I was helping my wife clean our living room, and I was, as I often am, thinking about what I could write here. I was not thinking about my wife, my kids, or my professional colleagues.

I was just thinking. (Remember, I am a recovering engineer. I am almost always “thinking.”)

I started thinking about how we often misinterpret other people’s meaning, and this little rhyme popped (almost) fully formed into my mind.

So, I share it here with you today:

I’ll never know your real intent,
Until I ask you what you meant.
And, if you choose, in your reply,
To then, tell me the reason why.

Related posts:

1. Effective Communication Skills: You Don’t Know Until You Ask
2. Resolving Conflict Lesson: Watch Your Step
3. Effective Communication: Begin With The End In Mind

One of the most common questions about using the DISC model is this: “How do I know another person’s personality style?”

Well, the short answer is: you can’t know another person’s style without assessment results.

You can, however, make an educated guess about their primary style (or at least how they are interacting in the current situation) by observing their words and behaviors and answering two simple questions (phrased in the language of the DISC model):

1. Are they more outgoing or more reserved? and
2. Are they more task-oriented or more people oriented?

Or, stated another way:

1. Do they speak more quickly, loudly and emphatically or more slowly, softly and monotone?, and
2. Do they speak in more factual, “thinking” language or in a more relational, “feeling” language?

Answer those two questions and you’ve got your starting point for connecting better with them.

If they are:

• Outgoing and Task oriented, use Dominant language.
• Outgoing and People-oriented, use Inspiring language.
• Reserved and People-oriented, use Supportive language.
• Reserved and Task-oriented, use Cautious language.

Related posts:

1. Communication Tips: Connecting With Reserved, People-Oriented People
2. Get Over Yourself To Develop Effective Communication Skills
3. Communication Tips: Connecting With Outgoing, People-Oriented People

In one way or another, I have commented on this common difference between people in this blog and in other articles. It seems that I have, in many cases, made the point in an indirect way. Today, I thought I would make a more explicit observation about one of the common differences between task-oriented people and people-oriented people (from the DISC model):

• Task-oriented people generally “think” about things (including relationships).
• People-oriented people generally “feel” about things (including tasks).

In a previous post, I shared the story about calling home while I was traveling. That story illustrated my task nature and how I made a relational effort (calling home) into a task. That story also illustrated how the way that I defined the task led me to ignore the relational aspect of calling home. I called home and I was done. No conversation. No real listening. I checked out when my task (calling home) was checked off my list.

A similar mental barrier can creep into the approach that people-oriented people take with regard to tasks.

For example, I once worked with an extremely people-oriented person on evaluating a potential business investment. As we talked through his options, we came to a logical conclusion about what he should do next. After we came to our conclusion, he paused and said that he had some reservations about being able to invest the money needed to move forward.

I said: “How much money do you have?”

He said: “I don’t know for sure. I just don’t feel like I have enough.”

I wanted to say (but, thankfully, I didn’t): “How much money you feel like you have was not the question. I asked, how much do you have?”

At that moment, we could have had a major communication breakdown. He felt rather than thought about a factual, data-driven issue.

My colleague in this story is a very intelligent person. We did not get into a conflict over this situation because we were both able to adjust our communication styles (word choice, tone, etc) to better connect with each other.

What if, instead of holding back my initial thought, I had said what was in my mind: “…how much do you have?” (With the accompanying sarcastic tone.)

How would our relationship have progressed from that point?

I think it would not have gone well.

The misinterpretation of intent that often comes from this simple difference in perspective and approach can create some pretty intense conflicts.

Task-oriented people can think that people-oriented people are not rational.

People-oriented people can feel that task-oriented people don’t care.

And both assumptions are often wrong.

Related posts:

1. Conflict Resolution Tips: Task Oriented People with People Oriented Individuals
2. Conflict Resolution Tips: People Oriented Individuals with Task Oriented People
3. Better Relationship Tips For Task Oriented People: Redefine Your Task

In many cases, the path from conflict to resolution is like traveling down a dirt road in the country.

It’s a little rough. Dirt might get in your eyes so that you don’t see clearly what lies ahead. You have to go more slowly than you do in other situations. Once you are on the road, you have to keep going. It is too narrow to turn around and go back the other way.

At some point, you come to a fork in the road and you have to make a choice.

In the first few moments of a conflict situation, many of us (close to all of us) are prone to say and/or do things that make the conflict worse. When we perceive a threat, we go into “fight or flight” response and adrenaline takes over our brains. We do not act as calmly and rationally as we do at other times. This response often leads to an “I don’t know why I said that” experience.

When you have an “I don’t know why I said that” moment, you are on the dirt road.

You are on the dirt road before you even know what happened. You were in a conversation with someone, and, suddenly, the conversation turned and it got a little rough. You’re not really sure what’s going on.

Eventually, you regain your bearings. You start to realize that you’re now on a dirt road (under the influence of adrenaline). The adrenaline rush makes it hard to see and think clearly, but you are now aware of where you are.

