Tag Archives: nonviolent communication

Developing your empathy: learning from intimate relationships

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Recently I wrote at length about empathy and made a mental note to write about the “how” of empathy – both of giving and receiving empathy and of how you develop it if you’re not there yet.  I haven’t yet fulfilled this promise I made to myself so, when I was sent a link to a podcast by Kelly Bryson I took time to listen.

Kelly is talking about empathy in the context of intimate relationships, including sexual relationships.  And let’s be clear, if ever there’s a context in which challenging emotions and emotional pain are triggered it’s in our most intimate relationships.  Over the years, our failure to “mop up the mess” of our misunderstandings can drive us apart or create an inbuilt “toxicity” in our relationships.  Kelly’s podcast talks through some of the elements of Nonviolent Communication and how they can be used in intimate relationships to give and receive empathy.  In this way we can clean up the messes as they occur and – over time – build, restore and maintain trust.  It also completes with two exercises for giving and receiving empathy and building connection.

What is the relevance of this in our professional lives?  I could say so much about this.  Firstly, insofar as we carry the hurt of our unmet need for empathy in our private lives, we are likely to be sensitive in our professional lives – and so are others.  This is a common human experience, encoded in the most ancient parts of our brains.  Learning to give ourselves empathy or to ask for the empathy we need makes us more able in our work to be present in the here and now rather than to be triggered by “old stuff”.  As leaders, it helps to know that this is true for those we lead, too.  With this understanding we can see and respo9nd to the behaviours and responses of our staff in their wider human context.

And what else?  Well, for now, perhaps it helps to know that the skills for giving and receiving empathy are the same no matter what the context.  For this reason I share Kelly’s podcast as a resource for all my readers.  And if you do choose to listen to it, will you let me know what you take from it?  I’d love to see your comments below. 

Empathy in practice: free of enemy images

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I am grateful to Bridget Belgrave, certified trainer in Nonviolent Communication, for sharing this link to a video taken from the security camera of a mobile phone shop in the US.  The video shows how the shop’s manager, faced with a would-be armed robber, engages him in conversation and shows she understands what he is going through.  At the point at which she tells him that she will have to make up any shortfall that results from a theft he decides to leave.

The manager is showing one of the fundamental qualities of empathy – the ability to connect with their shared humanity and to engage with him as a real person rather than from a place of fear.  Her care for the would-be thief is striking.  In the case of this young manager it seems to be her Christian faith that inspires her, though this does not mean you have to be a Christian or have any religious faith to provide empathy.

So, if you are seeking to develop your ability to show empathy, take a look at the video on this BBC News Page.  To what extent are you able to engage with other people in your life from this place of seeking to understand them as fellow human beings?

Feeling your way into your perfect job: a powerful question to bring your dreams alive

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In recent days I’ve been exploring ways to feel your way into the perfect job for you, recognising that the more you have a felt sense of your perfect job the more likely you are to be inspired to find it.

In this last posting on this topic (OK, at least for now) I offer the simplest of questions which you can ask yourself about the job you really yearn to do – and perhaps the most powerful.  This question comes from my NLP trainings and is the number one question for coaches everywhere (and no doubt others, too):  what do you want?

Well, actually, there’s a supplementary question, too.  And it’s this little supplementary question that gives the first question its power and that is:  what would that do for you?  So, what do you want in your new job?  (Let’s say:  “I want to lead a business out of the current recession”).  And what would that do for you?  (“It would give me the thrill of turning around a business which otherwise could go under”).  And what would that do for you?  (“It would meet my need to contribute to our economic recovery”).  And what would that do for you?  (“I just want to make a positive difference to people, to conribute, to offer hope…”).  You get the gist!

This powerful little question takes us from the surface manifestation of a dream to the underlying needs that would be met by fulfilling that dream.  In the language of Marshall Rosenberg, author of Nonviolent Communication:  A Language for Life, this is the difference between recognising the strategy by which we meet meet a need and connecting with the need itself.  You know you’ve connected with the core of your dream when you feel you’ve connected with your dream – everything in your body changes at this moment of recognition.

Several things happen when we explore this question which are invaluable to the job hunter (and to anyone else come to that):

  • Firstly, as we get closer and closer to recognising the needs we think our dream job will meet we experience a felt sense of this perfect job.  This is, if you like, another way of “trying it on for size”.  In terms of the way we feel, connecting with our needs in this way is pretty much as good as meeting them!  At least in this moment of connection we experience the quality of feeling we would like to experience in our lives on an ongoing basis;
  • Also, recognising our underlying needs can open up new options as we realise “Ah!  If that’s the need I’m trying to meet, I could do it in this way, too, and this way…!”
  • Occasionally, as we connect with the need we recognise that our initial choice of how to meet the need was, frankly, way off beam.  If caring for your family is your number one priority for example, maybe the high flying job that takes you all over the world supplies the money you want to earn …but not the opportunity to stay closely involved and connected with your loved ones in your every day lives.

