The Fine Art of Quibbling

Miguel suddenly realized that they were down the rabbit hole again, debating about the finer shades of meaning of the word "report." Instead of deciding about the severity of the defect, they were arguing — again — about whether it had been reported properly. Miguel could tolerate no more of this. "Hold it," he said. "I don't care about how we found out about this. We have to decide what to do about it."

Dennis held his ground. "I agree that we have to act on all properly reported problems. But this one hasn't even been officially reported yet, so…end of discussion."

Dennis might have a point. Or he could be seeking refuge from the problem using a technique sometimes called quibbling. To quibble is to object unnecessarily, or to evade the truth of an assertion by resorting to trivial faultfinding. Sometimes the term refers to petty disagreements about such things as the meanings of words. And sometimes — more interestingly — it's an illegitimate debating technique that leads to poor decisions.

When quibbling happens from habit or by accident, it's relatively harmless, because the conversation partners usually recover quickly and return to substantive discussion, once they realize that they're quibbling or someone tells them so. But disingenuous quibbling is another matter. It can be a deliberate distraction, a protective device, a power ploy, or worse.

Quibbling can be
a deliberate distraction,
a protective device,
a power ploy or worseA disingenuous quibble is a devious attempt to gain rhetorical advantage by resorting to petty objections. Here are four strategies disingenuous quibblers use.

Defending against another issue

The quibbler might be trying to halt progress toward surfacing some other related issue. By burning up the group's time and energy on minor details, the quibbler can sometimes prevent exposure of something important.

Impressing the room

Because quibbling usually requires a fine mind and a mastery of words and subtlety, the listener is often confused by the quibble and requires further clarification. This could be a power ploy by the quibbler, because it moves the quibbler to a one-up position — at least temporarily.

"Winning" the point

Winning the point might not be the ultimate objective — it might be a means to another end. For instance, conceding the point might lead to a conclusion that might be uncomfortable for the quibbler, or embarrassing or painful to face.

"Winning" all points

Here the quibbler avoids conceding any point at all, and the motivation is more about winning (or rather, not losing) than it is about winning the specific point. All-points quibblers are more likely to combine the quibble with other techniques, such as interruptions, floor hogging, and multiple rhetorical fallacies.

Take care — what seems to you to be quibbling might actually be substantive. Wait for a pattern to emerge, and then talk about the pattern. Detailed discussion of a single instance of quibbling might be quibbling itself.  Top    Next Issue

Are you fed up with tense, explosive meetings? Are you or a colleague the target of a bully? Destructive conflict can ruin organizations. But if we believe that all conflict is destructive, and that we can somehow eliminate conflict, or that conflict is an enemy of productivity, then we're in conflict with Conflict itself. Read 101 Tips for Managing Conflict to learn how to make peace with conflict and make it an organizational asset. Order Now!

Your comments are welcome

About Point Lookout

Thank you for reading this article. I hope you enjoyed it and found it useful, and that you'll consider recommending it to a friend.

Point Lookout is a free weekly email newsletter. Browse the archive of past issues. Subscribe for free.

Support Point Lookout by joining the Friends of Point Lookout, as an individual or as an organization.

Do you face a complex interpersonal situation? Send it in, anonymously if you like, and I'll give you my two cents.

Related articles

More articles on Conflict Management:

An Emergency Toolkit

You've just had some bad news at work, and you're angry or really upset. Maybe you feel like the target of a vicious insult or the victim of a serious injustice. You have work to do, and you want to respond, but you must first regain your composure. What can you do to calm down and start feeling better?

Political Framing: Communications

In organizational politics, one class of toxic tactics is framing — accusing a group or individual by offering interpretations of their actions to knowingly and falsely make them seem responsible for reprehensible or negligent acts. Here are some communications tactics framers use.

Untangling Tangled Threads

In energetic discussions, topics and subtopics get intertwined. The tangles can be frustrating. Here's a collection of techniques for minimizing tangles in complex discussions.

Preventing the Hurt of Hurtful Dismissiveness

When we use the hurtfully dismissive remarks of others to make ourselves feel bad, there are techniques for recovering relatively quickly. But we can also learn to respond to these remarks altogether differently. When we do that, recovery is unnecessary.

Toxic Conflict in Virtual Teams: Minimizing Authority

Toxic conflict in virtual teams is especially difficult to address, because we bring to it assumptions about causes and remedies that we've acquired in our experience in co-located teams. In this Part II of our exploration we examine how minimizing authority tends to convert ordinary creative conflict into a toxic form.

See also Conflict Management, Effective Communication at Work and Critical Thinking at Work for more related articles.

Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout

Coming February 26: Unintended Condescension: II

Intentionally making condescending remarks is something most of us do only when we lose control. But anyone at any time can inadvertently make a remark that someone else experiences as condescending. We explored two patterns to avoid last time. Here are two more. Available here and by RSS on February 26.

And on March 4: Workplace Remorse

Remorse is an unpleasant emotion. But it need not be something we suppress or avoid. It can provide a path to a positive learning experience that adds meaning to life. Available here and by RSS on March 4.

Coaching services

I offer email and telephone coaching at both corporate and individual rates. Contact Rick for details at rbrenmhXARWRMUvVyOdHlner@ChacxgDmtwOKrxnripPCoCanyon.com or (650) 787-6475, or toll-free in the continental US at (866) 378-5470.

Get the ebook!

Past issues of Point Lookout are available in six ebooks:

• Get 2001-2 in Geese Don't Land on Twigs (PDF, )
• Get 2003-4 in Why Dogs Wag (PDF, )
• Get 2005-6 in Loopy Things We Do (PDF, )
• Get 2007-8 in Things We Believe That Maybe Aren't So True (PDF, )
• Get 2009-10 in The Questions Not Asked (PDF, )
• Get all of the first twelve years (2001-2012) in The Collected Issues of Point Lookout (PDF, )

Are you a writer, editor or publisher on deadline? Are you looking for an article that will get people talking and get compliments flying your way? You can have 500 words in your inbox in one hour. License any article from this Web site. More info

Public seminars

The Power Affect: How We Express Our Personal Power

Many people who possess real organizational power have a characteristic demeanor. It's the way they project their presence. I call this the power affect. Some people — call them power pretenders — adopt the power affect well before they attain significant organizational power. Unfortunately for their colleagues, and for their organizations, power pretenders can attain organizational power out of proportion to their merit or abilities. Understanding the power affect is therefore important for anyone who aims to attain power, or anyone who works with power pretenders. Read more about this program.

• A recording of a program presented June 29, 2017, Monthly Webinar, sponsored by Technobility Webinar Series. PMI members can earn 1.0 Category 'A' PDU by viewing this program. View this program now.