Then, you come to a “fork in the road.” You reach a point in the conversation where you have to make a choice to stay on the road or to take the right fork that leads you back to the main highway of resolution and positive interaction.

The moment of choice might not happen immediately. It might, in some cases, take a day or so to calm down enough to realize that you can choose a different path in this relationship.

Even if it takes awhile, the adrenaline will wear off. When it does, you cannot continue to claim: “I don’t know why I said that.” You are no longer in the automatic and reactive mode.

After the heat of the moment passes, you can exercise your power of choice to act in better and more constructive ways. You can:

• apologize
• forgive
• explore alternative solutions
• listen
• engage in conversation, etc.

Human nature can make us prone to rationalize and justify our bad behaviors by blaming others and claiming that we had no other choice. The truth is that we almost always have a better and more positive option we can choose.

Remember to exercise your power of choice in conflict resolution.

Related posts:

1. Conflict Resolution Techniques: Question Your Assumptions
2. Snow Drifts, Driving Lessons, and Conflict Resolution
3. The 7 Deadly Sins of Conflict Resolution

A few weeks ago, I read an interesting article titled On the Job, Nice Guys May Finish Last. The title immediately caught my attention, and I had to take a look.

In reading the article, I saw an immediate connection to my work and for other people interested in using the DISC model in their professional and personal lives.

The point made in this article is particularly significant for people with supportive tendencies (people who are people-oriented and reserved).

People with strong supportive traits are great at building relationships, easing tensions, helping others, and holding a team together. And, as Dr. Christine Riordan says in the article I mentioned above:

People with this natural personality trait may be less likely to face confrontation or other difficulties at work.

I’m not suggesting that having the supportive trait is a problem (it happens to be a strong secondary trait for me). I am suggesting that people with this trait commit themselves to learning the skills of assertive communication.

People with supportive traits often use passive communication strategies in an effort to ease tensions and reduce conflicts. While these strategies are sometimes useful and necessary, I recommend learning to use them intentionally when appropriate rather than as a default because they are more comfortable.

Consistently passive communication and conflict avoidance can create situations where conflicts go unresolved and continue to simmer under the surface until they explode and destroy a team or family. In addition, passive communication can make people, like the lamb pictured above, susceptible to “predators” in the workplace. Both scenarios can have  major negative impacts on your career.

Learning to apply assertive communication techniques can improve the odds of successfully confronting and resolving conflict situations at work by stopping the spread of destructive conflict and confrontation.

Related posts:

1. Communication Tips: Connecting With Reserved, People-Oriented People
2. DISC Model FAQ’s: Could I Have More Than One DISC Behavior Style?
3. DISC Model FAQ’s: Is Changing Your Behavior Phoney?

… And What You Can Do About It

Have you ever told yourself that you wouldn’t do something? Maybe you said you wouldn’t eat too much at a party. Maybe you told yourself that you wouldn’t speak too soon at a meeting. Or maybe you just told yourself that you wouldn’t break the speed limit on the way home from work.

Whatever it was, you told yourself that you wouldn’t do something that you either normally do, wanted to do, or habitually do, and you eventually “gave-in” to the temptation.

Well, there’s a good reason for this behavior, and Dan Heath gives more details about it in this article over at Fast Company. I suggest that you check out the article for more details. For now, here’s the short version: self-control eventually runs out. In other words, you can only resist so long before you “run out” of self-control.

Your limit might be different from mine, and we all have a limit.

So, what does this observation have to do with this blog?

Since one of the recurring themes here is “get over yourself,” the concept of depleting self-control is vitally important to understand.

Whether you are trying to change your behavior, your team member’s behavior, or your child’s behavior, remember that everyone has a self-control limit, and when you exceed the limit you invite failure.

You invite failure to comply with rules, failure to cooperate, and failure to do things in new and different ways.

This is an observable and repeatable psychological phenomenon. Like so many of the things I write and speak on, I don’t suggest hiding behind the behavior. Rather, I suggest understanding the behavior and then making plans that recognized the reality of life instead of wishing that things were different.

So, what do we do with this observation?

Here are three suggestions to get you started with applying  this principle in your efforts to change your behaviors or to influence another person’s behaviors:

1. Get away from tempting situations as quickly as possible.
   Since we know that self-control will eventually run out, if at all possible, remove the temptation to do things the old way or to partake in some forbidden behavior.
2. Give people (or yourself) a break.
   If you ask someone to change their behavior in a particular situation, make some time for them to get away from it for awhile so that they can replenish their “supply” of self-control.
3. Make big changes in small steps.
   Smaller steps do many things to make change easier to accept. One benefit of smaller steps is the reduction of effort required to remember the new way of doing things. If the effort to remember the new way is small, the time to “self-control” exhaustion is longer. This longer temptation resistance time increases the odds that the new way of doing things becomes easy to remember before our self control runs out.

Photo by NomadicLass.

Related posts:

1. Being Too Nice Can Hurt You
2. A DISC Model Question You Should Ask of Yourself
3. DISC Model FAQ’s: Is Changing Your Behavior Phoney?