 So, I invite you to try on this powerful pair of questions and of course, be sure to let me know how you get on.

PS I love Rosenberg’s book!  So much so that I’ve set up this link so that, as a member of Amazon Associates UK, I shall receive a referral fee if you buy this book using the link in this posting.

Empathy begins at home

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Today I decided to share my needs with the man from the call centre who wanted to sell me services I didn’t want to buy. When he said he wanted to ask me some questions about my current service provision I knew from experience that this might lead to a conversation about how I could get better, cheaper services with his company.  I did not want to go down this path, and I told him so.  In addition, I was already wary of the “I’m wanting to have this conversation because it meets your needs” routine that is encoded in so many call centre scripts.  Here’s a brief extract from our conversation:

Call centre man:  Do you mind if I ask you which company you’re using at the moment?
Me:  Actually, that’s not how I’d like to spend my time today as I have some commitments I want to fulfil.
Call centre man:  It won’t take long.
Me:  May I just check with you – would you be willing to tell me what you heard me say so that I can check that I made myself clear?
Call centre man:  Are you telling me that you don’t want to save money on your broadband services?
Me:  No, that’s not what I said.  And I do have a need to be heard and understood that’s not being met here and I notice that I am feeling some anger right now…

Our conversation reminded me just how often we find it hard to hear and be present to the needs of others.  I could identify any number of reasons for this which all lead back to the same Mother-of-all-Reasons:  because we live in a culture in which we think there is such a thing as “right” or “wrong”, believing that this is some independent and objective truth for which we are searching rather than believing that this is a concept we use in pursuit of power and control.

What about the man from the call centre?  Whether correctly or not, one thing I infer from the comment “Are you telling me that you don’t want to save money on your broadband services?” is that my partner in conversation is wanting to meet his own needs and that he isn’t owning what they are:  he isn’t being honest about his true aims.  If he really wants to be of service, he would be attuned to my desire to choose how I spend my time and support me by getting off the phone after a respectful goodbye.  It’s not entirely clear what needs he is trying to meet – the needs that might be met by getting X number of clients to buy today.  (And I could say that yes, the conversation is scripted and he is following somebody else’s guidance about what to say.  Still, he has chosen the job in which he has to execute this script again and again and again and – I believe – he has made this choice because to do this job and to earn the salary it provides helps him to meet needs he can identify).

I see a level of self-honesty as an important pre-condition for empathy.  When I can be very clear with myself about what needs I am trying to meet I am more likely to be able to empathise with my partner in conversation.  This is not just about conversations with strangers from distant call centres:

  • When a senior executive can own her enthusiasm for a particular path or project she is more likely to recognise that when she responds to a colleague’s request to be heard by making a suggestion in line with her preferred path she is not responding to her colleague’s need for empathy so much as seeking to meet her own needs;
  • When a father can own how scared he is of the prospect of his daughter learning to drive and be honest with himself about about his needs and about those actions he is taking to meet his needs he is more likely to be able to be present to his daughter and her excitment when she thinks about the increased level of autonomy that learning to drive will give her;
  • When a line manager can own his anxieties about speaking openly with a much-loved employee about his recent poor performance he is more likely to be able to address his needs by holding an open and honest conversation with the person concerned.  What’s more, this level of self-honesty makes it far less likely that the line manager will see his choice to hold back as “protecting his employee”.

To be able to be present to and honest about our own needs whilst also being present to the needs of others, even when it seems impossible for the needs of both parties to be met, belongs to the post-graduate school of empathy – a level that many of us never reach.  Is it possible – maybe even for all of us? – to reach this level.  It’s my experience that empathy can be learned.  How?  That’s a posting for another day – so please keep reading.

PS  And was I present to the needs of the man from the call centre in my conversation today?  No.  Today I was asking for empathy without offering it.  Maybe next time. 

What is empathy, anyway, and why does it matter?

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We can say that when a person finds himself sensitively and accurately understood, he develops a set of growth promoting or therapeutic attitudes toward himself.

Carl Rogers
Empathic:  An Unappreciated Way of Being

Well, I didn’t set out to make this week Empathy Week and still, I am immensely grateful to my colleague in the world of non-violent communication (NVC), Jeroen Lichtenauer, for highlighting a wealth of resources available to support my exploration.

