize we’re at 11:45. I will take a couple more questions. Again, if we don’t get to your question, feel free to just take the same question and email it to us. I see a few that are a bit more specific, and I think would be worth a conversation—so definitely open to having that conversation.
Here’s a question, and it looks like it’s back to you, Eleanor. Emotions—Is the emotional check-in only for us, or are we also checking in on the individuals?
Yeah, so this is a great time to maybe just put forward a quick reminder that the EASE template is about what we’re doing to prepare for the conversation and get the conversation started. It doesn’t go as far into the conversation itself. So in theory, the check-in is for ourselves—this is how we’re preparing.
But I think the question is an excellent reminder that we may want to check in with the person during the actual conversation. I did say, as part of the prep, at least be mindful that chances are they have a lot of emotional content. Whether you want to check in with them or not will depend on the circumstances. But absolutely, I think it’s a good thing to think about—whether you might want to say, “How are you doing these days?” or “What feelings are coming up for you around wearing a mask?” or whatever it is. But to explicitly check in with them—absolutely.
All right, thank you. So let’s end on this question. I think it’s one that several people might be thinking about: How do I have these conversations when people are aggressive, passionate, or borderline violent?
Again, let me put that out to the panel. Who wants to take the first stab at that one?
I’ll take a crack at it, and then I’m going to hope Jason will have a chance to answer with some reflection.
You know, I feel very differently when the word passionate is used than when we transition to borderline violent. I think when we talk about borderline violence—you’d mentioned safety before, Oliver—and I think you were speaking more specifically, like, “Do I feel safe with respect to COVID? Do I need to keep my six feet of distance from this person?” But this is a reminder that safety is in all categories. So if I think somebody might be potentially violent, that’s going to have an enormous impact on whether and how I have the conversation.
Do I do it over Zoom instead of in person? If I have to do it in person, do I want somebody else there? If there’s any risk of violence, I think that’s a whole different thing than if I just think this person feels very strongly about the issue but can manage not to be violent.
In that case, I think the advice is just to acknowledge it. Just say, “My sense is that you feel very strongly about this,” to convey that you’ve registered how passionate they are about it. Then say, “Can you tell me more about why you feel strongly?” or “I’d like to understand that better.”
Again, we come from the perspective that the best way to persuade someone is to understand where they’re coming from—to understand their perspective. So if I just thought they had a very strong view, I’d acknowledge it and inquire about it. But if it’s violence—that’s a different matter.
Thanks so much. Jason, did you want to jump in?
Yeah—just to sort of add on, because I agree with what Eleanor was saying. But the mentality of de-escalating some of those situations—again, if it’s a violent situation, you want to be thinking safety first. You don’t want to be having the conversation when someone is throwing punches. That’s not the situation anyone should be in.
I think going back to what Oliver talked about—some of those viral…
Viral Videos
Videos that we all see it does seem to me sometimes like the focus of the person the camera is to get a viral video and they’re more focused on how can I get a good funny viral video that’s gonna get me a lot of likes on Twitter rather than okay this person’s clearly really upset this person’s clearly really bothered is there something that we can do to put forward to demonstrate to them that we’re willing to hear them out where maybe they’re so passionate because they feel like nobody’s listening and being open to listening hearing them out can I would say potentially be helpful again not in those necessarily violent situations but maybe in the more passionate situations and what you’re hearing from both of my colleagues is there’s a part about this that’s about de-escalation and unfortunate we don’t have the time to talk about that but we do talk about those in our workshops how to de-escalate people so that now they’re engaged and having some of these conversations I recognize it seems challenging at the outset but that’s kind of the first step to be able to start to engage with people I see one question that’s just a quick answer and that’s to take the advanced training do I have to take the dealing with difficult people workshop first short answer is yes because this one day and it’s a bit less than one day from about 9:00 to 3:00 p.m. is going to pick up we’re assuming that you have the knowledge and content from before and we’re taking from there so that’s the short answer let me take a moment to thank my colleagues here both Jason and Eleanor I know mark has been behind the scenes responding to some of you with your questions for those who still don’t get their question answered again a reminder do reach out to us we’d love to be able to connect with you if you haven’t figured it out we like talking about this stuff and we really do want to help people to interact better together we want to end by doing a last poll and this poll is just to give us some information that can help us with future webinars so it’s gonna ask you for some possible webinar ideas based on some ideas that we thought of and some other things if you can take your last 90 seconds to fill out that poll we’d be eternally grateful thank you so much for joining us on experts corner and we’re looking forward to seeing you at a future expert corner or at one of our workshops thank you so much thank you all good luck thank you everyone.
Does your workplace meet the Health and Safety standards to re-open after the pandemic?
Do you know what to do if an employee suggests they don’t feel safe returning to work?
As an employee, if you don’t feel safe, do you know what to do?
How do Health and Safety requirements apply for people working from home?
Health and Safety in the workplace is always an important issue for all of us. These days, it is front and centre. With workplaces poised to re-open, employers and employees may face some challenging issues and have difficult conversations regarding health and safety in the workplace.
This is an informative and interactive webinar with Doug MacLeod, a leading employment lawyer with over 30 years of experience. Doug discusses Health and Safety issues in this new environment and takes questions from the audience. He shares ideas about managing the challenging conversations associated with these requests.
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.
Webinar: Health and Safety During the Covid-19 Pandemic
Here’s the video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9Z5TOixwr4
{Transcript}
[Music]
My name is Eleanor Witor, and I would like to welcome you to our webinar on health and safety issues during the pandemic. I’m the Vice President of the Stitt Feld Handy Group, and at the Stitt Feld Handy Group, we do a number of things. We offer training on negotiation, mediation, and conflict resolution, how to have difficult conversations, and deal with difficult people. We also provide services to our clients, mostly around workplace issues. That can include workplace mediation for people who may be having a dispute in the workplace or workplace restoration when there’s a team and maybe they’re looking for ways to function more effectively. We also provide coaching and a variety of other support services.
Like many of you, we’ve transitioned to offering our services online and remotely. We now offer virtual instructor-led training, which is essentially live training—just done online. That includes role plays and exercises, all conducted online. We now also provide our mediation services and coaching services online as well.
Our Purpose
Whether we’re offering training or services, historically, we were doing it all in person. But again, like many of you, we’ve had to transition to doing that online. Whether it’s online or in person, mediation or training, our purpose is always the same. Our purpose at the Stitt Feld Handy Group is to try to help people live and work better together.
These days, living and working better together are presenting some unique challenges. So one of the things that we decided amongst ourselves—when we started to work remotely and when the pandemic occurred—was to try to find additional ways that we might be able to reach out to people and meet our purpose of helping people live and work better together. One of the ideas we came up with was the idea of offering short, free webinars that would hopefully provide people with some relevant information and some tips and techniques that would be helpful as we all navigate these challenging and choppy waters.
When we thought of the idea of Expert Corner, what we hoped to do was to draw upon the expertise within our own organization and within our broader network of people. One of the first people who came to our minds was Doug McLeod. Doug was introduced to us many years ago when he took a workshop on negotiation and mediation with us. He’s here today because of his deep expertise in labor and employment issues.
