On Differences and Disagreements

Usually, there's more than one way to convert disagreement into agreement. Choosing one can be tricky, though, because we so rarely appreciate all of what separates us or what distinguishes our views. Here's a collection of insights that might help find a path from disagreement to agreement.

• If I don't think I can explain it to a child, maybe I don't fully understand it.
• If it's urgent, go slow.
• Accountability and blame are two very different things.
• The problem is not the problem. The coping is the problem. — Virginia Satir
• Questions are usually just questions. Even when they're counter-arguments in disguise, they're still opportunities for giving great answers.
• When people I work with closely get into tangles, I'm probably involved in at least a minor way. Minor might still be significant.
• In tangles, everyone has a role. Being a spectator is a role.
• The person we all acknowledge as being involved in the trouble is only the person we're all willing to acknowledge. There are certainly others.
• We probably aren't the first people in the world to get into this particular fix.
• Our differences in this situation might contain echoes of our differences in another situation. Maybe one key to this situation lies in the other one. Unlocking this one might require more than one key.
• Although there are some people at work who are actually trying to harm others, they are so rare that I probably don't know anyone like that.
• The number of people who hold a particular belief isn't an indication of the correctness of that belief.
• When I say something I later regret, I'm usually repeating a previous error.
• For resolving differences, face-to-face is best. Phone-to-phone is next best. Voicemail is nuts. Anything involving a keyboard is totally nuts.
• Nobody has an accurate view of everything. I might be mistaken on this.
• There is almost always more than one way out.
• When I think there is only one way out, I probably haven't thought about it enough.
• When I Differences and disagreements
  are the doorways to growththink I've thought about it enough, and I still don't have a way out, I'm probably just tired. I take a break and try again later.
• If I think I don't know what I want, maybe going for what I really want is too scary.
• I can consider what to do about an unpleasant possibility without accepting that unpleasant possibility as inevitable.
• I can't actually unsee what I've seen.
• I can see in new ways things I've already seen in old ways.
• I can see for the first time things I've never seen before.
• I can see something for the first time only once.
• I can't unlearn what I've learned, but I can learn what I haven't yet learned.
• When somebody else seems to be trying mightily to make things worse, maybe I don't fully grasp what he or she is trying to accomplish.

This collection is a work in progress. ChacoCanyon.com. I'm always interested.  Top    Next Issue

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And on May 1: Antipatterns for Time-Constrained Communication: 2

Recognizing just a few patterns that can lead to miscommunication can reduce the incidence of problems. Here is Part 2 of a collection of antipatterns that arise in technical communication under time pressure, emphasizing those that depend on content. Available here and by RSS on May 1.

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