I have noticed one behavior many of us use that almost guarantees that our suggestions, solutions, and opinions will be ignored when we offer them:

We tell people what to do before we have heard their whole story.

When we offer people suggestions, solutions, and opinions before we have heard them out, they often do not care what we have to say. So, they rarely listen to and fully comprehend what we are suggesting.

The suggestion might be useful. It might be right on target. It might be exactly what the other person needs to hear.

And, they probably won’t hear it.

If you speak too soon, you’re just trying to push fluid into an already full container.

Offering suggestions before people have told their whole story is like having a doctor prescribe medication or treatment before listening to all of the symptoms.

I once had numbness and tingling in my foot. I went to my doctor, and he asked a whole battery of questions before prescribing a treatment plan. He asked about my physical activity, other pains or sensations I had in other parts of my body, how my leg felt, etc.

In the end, we identified the source of the numbness in my foot to be a problem in my lower back. It could have been any number of other problems. If he had jumped on the numbness in my foot without digging further into my other symptoms, he could have prescribed a wonderful treatment for a problem that had nothing to do with my problem.

In this case, he chose to diagnose the problem before he prescribed a solution.

When we work with other people, we need to keep this idea in mind.

We may have valuable experience to offer. We may have seen this problem before. We might even have a great, simple solution to offer.

And it just doesn’t matter if we offer the suggestion, solution, or opinion in a way that virtually guarantees that the other person ignores or discounts our input.

As you work with others and attempt to share your experience, remember the lesson from my doctor:

Ask, listen, and diagnose before you prescribe.

Related posts:

1. Effective Communication Skills: You Don’t Know Until You Ask
2. How To Get People To Do What You Want
3. DISC Model FAQ’s: Is Changing Your Behavior Phoney?

Guy Answers the Question:
Is Changing Your Behavior Phoney?

As I teach, train, and coach using the DISC model, people hear me say that I encourage them to change their behaviors to fit the situation and to better connect with other people.

Sometimes, people ask me if consciously changing behavior is phoney or fake. This concern raises another common question about the DISC model, and how I recommend people use it to connect and communicate more effectively.

In answering this question, I often refer to a Thomas Jefferson quote:

In matters of style, swim with the current. In matters of principle, stand like a rock.

As I see it, choosing a behavior, word, or tone that will improve your communication effectiveness is not a moral or ethical issue. It is just a matter of style.

We often change our behaviors for different environments. For example, most people recognize that appropriate behavior during a wedding ceremony is likely to be different from appropriate behavior at the celebration party after the ceremony. Different environments call for different behaviors.

As long as your intent is not to defraud, manipulate, or somehow deceive the other person, behaving in a way that might be uncomfortable or unnatural for you in the interest of connecting with them is not fake or phoney. Rather, I see it as working to create a better environment for the other person.

Related posts:

1. A DISC Model Question You Should Ask of Yourself
2. DISC Model FAQ’s: Could I Have More Than One DISC Behavior Style?
3. DISC FAQ’s: Can I Change My Personality Style On Purpose?

Earlier this week, I attended the ASTD conference in Chicago. As I worked in the Kevin Eikenberry Group booth, I noticed an interesting dynamic happening at the booths around me.

Where someone was willing to stand on a platform and speak, other people were willing to stop and listen.

In fact, it looked to me like people were not just willing to listen; they wanted to listen.

Likewise, at the booths where people sat and waited for the conference attendees to approach them, nothing happened.

So, here’s a big lesson I learned while working an exhibit hall booth at ASTD 2010 in Chicago:

If you’ve got something to say, stand up and say it.

If you stand up and say it, other people will probably stop to listen. They might not like what you have to say. They might not agree with what you have to say. They will listen to what you have to say.

I’m not advocating the use of a platform to harrangue, harrass,  or irritate people. I am suggesting that to be heard you have to have the courage to stand-up and speak.

Related posts:

1. One Way To Guarantee That Your Suggestion Is Ignored
2. The Positive Runs Out

This is a simple, straightforward communication technique that you can use immediately to improve your ability to connect and communicate with others:

Use “and” more than “but”.

Imagine that you and I are in a conversation and that you have just shared your opinion with me.

Compare these two responses that I might make:

1. “You know, that’s a good point, but …”
2. “You know, that’s a good point, and …”

With the first reply, it almost doesn’t matter what I say. I have probably triggered a natural defensive mechanism. Even if what I say is positive, you probably have a bit of a defensive posture in receiving what I am about to say.

The second reply creates a more positive lead-in to the second part of the statement. Even if I offer a slightly different interpretation of the facts, I have avoided triggering defensiveness  early in the process so that you might receive what I have to say with an open attitude.

As I think about the times I am tempted to say “but” rather than “and”, I see that the vast majority of the time my real message is an “and” message rather than a “but” message.

One little word substitution can yield huge benefits in communication effectiveness.

So, remember to use “and” more than “but”.

Related posts:

1. Effective Communication Skills: You Don’t Know Until You Ask
2. Get Over Yourself To Develop Effective Communication Skills
3. Effective Communication Skills: How to Quickly Guess a Person’s DISC Style