Doug is the founder of the McLeod Law Firm, which is a Canadian labor and employment law firm. He’s got almost 30 years of experience in the field, and in fact, in 2018, he received the Award of Excellence from his colleagues at the Ontario Bar Association’s Labor and Employment Law section—a pretty significant accolade from your peers.
Doug’s Background
The other thing that’s notable about Doug, including the breadth and depth of his experience, is that Doug and his associates provide advice and representation to both employers and employees. For those of you familiar with the field, you’ll know it’s unusual to come across lawyers who have expertise representing both sides—and therefore understand the challenges from both perspectives.
Doug also writes a blog, which I’ve found to be very informative. It’s succinct, clearly written, and when you’re looking for information through complex situations, it can be very useful. These are just some of the reasons we felt Doug would be a great person to include in our expert series. We were very grateful when he agreed to contribute his expertise through this webinar.
In a moment, I’m going to invite Doug to join me, but I just want to deal with a couple of logistical things about the webinar.
Logistics
In addition to Doug, two of my colleagues are providing terrific assistance to make this webinar possible. Jason Stead is going to be behind the scenes, monitoring the questions you send in. If you have a question, you’ll notice at the bottom of your screen there’s an icon with a Q&A symbol. Please click on the icon, and a window will open where you can type in your question. It will go to Jason.
We then encourage you to close your question window so you can continue to watch the webinar. What Jason is going to do is read through the questions—because we have a very large audience today—and try to identify themes that might be relevant to a broad group of people. Please note: your question may not be worded exactly as you submitted it, because it may be blended with related questions, but your question will hopefully still be submitted to be answered by Doug today. We’ll do our best to have Doug answer as many questions as possible, though time will be somewhat limited.
We also have the assistance of Elizabeth Jamieson. Elizabeth is handling all the technical aspects behind the scenes. The fact that you can see me, hear us, and submit questions is all thanks to Elizabeth, who will be helping us throughout the webinar.
At 11:45, just as we conclude the webinar, there will be an opportunity to participate in a very short poll. The purpose of the poll is to help us understand a little more about the audience and what topics you might want us to address in future webinars. At the moment, we’re planning our next webinar for July 14th at 11:00 a.m. We’ll obviously send out more information, but the focus will be on how to have difficult conversations related to COVID—whether that’s speaking to someone about maintaining physical distance, requesting they wear a mask, or any of the specific kinds of difficult conversations that we might now need to have.
Also, at the end of the webinar, we’re going to send out a resource sheet…
Resources
Everybody who attended today will, we hope, receive the resource sheet within the next day or two. We try to design the resource sheet to include information that’s been addressed in the webinar, as well as additional information. We’ll make sure that gets out shortly.
Lastly, we’ve invited Doug because of his terrific expertise in this area, but please note that what he’ll be providing today is legal information. He’s not in a position to provide legal advice based on the brief questions that people are submitting. So if you do need legal advice, we would encourage you to reach out to Doug directly, or to other lawyers who have employment expertise, to retain them and receive legal advice. The focus of this webinar is on sharing legal information.
Doug
On that note, I am going to invite Doug to join us. Good morning, Doug—there we are. Good morning, nice to see you, and I’ll just unmute you for a moment so you can say hello. There you go.
Good morning, and good morning to your participants. Thank you.
Okay, so I just thought, Doug, maybe I would start with a sort of general question. I was thinking this morning that there have probably been health and safety issues in the workplace as long as there have been workplaces. There probably wasn’t health and safety legislation, but there were health and safety issues as long as there have been workplaces.
Of course, the focus these days is on health and safety issues presented by the pandemic, and particularly now that people are going back into the workplace and workplaces are reopening. So I was just wondering if you could talk—just as a sort of starting point—about where people might find information around what the standards should be as they return to the workplace.
OSHA
Sure. The main health and safety law in Ontario is called the Occupational Health and Safety Act—or OSHA. Every jurisdiction in Canada has one, and in the States, the same thing. As you alluded to, it’s been around for a long time. There are 26 regulations underneath the Act. The Industrial Establishments Regulation is probably the one most people listening are familiar with.
Now, of course, OSHA does not contemplate COVID, so there’s nothing specific in the legislation right now. As of yesterday, the Ministry of Labour, which administers OSHA, indicated it had inspected almost 11,000 workplaces since COVID broke out. There have been over 66 orders issued to comply with one section of OSHA or another, and they’ve issued 23 stop-work orders. So the Ministry of Labour has been very busy since COVID hit.
The Ministry also provides some really good resources, which I’ll quickly refer to. On their website—if you go to the Ontario Ministry of Labour website—they’ve got a section called “Resources to Prevent COVID in the Workplace.” There, you’ll find posters you can download and print, as well as sector-specific guidance for over 100 sectors in the economy. If you haven’t visited that website to look at the guidance for your sector, please do so.
One reason for that is under OSHA, an employer has an obligation to take every precaution reasonable in the circumstances for the protection of workers. At a minimum, that would include being familiar with those sector-specific guidance sheets.
Yesterday, the ministry also published something very valuable called Developing Your COVID-19 Workplace Safety Plan. Here are the six questions they cover:
This was just released yesterday—it’s on the Ministry of Labour website. I encourage everybody to take a look if they haven’t already.
Public Health Ontario also has a lot of really good resources online. If you Google “Public Health Ontario COVID-19 public resources,” you’ll find helpful material that can be applied in the workplace as well.
Work Refusals
It sounds like those resources would be great places for employers to start in order to be informed and meet their requirement to take every reasonable precaution in the circumstances to protect employees.
Some of the questions we received in advance were from employees saying, “What if I return to the workplace and I don’t feel safe?” Maybe they feel the employer hasn’t met the standards, or something’s going on and they feel unsafe. What would happen in that circumstance?
There is a provision in OSHA that deals with work refusals. It’s been there a long time, and it’s basically a two-step process.
If an employee at work feels they’re exposed to a health and safety risk, they can put up their hand and say, “I don’t feel safe.” At that point, the employer must conduct an investigation into the safety concern the employee has identified. If there’s a Health and Safety Representative in the workplace, they must be involved. If there’s a Joint Health and Safety Committee, they must be involved as well.
At the end of the investigation, the employer either agrees with the employee and addresses the concern, or disagrees with the employee. If they disagree, the employee can escalate the issue by contacting the Ministry of Labour. The Ministry will send an inspector to conduct an independent, objective investigation into the employee’s concerns, and the inspector will make a decision.
So yes, an employee can trigger that work refusal process if they feel unsafe.
Pay During Work Refusal
What happens in terms of employee pay during that time—during the work refusal and while the investigations are being completed?
During both stages of the investigation, the employee is removed from the part of the workplace they feel is unsafe, and they are paid during that investigation process.
You said “part of the workplace that is feeling unsafe”—so one option might be for the employer to relocate the employee to a different location or workspace while the existing space is investigated?
Yes. The typical situation is something like a machine. If an employee normally works at a machine and it’s not guarded properly—or there’s some other concern—they are removed from that area and placed elsewhere in the workplace.
Mask Wearing Policy
One of the questions we received was: What is the employer’s ability to enforce mask-wearing for safety?