Today, I have been diving into a paper written by Carl Rogers, entitled Empathic:  An Unappreciated Way of Being.  Before I write about Rogers’ article it is worth saying a few words about the man himself:  Carl Rogers worked as a psychologist and therapist in twentieth century America and his work has been highly influential across a range of related fields.  As well as shaping an approach to therapy which is radically different to some of the more analytical approaches which preceded it, Rogers’ approach has been highly influential in the modern coaching profession and Marshall Rosenberg also points to Rogers as having influenced his attempts to develop an approach (eventually called Nonviolent or Compassionate Communication) which could be shared easily around the world without the costs associated with individual therapy.

Now, Rogers’ credentials are highly rated with some and yet may ring alarm bells with others.  What does all this mean for the average man or woman seeking to find a way through a corporate career?  It’s worth mentioning the work of David McClelland and his colleagues (popularised by Daniel Goleman in such books as Emotional Intelligence and Working with Emotional Intelligence).  McClelland’s research showed that our effectiveness in the workplace depends significantly on a number of competencies which depend on our emotional rather than intellectual intelligence.  Empathy matters!  And, in fact, empathy is listed as a competency in the Hay Group Emotional Competence Inventory which seeks to translate these research findings into practical ways of measuring competency and emotional intelligence at work.

Rogers’ paper includes a number of definitions of empathy including at least two of his own.  The quote above, from the conclusion of his paper, points both to what we might mean by empathy and to the significance of empathy for the individual.  Both are big subjects in themselves so let me just say for the moment that when we are able to be present to our own thoughts, feelings, experience and needs (self empathy) or to the thoughts, feelings, experience and needs of another (empathy) without judgement we open up a wide range of possibilities in our relationships and communication with self and other.  This is every bit as significant in the workplace as it is in the therapist’s office, where the presence or absence of empathy will have an effect on key aspects of our work life.  These include our ability to make and execute sound decisions as well as our personal well-being, our ability to engage those we lead as well as our ability to marshall our own inner – and often conflicting  – voices.

What is the key question we might ask our selves to determine the extent to which we are able to demonstrate empathy?  Here is my starter for ten:  am I able to put myself in the shoes of another, to connect with their feelings and needs and in this way to see multiple perspectives without needing to be “right”?

Practical approaches to developing empathy

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Sometimes, leaders in organisations come to coaching with a yearning to develop their ability to empathise and this is no surprise, since our culture, including our workplace culture, does not always favour the use of empathy.  So when one of my colleagues on the Training Journal Daily Digest asked for recommendations for practical reading on developing empathy I made my contribution and also looked out for the contributions of others.

This is what I wrote, which will come as no surprise to regular readers of my blog:

Developing empathy…. my top reading recommendation would be Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication: A Language for Life.

I don’t think you can beat Rosenberg’s approach to empathy. For those of us who are naturally empathetic it helps us to develop an approach to empathy which maintains clear boundaries. To those of us for whom empathy is a bit of a foreign country it provides very clear distinctions (e.g. between the needs we have and the strategies by which we seek to meet them) and very clear steps for providing empathy.

Given that you are looking for something for an executive client I would want to acknowledge the book’s potential limitations. The subtitle (‘create your life, relationships and your world in harmony with your values’), the visuals of the front cover and even some of the terms used can be a step or two outside the comfort zone of some people who are used to the FT as their daily reading. In other words, the book is targeted at human beings rather than at executives. Having said that, I have recommended it to a number of executive clients and I’ve never had this back as a comment. More often, they are immensely grateful for the recommendation and go on to apply their learning in a variety of contexts.


Recently, and from the same ‘school’ of nonviolent communication, colleagues have recommended a second book which is aimed at executives, Words That Work in Business: A Practical Guide to Effective Communication in the Workplace, by Ike Ilaster. I haven’t read it yet but I do notice that it starts with input on self empathy and empathy for others.

I look forward with curiosity to others’ recommendations.

PS Just to let you know, as a member of Amazon Associates UK, I shall receive a referral fee for any books you buy using the links in this posting.

