Dialogue Works

Recently, I was perusing the titles in the “Self-Improvement” section of Barnes and Noble for books that had been written on effective communication and conversation. I was surprised to find that some titles described how to have “fierce,” “toxic,” or “difficult” conversations. My first thought was why would I want to hold a conversation that was “fierce,” “toxic,” or even “difficult”? The former two titles would be conversations I would avoid at all costs. And to approach the topic of a “difficult conversation” elicits a degree of reticence and anxiety. Why would I want to engage in a conversation that was difficult if I thought I wouldn’t succeed?

There was another title on the shelf that referred to “courageous conversations.” What if an individual didn’t have “courage”? I couldn’t determine if reading the book would create enough courage to face one’s fear and actually have the conversation. Finally, I came across Crucial Conversations. It dawned on me that not all conversations are “crucial,” yet they still may be extremely important, even though they are not fraught with “strong emotion” and “high stakes.” Outside the marketing hook of the title, I found something was missing. I was disappointed because the content mainly focused on the “explicit” aspect—the specific words used to make the conversation more effective—rather than the “tacit.” I found this to be true of the content in all the works I was reviewing.

Let me explain the difference between the “explicit” and the “tacit” aspects of conversation. Most of us are familiar with the illustration below that was drawn by Leonardo Da Vinci.

He entitled this work the Vitruvian Man. In his drawing, Da Vinci used the circle and the square to represent the blending of science and art in considering the proportions of man. The square represents science, and the circle represents art. Effective conversations are what we refer to as REAL Conversations—a blend of science and of art: the explicit and the tacit. The explicit in a conversation is the form or the words of a conversation, while the tacit represents all the other elements of conversation. Some of the elements of conversation included in the tacit are:

• The assumptions that the individuals in the conversation make about each other

• The situation and the context in which the conversation occurs

• The intent or purpose for having the conversation

• The impact of emotion or defensiveness on the conversation

• The tempo or pace at which the message is actually delivered

• The influence of the brain’s protective-reactive mechanism

• The impact or status of the current relationships of those in the interaction

• Attention from the listening audience, or the lack thereof

• The respect that is exhibited non-verbally or visually during the conversation

• The message that is conveyed by the tone and inflection of the message

• The use of pauses in a conversation for emphasis or effect

• The differences of  interaction styles of those involved

• The mental models or different perceptions of each individual

I am sure you can think of even more tacit elements than the ones I listed. Bottom line: There is more going on that needs to be taken into account when holding a challenging conversation of any kind. Considering the impact tacit elements have on the effectiveness of any conversation, it is surprising to me how little emphasis was placed in the aforementioned book content that dealt with what really makes communication work. A deeper dive into understanding the tacit also helps us understand why the espoused methods in simplified recipes may not work.

Albert Mehrabian’s landmark communications study concluded only seven percent of communication is contained in the verbal message—in the explicit. Mehrabian stated that the remaining 93 percent of communication takes place through visual and vocal cues—the tacit. However, even Mehrabian omitted the mental aspects that impact conversation. Consequently, we will refer to effective conversations as REAL Conversations which blend both the explicit and the tacit to achieve desired results. We will be exploring not only the explicit elements, but also the tacit elements that need to be addressed to make your conversations work. We hope you will join us for the journey.

Tags: conversation

This entry was posted on Friday, May 22nd, 2009 at 2:01 pm by lightstorm and is filed under Conversations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.