As you may know, the Premier yesterday said that while masks aren’t mandatory, he strongly recommends that people wear masks when they can’t socially distance or are in places where they’re more likely to spread the virus. So that’s the public health guidance.
Beyond that, an employer has the authority to implement reasonable rules. Under the requirement to take every precaution reasonable in the circumstances, if they decide to implement a mask-wearing policy, they can do so.
If an employee refuses, the employer—hopefully—can convince them why it’s necessary. It’s about protecting others in the workplace, not just the person wearing the mask. If the employee still refuses, the employer may, in the right circumstances, discipline them.
At-Risk Workers
Another question: How should we handle workers in the government-identified at-risk group—those particularly vulnerable to COVID?
I’m not aware of any specific requirements, but an employer does have a duty to accommodate a disability. If an employee goes to their doctor, and the doctor provides a note saying the employee has an underlying health condition and recommends certain accommodations, the employer must respond to it—just as they would to any accommodation request.
Refusal to Return
When an employee refuses to return to the workplace—not because they entered and felt unsafe, but because they say, for whatever mix of reasons, “I don’t feel safe coming into the workplace, so I’m not coming at all”—how should that be handled?
A general refusal without any reason is difficult to deal with. If there’s no good reason, then you could take the position that the person has quit. One of your responsibilities as an employee is to show up for work, and unless you have a good reason for not coming, it could be considered a resignation.
Another approach would be to say, “We’ve directed you to come to work, and you haven’t, so we’re going to discipline you.” What I would do is ask the employee why—why won’t they come to work? Do what you can to find out the underlying interest and the reason for their position. A bald “no” isn’t that helpful. I would start a difficult conversation with them and find out why they’re taking that position.
I note that there have been issues come up under the CERB regarding whether people are eligible if they’re recalled to work and don’t return. One of the government ministers, Wayne Easter, was asked about this. He said that although there’s nothing in the legislation directly addressing it, his view—and the government’s interpretation—is that if you’re recalled to work and there’s no good reason not to go back, then you won’t get the CERB. By analogy, you could argue the same: if public health authorities have said it’s safe to go back to work and you choose not to, then you are resigning. But I think most people don’t generally refuse to work—especially if they’re not getting paid—unless there’s a reason. So I would really encourage employers to find out what’s going on.
Unpaid Leave
Would one option be to treat it as an unpaid leave? That could be another way of approaching a situation if the person’s not coming back for some reason and needs some time.
If they gave a bit more information about their concern and it turns out they just need a relatively short period before they’re willing to return, then a leave of absence is something you could offer as an alternative.
Masks
What if the person says they can’t wear a mask either for health reasons or religious reasons?
As mentioned earlier, if it’s for health reasons, they would require a doctor’s letter indicating that mask-wearing should be accommodated. The same would apply for religious reasons. There are certain religions that prohibit wearing face coverings, and employers have a duty to accommodate on the basis of religion.
Getting to Work
Some concerns might not relate to the workplace itself, but to getting to the workplace—such as taking public transit. How can an employer address that?
A lot will depend on the length of the commute. For example, the City of Toronto is increasing bike lanes and encouraging biking as an alternative to transit. Walking is another option. But if someone lives far away—say, they work downtown but live in Oakville—that’s a long bike ride or walk.
Again, the same analysis applies. If public health authorities say it’s safe to take public transit and safety protocols are followed, then refusing to commute could be viewed as abandonment or insubordination—unless there’s a valid legal reason. Generally, an employer is responsible for health and safety in the workplace, not getting to the workplace. Employees are responsible for arriving at work, and unless there’s a good legal reason for not showing up, the employer could consider it a resignation.
Transportation Between Work Locations
What if employees are required to travel between multiple locations as part of their job?
Normally, people use a car for that. But if the employee is expected to take public transit between work sites and they have an underlying health condition that prohibits this—and their doctor supports the claim—then the employer must accommodate. Otherwise, if it’s always been part of the job and public health authorities say it’s safe, then the employee will likely have trouble justifying refusal.
Return to Work
Before transitioning to employer responsibilities for remote workers, is there anything else to touch on regarding health and safety and return to work?
Yes. I think it depends on where we are in the curve. If there are 600 new cases a day, people who are health-conscious will be more hesitant. If cases are under 200 or approaching zero, people will feel better. Governments take different approaches: some jurisdictions are more aggressive in reopening and may be ahead of public comfort, others behind. If a government is pushing for reopening and an employee is more health-sensitive, it can take time before they feel comfortable returning.
Assuming things improve, many people may need a short adjustment period. And as an employer, if this is a valuable contributor to your team who’s always been reliable, you may want to give them time to become comfortable again.
It’s an adjustment. Those of us working from home feel pretty safe there. So re-entering a workplace—with more people around and more issues—will require a transition for many.
Whether someone returns may also depend on whether remote work is possible. If they work on a manufacturing line, there’s nothing they can do from home. But if they’ve been working remotely successfully, and can continue, then allowing them to work from home in the short term may not be a bad thing. It also helps employers limit how many people return at once.
Some organizations are bringing back half the team one week, the other half the next—limiting exposure and the number of people in the office at any time.
Temperature Checks
If an employer wants to include temperature checks as part of their safety plan, are there parameters to consider?
That’s a good question. The first thing that comes to mind is employee privacy rights. A temperature check isn’t particularly invasive—it’s not a saliva or blood test. While it’s unclear whether employers can require it, I don’t know why anyone would object to it.
Hotels
A question came in: what if employees are required to stay at hotels? I’m assuming this falls under having to assess the risk associated with staying in a hotel. If you have to stay in a hotel as part of your work, then I guess it would be the same as we were talking about before. If the hotel is open and has the requisite safety protocols that the Ministry of Labor has prescribed in their guidelines, I don’t see why an employer couldn’t do that.
Remote Work Equipment
Let’s transition for a moment to looking at the requirements that employers have for their employees while working remotely. We had a couple of questions come in about whether the employer is required to provide computer equipment, desks—just the equipment that one might need to work from home. What is the employer’s obligation in terms of setting up the location for remote working?
Well, under the Occupational Safety Act, there are certain personal protective equipment requirements that an employer must meet, but computers and computer chairs aren’t among them. Generally, an employee is not required to provide equipment necessary for the job. Unless there’s something in the employment contract that says the employee will provide their own computer, phone, etc., I don’t think you could force an employee to buy those things. You do see employment contracts where employees have to provide their own car or cellphone, and that’s specifically stated in the contract. But asking an employee who’s never had to buy equipment to now purchase a laptop or phone—I don’t think so.
Requesting Equipment from Employers
What about the flip side? What if the employee is saying, “I’d like my employer to provide me with an ergonomic chair or a special stand for my computer,” and is asking the employer to ensure they’re safe in their home workplace?
There’s a section in OSHA that says OSHA doesn’t apply to private dwellings, and there’s mixed case law on the applicability of OSHA to private homes. But quite apart from that, if the employee is working from home and develops a work-related injury, then there’s potential liability under workers’ compensation legislation. For example, if someone is sitting at their computer all day and gets neck problems, carpal tunnel, or back issues due to improper furniture, then the employer could face liability. So it’s in the employer’s interest to do what they can to ensure the employee has a safe workplace setup at home.