Crossing the Unknown Sea

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“Work provides safety.
To define work in other ways than safety is to risk our illusions of immunity in the one organized area of life where we seem to keep nature and the world at bay”.
David Whyte
Crossing the Unknown Sea:  Work as a Pilgrimage of Identity
Recently, amongst the people with whom I spent five days at Vicky Peirce’s Come to Life Barn, I enjoyed meeting David, a recent graduate embarking on his career at a time when the economy is rocky and jobs are scarce.  Returning from the Barn and pondering our current economic situation I found myself picking up a book which has been waiting to be read for some time, David Whyte’s Crossing the Unknown Sea:  Work as a Pilgrimage of Identity.
With his characteristic style David Whyte draws on his own experiences and on the writings of others to reveal and explore the depths that await us if we only dare to bring ourselves fully to the experience of our work.  Every page reveals a deep truth about our relationship with work and about the relationship with ourselves which is revealed through this relationship.  The theme of conversation is woven throughout the book and I am at risk (though only very slightly) of losing sight of the overall arc of the book as I read sentence after sentence that lends itself to being quoted elsewhere.
As I read I also reflect on the experiences of friends, colleagues and clients in our current climate.  It seems to me that we have moved beyond redundancy as something that is happening to a few other people towards redundancy as something that is only a step away from each and every one of us.  With this comes a challenge to those of us for whom work is our primary and underlying security – for when our chief underlying security is no longer secure, we are challenged to look elsewhere.
The possibility or experience of job loss has a significant impact on the conversations we hold – at times without awareness – with ourselves.  For some, this is a devastating experience, rocking our very sense of self as someone worthwhile and with something to contribute.  We can see this in individuals and also in whole communities affected by the loss of an industry with which generations of neighbours and family members have become deeply entwined.  For others, redundancy becomes an opportunity to engage with deeper questions of who we are, what we want and what we bring, opening up new possibilities and pathways towards work as an expression of our true selves.  It is to these people that Whyte’s book is calling and it is with these people that I love to work in coaching partnership.
The possibility or experience of job loss is also something that shapes the conversations we have with one another.  For as we become aware that keeping our heads down and doing a good job may not be enough to secure our position in the workplace we are invited to reach out in mutual understanding and support.  Amongst the outcomes that our current climate can bring this is one that I see as entirely positive.  This is a movement away from a brightly-surfaced, brittle isolation towards a greater depth and intimacy in our conversations.  And once the surface of our isolation is broken and trust is established our world has already expanded and has the potential to continue to expand. 
For this reason, speaking to a client about the situation he faces as possible redundancy ebbs and flows, I notice that I cannot put my hand on heart and say that I truly wish he does not have to face the loss of his current job.  For whatever lies ahead I know that he – along with others like him – has the resources he needs to experience such a loss as an opening, a blossoming, as an experience by which he learns more about himself and his possibilities.  Whilst I do not have any wish for him that he lose his job, I do come back to my faith in the richness of human experience and in our capacity to learn, grow and thrive.
PS Just to let you know, as a member of Amazon Associates UK, I shall receive a referral fee for any books you buy using the links in this posting.

Seeing the unseen: truths about the society we live in

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Last week I wrote about the context in which we give feedback and this week I want to point to two more resources which supply insights into the society we live in.  Both provide insights for leaders about the context in which we lead.  This is not just about organisational culture.  It’s also about a wider culture.

The first resource is Walter Wink’s book The Powers That Be:  Theology For A New Millenium.  Winks has written extensively about what he calls the “powers” and this book draws together key points from a number of his books.  Maybe one way to understand Wink’s book is to imagine as a human being without knowledge of the overall size and shape of our planet being taken into space and shown, for the first time, that our planet earth is round and part of a much wider system.  Wink’s provides a compelling case for the idea that we live in a culture which favours violence (he calls it the domination system) and offers an alternative both to using violence to respond to violence and to a passive acceptance of domination by others.  He calls this alternative to classic fight or flight the third way or nonviolence.  I have heard that this book provided inspiration for Marshall Rosenberg’s book Nonviolent Communication:  A Language for Life as well as for Rosenberg’s lifetime commitment to teach nonviolence.  As a fan of Rosenberg’s work I found Wink’s book informed my understanding of this thing called NVC, too.

(Maybe it’s important to recognise in this posting that the subtitle of Wink’s book Theology for a New Millenium points both to Wink’s Christian faith and to the source of his interest.  If you are what often gets called a practising Christian you may find that this book challenges you in your understanding of Christ’s teachings, providing new insights into some key events in Christ’s life based on an understanding of the historical context in which Christ taught people – for example – to “turn the other cheek”.  And if you are not a Christian but simply someone who is seeking to understand the context in which you live and work I hope you will still read Wink’s book and draw insights from it).