Productivity and Cost Issues
And beyond the legal issues, there are productivity issues as well. If you want employees to work effectively from home, ensuring they have proper equipment could be significant. People have also asked whether that would extend to the employer paying for internet and phone. It sounds like these questions are “live” in the sense that OSHA doesn’t specifically state the employer has to provide those things.
Again, an employee normally doesn’t provide the IT needed to get work done. If the employer wants to use the employee’s IT at home, I guess the roles reverse—the employee could say, “I don’t want to use my IT.” So I don’t think it’s an occupational health and safety issue—it’s a question of who bears the cost of expenses incurred from a home office. Unless the employee has agreed to assume those expenses, it’s going to be hard for an employer to require them to pay.
Remote Work Requests
Does that change if it’s the employee who is requesting to work from home? Say the workplace has reopened and the employer says, “Please come back,” but the employee says, “I have some concerns; I’d prefer to work remotely.” Does that impact the employer’s obligations around equipment?
Depending on the facts, you’re now into a negotiation. At that point, the employer could say, “We want you back at work, and if you choose to work from home, you’ll have to pay these costs. If you came into the workplace, we wouldn’t be incurring those expenses.” So the employer can put conditions on remote work if it’s offering that as an option.
Concerns About Sick Co-workers
One final question: what if a co-worker is displaying symptoms but claims it’s just allergies or is simply waiting around until the end of the day for a ride home? If you’re concerned a co-worker may be sick, what should an employee do?
If they genuinely believe the person may have COVID—due to a cough, temperature, or other symptoms—then, if it were me, I’d go to my supervisor and say, “This person is exhibiting symptoms; I’m not comfortable being near them—please deal with it.” If the supervisor doesn’t respond appropriately, then the employee could exercise their right to refuse work. Even if it’s just an hour or two before the end of the day, a work refusal should get the job done.
Why Negotiate
Several things came up in the conversation—work refusal, employees preferring not to wear masks, or refusing to return to work. All of these are situations where the advice has been to have a conversation. It may be a difficult conversation or a negotiation to find a solution that works for both the employee and employer.
Sometimes people feel uncomfortable with the idea of negotiating in the legal realm. There’s a sense of “I have rights” and “I should be protected.” Employers may think, “It’s my right to require the employee to return—why negotiate?”
What are your thoughts on why it’s important to try to negotiate a solution directly?
Assuming both sides know their legal rights, the question becomes: do they want to assert them, especially in a litigious situation? Most employer-employee relationships are ongoing and indefinite—you want to take a longer-term view. Having that conversation to figure out whether there are options to meet both parties’ needs is important.
This is COVID—none of us have seen this before. People have genuine health concerns that may not seem reasonable to others—but they’re real. Some people may be prepared to stay home and not earn money, or even give up their jobs because they feel so strongly. And although that may result in a no-cost termination to the employer, is that what the employer really wants?
If this situation might resolve in a few months, is asserting strict legal rights really where you want to end up? Maybe not.
Where You Want to End Up
Where we want to end up, I think, is a workplace that’s safe—where people feel comfortable, where the work can be done, and where we achieve productivity again. All of those things are a shared goal in most workplaces. These are very uncertain times, and it’s hard to know how best to do that. So I think being informed of our legal rights is the important starting point, and then, as you’ve said, try to have some conversations and come up with options that may meet the legitimate interests that both sides have—because it’s choppy waters these days. We’re all trying to figure out how to go forward.
We’re just coming to the end of our time, so I wanted to again check in and see if there was anything else you wanted to add that we haven’t touched on.
No—just to reinforce my last point, which is: most people are not going to refuse to come to work, particularly if they’re not getting paid, unless there’s something there. So, you know, the employee may not want to share it with the employer, but that’s counterintuitive to me. It suggests that people may have enhanced health sensitivities that don’t make sense to you or me—but they make sense to them. Those sensitivities will likely dissipate as things continue to improve. So just take a medium- to longer-term view of these things.
Some employers are very quick to label situations as insubordination or voluntary quit, and I think that’s a very short-term view in this kind of scenario.
Are you saying it’s counterintuitive, in your view, for an employee not to share a little more information to help the employer understand why they have the concern?
No—it’s counterintuitive for someone to stay at home and not get paid when the alternative is to go to work and get paid.
I see. Okay.
Particularly if they’ve been living on CERB for the last three months—most people are feeling the financial pain of not working, so to continue that and make that pain worse… that’s counterintuitive to me.
I see. Okay.
Thank You
Well, I started this morning by saying how grateful I was that you were willing to join us for this webinar and share your expertise, and I remain really grateful. I know when we did the last webinar together we had lots of feedback from people saying they found it really helpful. So I just want to thank you—you’ve been very generous with your time and expertise today. Thank you, I really appreciate it.
We’ll let you go now, and I’ll just invite the audience members to stay for the poll so you can give us feedback on topics you’d like to hear from us in the future.
Thanks again, Doug. Take good care.
Okay—so we’ll just have a poll. It’s going to ask you a couple of questions about yourself and a couple of questions about what you’d like to hear from us in terms of future webinars.
Just a reminder that, at the moment, our next webinar is scheduled for July 14th at 11:00 a.m., and the focus will be on how to have difficult conversations that are related to COVID.
Elizabeth will now transition us to our poll. And thank you for joining us.
You.
Elinor Whitmore provides advice and guidance on how to start a challenging conversation with a difficult person, on a difficult issue, or both.
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.
How to Start a Difficult Conversation
Here’s the video link of the transcript below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwZCPHoCrl8
{Transcript}
We’re going to be looking today at how to start a difficult conversation. I was teaching a difficult conversation workshop a couple of years ago, and I had a pilot in the class. At the end of the class, he came up to me and said that some of the training had reminded him of the training he’d received as a pilot. He said, “When I was being trained as a pilot, we were taught there are two ways you can get a plane on the ground: you can land it or you can crash it—and it’s all in the approach.”
He said, “I sort of feel that that’s true of these difficult conversations.” And there is a certain truth in that—we can land a difficult conversation, or we can crash a difficult conversation, and a lot of it is in how we approach the conversation.
A lot of clients come to me and say, “I don’t know how to start. I don’t know what to say to begin the conversation.” So what we’re going to be doing today is looking at some templates. They’re almost like checklists that we can use to start a difficult conversation. We’re going to look at a few of them.
Of course, having a few templates isn’t going to cover every possible difficult conversation that you could possibly have, and yet I think these templates will cover a lot of the conversations that you might want to have. Also, the underlying concepts can be used in lots of different conversations. So, the templates are there to provide you with a kind of focus and a way to get started.
But I, of course, would leave it up to you to decide how you breathe life into it—sort of based on your personality, based on the person you’re speaking with, based on the situation.
So the first one we’re going…
Three Toone problem solve
To talk about is one that they call “Three-to-One Problem-Solve,” and it was developed by a man named Doug Stone at Harvard. It was designed to try to deal with some of the typical mistakes that people can make when starting a conversation. I’m going to give you an example.
Let’s say my colleague Paul and I have been charged with the task of upgrading the technology in our organization. Now, let’s just be clear—I’m not going to be upgrading the technology; we’re supervising the project. So we’ve been charged with that task, and we’ve talked about how to do it. He thinks that we should use external IT consultants, and I think that we should use our internal staff.
A mistake that I could make in starting the conversation with Paul would be to go to him and say, “You know, Paul, I’d like to talk with you about why I think we should use our internal staff.” The reason that that’s a mistake is that I’m starting the conversation at precisely the point of disagreement. That’s exactly what we disagree about, and I’m putting forward my perspective—which is the one he does not share. So I’m starting the conversation in a way that increases the likelihood of us having a difficult conversation.
If I were to follow the template “Three-to-One Problem-Solve,” the first thing I would do is try to think about: how would a third party—a neutral third party—describe what’s going on here? What’s the goal of the conversation? So they might say, “Well, the goal of the conversation—the reason why we’re upgrading the technology—is to improve productivity and improve efficiency, and we want to do it on budget. We have a difference of opinion about how to do that.” So that would be the third-party perspective.
Then the second-party perspective—in this case, because I’m the person starting the conversation—would be Paul. So they would say Paul’s perspective first, so that he knows it’s out there, it’s on the table. Then describe your perspective, then extend an invitation to problem-solve.
So what that might look like would be me going to Paul and saying, “Hi Paul. You know, I was hoping that we could find some time to talk about this project for upgrading the technology. I know we both want to make sure we improve productivity, we increase efficiency within the office, and that we do this project within budget. So we share those goals. Now, one way of achieving that would be to use external consultants. Another way would be to use our internal staff. There may even be other options that we haven’t talked about. I’m wondering if we could sit down and talk about those options—and maybe some other options—maybe look at the pros and cons of these approaches. And hopefully, at the end, we’ll be able to identify what we think might be the best approach.”
Fierce Conversations
Not saying that’s a perfect way to start a conversation, but you can see it’s going to have a very different impact. I’ve identified the shared goals and named his perspective first, and then mine—rather than starting with mine. So that’s “Three-to-One Problem Solve.”
The next template we’re going to look at is for beginning the conversation, and this would be one that we’d use more likely in a situation where we find somebody’s behavior to be unacceptable in some way. This particular template was developed by a woman named Susan Scott, and it’s set out in a book she wrote called Fierce Conversations.
The first thing she invites us to do is to name the issue. So let’s say you’ve got a colleague who’s coming in late for meetings. The issue might be punctuality. You might think, “I need to speak with them about punctuality.” Or, when you think about it, you might realize, “Well, they come to the meetings late, they’re dressed inappropriately, they make a bunch of personal calls, and they use inappropriate language in front of the clients.” Suddenly, there’s a very different issue on the table. When you pull all of those things together, you might think, “You know what? We’re no longer talking about punctuality—we’re talking about professional conduct.” So the issue I need to speak with this person about is professional conduct in the workplace.
The first thing you need to do is identify what’s the issue. Then the second step is to provide an example. Because if I just say to this person, “You know, you’re really unprofessional and I’d like you to be more professional,” well, they have no idea—perhaps—what they’ve been doing that’s unprofessional. Particularly if it’s just based on them coming late in the morning, they might say, “Well, at my old place of business, people showed up when they needed to, and they worked through lunch if they had to. Sometimes we stayed late, sometimes we came late—we just managed our time as long as we got the work done.” So to just say to somebody they’re unprofessional, you need to provide an example as to what’s giving you that impression.
But notice that the second step is “provide an example”—it’s not “provide the 598 examples that you’ve been storing up in your cheeks like a little squirrel storing nuts,” and the minute you have a chance to say them, they’re going to come flying out at the person. So it’s one example—maybe you’ll give two, maybe three—but you have to stop. You know, the idea is you just want to give them a sense of why you’re having the conversation.
The third piece is to describe the impact or the emotion that this behavior is creating. So in a workplace, the impact might be: if they’re coming late to meetings, it’s hard to stick to the agenda, or it’s having a negative impact on their colleagues in terms of morale, or it’s interfering with teamwork. You can use the same template at home, and at home or in your personal life, you might be more comfortable naming some emotions. So maybe somebody has done something and it hurt your feelings or it embarrassed you—and this would be the point in the conversation where you’d want to name that.
The fourth step is to name your contribution—how you might have contributed to the situation arising. Now, I think a lot of people would say, “How could I possibly have contributed to my colleague coming late for work?” And you’re right—you haven’t. You’re not responsible for them coming late to work. But you may have contributed to them coming late for work. And the way you may have contributed is: maybe somebody else came in late and you never said anything to that person, and they started to think it was okay. Or maybe you don’t always punch the clock and come in on time, and they looked at you and thought, “Well, it seems like this is the workplace where things are a little more easygoing around time.”
Or a classic one is—very rarely do we talk to somebody the very first time they do something that bothers us. So they come in late once and we think, “Well, I hope that doesn’t happen again.” And they come in late a second time and we think, “Well, I hope this isn’t going to become a pattern.” And then the third time, we go to speak with them. Well, if you’re going to speak with somebody the third time, your contribution may have been that you didn’t bring it to their attention earlier—that them coming late to meetings is a problem. And by not doing that, they started to think it was okay.
The last two steps are fairly quick…
Resolving Conversations
So the fifth step is just to indicate that you wish to resolve the issue, and the last step is to invite the partner to respond. Remember, this isn’t the whole conversation—this is just how you’re getting started.
So here’s how we might start a conversation with somebody who’s coming late to meetings. You could say: “Hi John, I just wanted to speak with you about an issue. I need to speak with you about the issue of punctuality. I noticed that you came late this morning to the meeting, and that’s the third time that you’ve come late. As I think you can appreciate, when you’re late for meetings, it means we don’t get started on the agenda, and I think it also has an impact on the other people who have come on time. I may have contributed to the situation by not bringing it to your attention earlier when you were late for the other meetings and not letting you know that my expectation is—when we set a meeting for 9:00—that people are going to come a few minutes in advance and get ready, and we’re going to be ready to go at 9:00. So I’d really like to try to resolve this to ensure it doesn’t happen again. Is there anything you want to add, or is there anything we need to discuss about this issue?”
There—you’re done. Sixty seconds. Six steps. You’ve been very clear, you’re very concise, and you’re done.
Now, there is a slight variation on that, which we call confronting. Confronting would be when you need to speak with somebody maybe for the third or fourth time about something that they’ve done, and you need to up the ante because you’ve already talked with them about it a couple of times and it continues to be an issue. Or, the thing that they’ve done right out of the gate is so unacceptable that you’re not going to have one, two, or three conversations in the hope that they change it. You need to confront them right out of the gate and say it’s not okay.
So in those situations, you insert a step after naming your contribution, which is to identify what’s at stake if they don’t change their behavior—and we’re even encouraged to use that language of “what’s at stake.”
Let me give you an example. I had a friend who called me up one day and her son had taken the family car without her permission. When I’m speaking with her, she’s all up in arms about it. She said, “He’s taken the car!” Then she’s really upset and said, “I’m going to confront him,” and she knew about these steps.