Alongside Wink’s book, I recently came across the work of Anne Wilson Schaef and decided to read her book When Society Becomes An Addict.  Schaef is also stepping a long way back to identify a systemic culture she initially called by gender-related names and in this book calls the addictive system.  What fascinates me about this book is the link Schaef makes to the behaviours of the alcoholic.  These include such things as seeking to control, lying, denial and confusion.  And this makes sense to me both as cause and effect of living in what Wink’s calls the domination society.  For if you are seeking to dominate you are unlikely to say “I’m telling you that I’m right and you are wrong because that gives me power over you and encourages you to comply” or “I am dismissing you or your ideas rather than look into them because I know my case is built on foundations that don’t stand up to close examination”.  Equally, if you are subject to domination by others you may well experience confusion when faced with the obfuscation of a dominant other (from parent to boss) and you may well lie in your attempts to protect yourself from the punishments that are built into the system.

What’s this got to do with leadership?  In truth, I hope this is readily apparent:  as leaders, we may choose to perpetuate the domination system or to create something different.  Goleman and his co-authors write about the impact of different leadership styles in their book The New Leaders.  Perhaps another way of looking at it is this:  Wink’s writing together with Wilson Schaef’s provide a context in which to read all sorts of writings about leadership.  If you like, a planet earth view.

PS  Just to let you know, as a member of Amazon Associates UK, I shall receive a referral fee for any books you buy using the links in this posting.

    

Nonviolent communication: finding out more

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As they often are, my post for today has been written in advance.  As I sit and write, I am looking forward to taking a week away on a Nonviolent Communication retreat, with Vicky Peirce at The Barn.  As you read, I am mid-way through our five days together.  My past experience tells me that I can expect to be both stretched and nourished by the experience.

Recently, colleagues in the UK community of NVC practitioners have launched a ning group – a kind of social network cum website.  The membership is growing and I expect it to grow further.  You will find it at http://www.nvc-uk.com/ or equally at http://nvc-uk.ning.com/.  This is in addition to a simple information page at http://www.nvc-uk.info/.  There’s also a wealth of information available via the official site of the Center for Nonviolent Communication at http://www.cnvc.org/.

Marshall’s book is also the book I recommend most often to my coaching clients.  Having imbibed BBC Radio 4 all my life, I sometimes call it my Desert Island Disc book.  This is Nonviolent Communication:  A Language for Life.

If you want to find out more about Nonviolent Communication or connect with others who are seeking to practice this approach to relationships with self and other, these are all good places to start.

PS Just to let you know, as a member of Amazon Associates UK, I shall receive a referral fee for any books you buy using the links in this posting.

Derrick Bird: more than a “killer”

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Wednesday, June 2, 2010.  As the day unfolds the news begins to emerge of a number of acts of violence in Cumbria.  What began as an ordinary day in an area beloved of holiday makers for its tranquility and outstanding natural beauty ends as another Hungerford, Dunblane, Omagh.

Thursday, June 3, 2010.  The news of the day is dominated by reporting of the shootings as each new detail is sought out and shared.  Wondering why we are drawn to report in such detail and why I am drawn to watch it, I recognise the shock we all experience at events which are so far outside our mental maps of the world and our need, somehow, to make sense of the tragic events of the day.  Talk of the fact that the weapons used were lawfully held blends seamlessly into questions about our UK gun laws as if, somehow, there must be a way of preventing every such act of violence.

The reportage is – to my mind at least – sensitive and respectful, recognising the shock of a whole community and the need to grieve both individually and as a community.  The events of the previous day will need to be processed and the community will need to find some way of coming to terms with the experiences and the heartfelt losses of the day.

Of course, one option is easy to reach for and already reflected in the language used to describe Derrick Bird, the man who killed 12 people and injured a number of others.  On the one hand witnesses describe him in his full ordinariness:  the man who was a regular in his local pub, sometimes quiet and sometimes joshing with his mates;  the man who had dedicated significant time to caring for his mother.  On the other hand, journalists reach for the descriptions which set him apart – the gunsman, killer.  It is not only that he committed acts of violence.  The language suggests that he was the acts he committed.

I am reminded of a story told by Marshall Rosenberg about teaching nonviolent communication in a prison, when a man convicted of murder told him:  “If I’d known about this [nonviolent communication], I would not have needed to murder my best friend”.  Whilst we may never know for sure the motives that drove Derrick Bird to shoot so many people before killing himself, we can be sure that his was the tragic expression of his unmet needs – needs that he lacked the skill to meet.  His tragedy has become the tragedy of his family, the tragedy of a whole community, the tragedy of a nation.

So, as my heart goes out to everyone involved, I choose to believe that Derrick Bird was more – much more – than the acts he committed on Wednesday, 2 June 2010.  I choose to embrace him in my thoughts with as much love and care as I have for his bereaved family, for those he injured and killed, for their loved ones and for those around them affected by the terrible events of the day.

His is not a legacy I would wish for anyone and yet it can be transformed by our ability to love and to heal.