So we’re walking through the steps, and I’m trying to be mindful of her emotional tenor. We get to the part about what’s at stake, and I said, “What’s at stake here? What’s the consequence if he does this again?” And she said, “If he does this again, I will be so mad!” I said, “Okay, let’s take a look at the situation,” because I knew he’d already done it a few times. I said, “When he did it those times, were you mad then?” And she said, “Yeah, but I’ll be really mad now!”
And the thing about “what’s at stake” is—it has to be something that matters to the person you’re speaking to. I think we could see that her son had already done a cost-benefit analysis. He said, “I could be out with my friends in my mum’s car having a fun time with a mad mother at home, or I could be at home with my boring little sister watching the television while all my friends are having a good time, and have a happy mom. Hmm… which one do I choose?” Well, we’ve seen which one he chose—he’s busily driving downtown in her car. So her being mad isn’t enough at stake for him.
I reminded her that “at stake” needs to be for the person you’re speaking with. Then she said, “Well, the only thing he seems to care about is girls. So maybe if I said to him, ‘If you take that car again, you will never have a girlfriend’—that would get his attention.”
Again, I’m trying to be careful because I understand she’s upset. I said, “I’m sure it would get his attention. Now—is that something that’s within your power?” Because of course, what’s at stake needs to be something you have control over—a consequence you’re going to impose. Of course, him not having a girlfriend is not a consequence she can impose.
So what she said in the end was: “I need to speak with you about the use of the family car. You took it last night without my permission and I’m very angry. I may have contributed to the situation by not letting you know the last time that this could never happen again. What’s at stake for you here is: if you do this again, you will never be allowed to use the family car under any circumstances. I’d like to try to resolve this with you. Is there anything you need to say?”
So I think the last part came out a little sharp. I think she may have been a bit pinched by the end, but you can see how you name what’s at stake—and we can certainly do that in workplace contexts as well. It just has to be something that’s within your control—a consequence that you’re prepared to impose. Whether it’s you’re going to speak to the person’s manager, or—if you are the manager—you’re going to put a letter in the file, there’s going to be some consequence if they do the action again. And then you leave it to them to decide how they want to behave.
I started by saying that we want to land our difficult conversations—and not crash them. I hope you’ll find these ways of starting a difficult conversation give you a way to land your difficult conversations. So good luck.
Oliver Martin walks us through how we communicate with people when challenges arise, demonstrating some tips and techniques for providing effective feedback.
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.
Here’s the video link of the transcript below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-UmqeXylKg
{Transcript}
Picture this: you’re on your way home from work, and you’re extremely hungry. You get home, walk through the door, and to your surprise, there’s dinner—and a further surprise is that it was your turn to cook. Wow, you appreciate your partner even more. So excited, you sit down and dig in to savor that first bite of chicken—and something doesn’t taste right. Actually, now that you think about it, it hasn’t tasted right the last couple times your partner made something for you.
Of course, at that moment your partner looks at you and says, “So how does it taste?” How do you respond? Have you ever been in that situation?
Or perhaps it’s similar to the situations some HR professionals have shared in our workshop. You have that employee who’s consistently underperforming or consistently arriving late—what do you do? Or perhaps it’s like some of our other participants in which they’re in a negotiation, and the other side presents an offer that is way below what they expected—how do you respond?
You have an option: to respond with criticism or feedback. Now, why is this even important? Well, if your goal is to improve the situation, then you’ll likely want to determine whether it’s better to give criticism or feedback. Is there a difference?
Criticism is defined as the expression of disapproval of something or someone based on perceived faults or mistakes. Feedback is defined as information about actions, a product, or a person’s performance, which is used as a basis for improvement.
Clearly, there’s a difference. Criticism aims to push the person down. Feedback aims to pull the person up. Criticism says, “You messed up. What’s wrong with you?” Feedback says, “This is how your behavior landed for me—was that your intent? How can we work together to improve the situation?”
Criticism keeps you in the past. Feedback helps you move forward. Understanding this is important as we assess situations and people’s performance.
In a negotiation, if the other side presents you with an offer that isn’t close to what you expected, feedback means you share how it landed with you. Feedback means you work with them to improve the offer. Criticism means you tear apart the offer and tell them why it’s awful. And if you’re not careful, by criticizing that offer, you’re also criticizing them—after all, they’re the ones who came up with it.
When you look at studies of criticism and how it affects brain function—while there aren’t that many—a recent study from King’s College in London shared that listening to criticism activates brain areas involved in the cognitive control over negative emotions. Think about that. Criticizing someone triggers the part of their brain that controls negative emotions. Is that what we want in negotiation? Is that what we want in the workplace?
Now let’s be clear: not giving criticism is not the same as not being critical. We need to use our critical thinking skills. We need to critically evaluate proposals that come to us—the pros, the cons, the merits—and employees’ performance. We must use our critical thinking skills. It’s when we criticize the individual that it poses a problem.
And let’s be clear about feedback—feedback is not aimed at making the person feel better. It’s meant to help them do better.
So how do we know if we’re giving criticism or feedback? A few tips:
You see, the way I see it—feedback is meant to do what the first part of the word says: feed. So let’s feed each other with ways to improve. Let’s nourish each other with ideas and thoughts to get better. And let’s do it in a way that’s digestible, so they can absorb the nutrients and grow.
Now it’s your turn. Provide me with some feedback—you.
Individuals commit the sunk cost fallacy when they continue a behaviour or endeavour as a result of previously invested resources (time, money or effort). This fallacy, which is related to loss aversion and status quo bias, can also be viewed as bias resulting from an ongoing commitment.
For example, individuals sometimes order too much food and then over-eat just to “get their money’s worth”. Similarly, a person may have a $20 ticket to a concert and then drive for hours through a blizzard, just because she feels that she has to attend due to having made the initial investment. If the costs outweigh the benefits, the extra costs incurred (inconvenience, time or even money) are held in a different mental account than the one associated with the ticket transaction.
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.
Sunk Cost and the Sunk Cost Fallacy
Here’s the video link of the transcript below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgc5nk6Dsaw
{Transcript}
Have you ever gone to a grocery store, gone to checkout, stood in a line, and then noticed that the line next to you is moving faster than the line you’re in? When you chose the line, your line was the shortest, but now the other line is moving faster and has caught up to you. So what do you do—do you change lines?
I’m Jason Stead, an instructor with Stitt Feld Handy, and I’m going to talk to you about a way to approach decision-making that will impact a number of different decisions you make. It will hopefully impact your negotiations, your dealings with difficult people, and a lot of different problems that you encounter on a day-to-day basis. This is going to reflect the bigger-picture decision-making process and hopefully help you think about some ideas on how to make those decisions.
I’m going to talk to you about sunk costs and the sunk cost fallacy. I want to talk about the process that goes into the decision about whether to switch lines at a grocery store. Then I’m also going to talk a bit about how that expands to bigger decisions, like making decisions about when to hire or fire a new employee.
A sunk cost is a cost that you have already incurred and is not recoverable. It’s often money, but it can also be something like time or effort. An example of money would be money that you’ve spent on a movie ticket or a parking pass. It can be effort you’ve spent on a group project, or time you’ve spent planning a trip. The key to it being a sunk cost is that there’s nothing you can do to get it back.
I want to talk about sunk costs and how it ties into a more commonly used phrase and a more common problem that we run into—and that is the sunk cost fallacy. The sunk cost fallacy is the idea that we are more likely to continue with something that we have already sunk a cost into, even if it does not make as much sense going forward. As people, we incorrectly attribute too much value to something just because we’ve already sunk a cost into it.
Let’s say you bought tickets for a movie and the tickets were fifteen dollars. When you’re about to go into the theater, someone offers to give you tickets to a movie you’d prefer to see—for free. The only caveat is that you’d have to throw away the tickets you just spent fifteen dollars on. So what would you do? Are you going to take the tickets to the movie you’d prefer to see, or the movie you don’t like as much?
The fact that you’ve spent the fifteen dollars on the movie tickets should be irrelevant to your decision going forward. But there’s something holding you back—it feels like it would be a waste of the fifteen dollars if you just threw out those tickets. In real life, people tend to decline the tickets to the movie they prefer to see, even though the cost for both is the same. The fifteen dollars is gone; you’re not going to get that money back. In those situations, we should be making our best decision for us going forward—but we’re not. And by not making the best decision, we’re committing the sunk cost fallacy.
When you’re making decisions, I want you to think about: what’s the best decision for me going forward? Rather than thinking about the various costs—time, effort, energy, money—that you’ve already spent. When we’re falling into the sunk cost fallacy, we’re overvaluing the time or money that we’ve put into something, and we feel like, “Oh, it’ll be a waste if I don’t go to that movie that I spent fifteen dollars on.” Well, I can tell you—it’s a waste either way. That money’s already spent. It’s already gone. That should be considered irrelevant to the decision that you make for yourself going forward. Make the best decision for you.
It’s one thing to understand this when buying movie tickets, but I want to talk a bit about how it applies to real life. Let’s go back to the grocery store example from earlier. You’ve been waiting in your line for three minutes and it’s barely moved at all. The line next to you used to be a lot longer, but now it’s caught up and is the same length—and it’s clearly moving faster than your current line.
You need to decide if it makes sense for you to switch lines. What’s holding you back from changing lines? If you were approaching the lines now and you knew one was moving faster, and they were both the same length, it would be an obvious decision—you’d go in the faster line because your goal is to get to the cashier and get out of the grocery store as soon as possible. So this should be an easy decision.
But we don’t switch. What’s holding us back? It’s that we feel like we’ve spent three minutes waiting in this line. Those three minutes could have been spent doing something else—you could’ve been shopping, talking to someone, checking email. Instead, you’ve been waiting in line. And if now you switch lines, that entire three minutes already spent feels wasted.
Well, I’m going to go back and explain the sunk cost fallacy—because that three minutes is already wasted. It’s a sunk cost. That time is gone, and there’s nothing you can do to get it back. Can you see how this falls into the sunk cost fallacy?
When thinking about decisions, we want to keep our ultimate end goal in mind: what do we want to get out of the scenario? In this case, we want to get out of the grocery store as soon as possible and make the decision that will get us there the best way.
It’s one thing to think about the sunk cost fallacy in grocery lines—but there are much larger, real-world implications. Let’s say you’re hiring a new employee. You’ve interviewed several candidates and chosen one you believe will be the best. The employee starts the job and spends six months getting up to speed. After a year, you realize that the employee isn’t what you expected. You’re pretty confident that one of the other candidates would do a better job.
You’ve invested a year into this employee and paid them for that year without getting much value. Now they’re up to speed, but doing the job poorly. If you let the employee go, you’ll have to restart the hiring process and incur those costs. What you don’t want to do is fall into the sunk cost fallacy.
Let’s think about which costs are already sunk: the salary paid over the year—that’s sunk; the time spent training them—also sunk; the effort in hiring them—gone. These are unrecoverable.
So what should you think about? What makes the most sense going forward. You want to do a cost-benefit analysis to determine what’s best. Keeping the current employee means no new hiring or training costs. Hiring someone new means someone who can likely do a better job. When framed like this, the decision becomes clearer.
Think: what better meets my needs as a company? Generally, going through the hiring process again is the better option—because you want good employees, and you want to be successful.
If we can stay focused on future decisions rather than past costs, we’ll be better decision-makers moving forward.
Avoiding the Fallacy
So what can you do in your life to avoid falling into the sunk cost fallacy?
First, be aware of it. Think about why you’re making a decision. Ask: what’s the best decision for me going forward—regardless of what’s been spent?
A good trick is to practice with small decisions. Let’s say you go out to eat, park your car, and pay for parking. Then you walk to the restaurant and discover it’s closed. Now you need to decide what to do. Do you go to a nearby restaurant, even if the food isn’t great, just to justify the parking? Or do you leave and drive to another restaurant where you actually enjoy the food?
Well, you want to think about your goal. Your goal in this case is not spending too much money and having a good meal. Which of these decisions is better to meet your goals? What’s important to you?
What I would encourage you to do is not fall into the sunk cost fallacy—not think about the fact that you’ve already spent the money on parking. Because no matter which decision you make, that money you’ve spent on parking is not going to be recoverable. It’s gone.
If you’re trying to avoid falling into the sunk cost fallacy, it can be easy to do this by looking at small everyday decisions like this: “Which restaurant am I going to go to?” and thinking about, “How much have I sunk into this?” and “Am I considering what I’ve sunk in when making my decision going forward?”
Another quick example as I’m wrapping up: you’ve now spent a number of minutes watching this video on the sunk cost fallacy. There’s nothing you can do to get that time back, but you want to make the best decisions for yourself going forward. So I’d encourage you to take some lessons away from this video. And remember—think about what you want out of a scenario, and don’t get caught up in what you’ve sunk in that you’re never going to get back.
How will you know whether to say “yes” or “no” to a deal? Allan Stitt shows how to prepare effectively for a negotiation to get great results.
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.
How to Prepare For a Negotiation
Here’s the video link of the transcript below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBfuEThGcfM
{Transcript}
What’s the best way to prepare for negotiation? Well, the first thing is—it is important to prepare. One of the mistakes that people often make is they look at the overwhelming nature of a negotiation and say, “It’s too tough to prepare. It’s going to take too long. It’s going to take too much energy. I have to do too much research, too much work—I’m just going to go in and wing it.” And that’s the first mistake people make about preparation.
Preparation is not a lot of work. It doesn’t have to be a huge effort. You don’t have to spend a huge amount of time. Preparation for negotiation can be a very reasonable exercise.
So what do you do to prepare? What’s the best way to prepare?
Well, actually, to think about how you need to be prepared, I think you actually need to go to the very end of the negotiation. At the very end of the negotiation, you’re going to have to make a decision. The decision you’ve got to make is: am I going to say yes, or am I going to say no? Am I going to walk away from the table, or am I going to shake hands, sign on the dotted line, and have a deal?
So the question is: how do you know how to make that decision? How are you going to decide whether you should say yes or say no—and when you should say yes or no?
Well, there are really two theories about how to know whether to say yes or say no.
There’s the common theory, and that is—you should say yes if the deal feels right. If it’s good for you, if you feel like it’s comfortable, or if you like what the other person’s had to say, it seems to be fair, it seems to be reasonable. It’s what you thought going in. It’s better than what you thought your bottom line was. That’s conventional wisdom.
But actually, conventional wisdom can cause you to make a number of mistakes. For example, let’s say you go into a negotiation and say, “This deal is fair. This deal is reasonable. This is a good deal. It’s better than my bottom line. It met my needs.” And you say yes. Then you walk away from the table and realize—wait, if I had said no, there’s something much better I could have done way out there. That would be a mistake.
On the other hand, probably an even worse mistake—suppose you look at what the other person is offering and say, “It doesn’t meet my needs. It doesn’t meet my interests. It’s not fair. It’s not reasonable. It’s worse than my bottom line. I don’t feel comfortable with it. I’m going to say no.” Then you walk away from the table and it’s a disaster—because what you walk away to is actually worse than what you could have agreed to at the table.
So the real test for whether you should say yes or no isn’t: does it feel right? Does it feel reasonable? It’s: how does it compare—compare to what I’m going to do away from the table?
So in order to be well prepared for the negotiation, you really have to know—what will you do if you don’t reach a deal? What’s going to happen if you say no to the other person, or if they say no to you? If you walk in and say, “Good morning,” and they say “No,” and walk out—what are you going to do?
So in order to figure out what you’re going to do, first of all, you have to figure out—what are all the things I could do? What are all the paths I could go down? What are all the courses of action I could take?
And those paths, those courses of action, are what are known as your alternatives to a negotiated agreement. And to prepare, you have to figure out: what are my alternatives? What are the different things I can do if I don’t reach an agreement?
But that’s not the end. Some of us do that, some of us don’t—and those of us who do it sometimes stop there. But we can’t stop there, because if we don’t reach a deal, we can’t go down all of these paths. We can’t choose each one and do them one after the other. We’re going to have to choose which path to go down.
So you need to think: based on the information you know now, based on all the facts you have, if you had to choose—which of those paths would you choose? Which of those paths is the best?
Which of the alternatives is your best alternative to a negotiated agreement?
Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement—the acronym is BATNA (B-A-T-N-A). A BATNA comes from the book Getting to Yes by Roger Fisher, Bill Ury, and Bruce Patton. BATNA refers to the best path you can take if you don’t reach an agreement.
So to prepare, you need to think about your BATNA. But that’s not the end either.
What you want to do with your BATNA is two things: you want to make your BATNA as good as it can be, and you want to make it as clear and concrete as it can be.
You want to make it as good as it can be because the better your BATNA, the better the deal has to be on the table in order for it to make sense for you to say yes. So if your BATNA is this good, the other person only has to present a deal to you that’s this good in order for it to make sense for you to say yes. But if you can make your BATNA better and make it this good, then the other person has to make their offer this good in order for it to make sense for you to say yes.
If you can improve your BATNA, you can improve your power in the negotiation because you know that if you walk away, the thing that you’re going to is better than what it otherwise was.
The second thing you have to do with your BATNA is make it as concrete and as clear as it can possibly be. That just means understanding what it means to go down that path—that is, your BATNA. Understand what will likely happen if you go down that path. What are the consequences of going down that path? The reason you want to make your BATNA concrete is that when you’re comparing the deal on the table to your BATNA, you want to be able to clearly know what your BATNA will mean and say, “Is that better or worse than the thing that’s on the table?”
Okay, so we’ve got all of these paths—all of these alternatives. We’ve chosen the one that’s best: our BATNA. We’ve made it as clear and as concrete as it can be. And then—then we put it away. We don’t necessarily use it in the negotiation. We may want to tell the other side about our BATNA if it’s better than the other person thinks it is, but usually we would just put it aside and use it at the end of the negotiation to pull out and to say, “Is my BATNA better or worse than what’s on the table?” If it’s better, we go with our BATNA. If it’s worse, we accept the deal that’s on the table.
So the most important part of preparation is: figure out your BATNA.
A couple of other things I would recommend for preparation: First, instead of thinking about how you should start with your position, think about what are your underlying wants and what are your underlying needs. What are your goals? Think about what your interests might be. Think about what the other side’s interests might be—because thinking about how they see things, trying to look at the situation from their shoes, will help you reach a better deal in the negotiation.
Also, instead of thinking, “I know the answer, I know the right answer, I know where this negotiation should end up,” you may want to think about: What are some possible answers? Where might this negotiation end up? I can still have my first choice for where it ends up, but what are some possible places it can go? How might this negotiation play out? What are some ideas the other person may come up with that could make sense for me?
So if you prepare for negotiation by first of all figuring out your alternatives—”Which one is the best? My BATNA: my best alternative to a negotiated agreement”—make it as good as it can be and as concrete as it can be, and then put it away. Then you’ll be all set in knowing when you should walk away and when you should stay.
If you also prepare by thinking about your interests, your wants, your needs, thinking about the other side’s interests, and thinking about a number of possible options—you’ll be well prepared to negotiate.
Elinor Whitmore shows how a workplace coach can help an employee better deal with a challenging person in their world by broadening their perspective.
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.
Coaching – Broadening Insights into Challenger
Here’s the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQVWtYI_KDA
{Transcript}
[Music]
So part of what I’m listening for is both what’s going on in this situation in terms of what you might do with your coworker, and also whether, again, it might help us understand more broadly what you find challenging.
What I’m hearing so far is that, first of all, the two of you have very different ways of solving problems. You said you like to be really reflective—you like to consult people, get their input, and have a chance to really think it through, like what’s causing the problem before you try to figure out what the solution might be.
Whereas she’s much more quick to just say, “Here’s the problem. We know what the solution is. Let’s move on.”
But we don’t know what the solution is! How can we know what the solution is if we haven’t discussed any of it—if we don’t look at what all the problems are? That’s what drives me crazy.
And I think it partially drives you crazy both in terms of the process and the concern that the solution isn’t going to be an effective one if it hasn’t had a good process to get there. Like, there’s a risk that if we haven’t had a good process and talked about it, then the solution’s not going to be a solution.
Exactly.
Allan Stitt provides tips on how to persuade others in a negotiation. The mirror-image principle of openness to ideas allows others to hear us more effectively.
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.
How to Become More Persuasive in a Negotiation
Here’s the video link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgMUd3YGbUg
{Transcript}
A powerful negotiator is someone who is persuasive. The real question for us to become powerful negotiators is how to become more persuasive. So what I’m going to do now is give you a few tips on being more persuasive.
Tip number one: to be more persuasive, be open to be persuaded. Now, I know that sounds counterintuitive—you’d say, “Why do you need to be open to be persuaded in order to be persuasive?” But really, it’s very intuitive. Because when you think about it, when you’re negotiating, what you want the other person to do is hear what you have to say. Then you want them to react by saying, “Okay, I hear you. I understand you. I’m open to your ideas. I’m not going to reject your ideas out of hand. I’m going to think about what you’re going to say. I’m going to consider what you’re going to say, and if I’m persuaded, I’ll accept it. But I’m open to your ideas. I’m open to be persuaded.”
If that’s what we want other people to do—if that’s how we want them to react—how can we really expect that behavior in them if we’re not prepared to exhibit that behavior ourselves?
