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| Communication Skills to manage conflict, handle difficult conversations and build emotional intelligence
A blog for leaders and others who want to gain confidence, self control and influence in difficult conversations when stakes are high.
conflict, resolution, resolve, difficult people, communication skills, emotional intelligence, EQ, training, coaching, courses, assertive, assertiveness, negative emotions
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Emotional Judo
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– Helping you communicate with EASE
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Seven Cancerous Communication Habits; do you have them?
Emotional Judo General / Improve skills / Significance v Insignificance / sympathy vs empathy
We’ve been talking since we were about 18 months old but how effective is our communication? If you or your organisation are participating in these seven cancerous traits, what is the cost? The Shotgun We could put any bad listening habit on this list: assuming, jumping to conclusions, mind excursions etc. The shot gun is just one example of poor listening skills. Not listening properly leads to miscommunication and error, a breakdown of trust and relationships, and potential conflict. Are any of those good for organizational outcomes? The shot gun is where a person who is meant to be the receiver of information prizes their information over another’s. As a result they do not listen to the content of the other, they are simply searching for a gap in the conversation so they can fire off their loaded shotgun with their views to take control of the conversation. Even if you disagree with the other party, there is a better way to enter the conversation. The shotgun fosters animosity and a lack of willingness to collaborate. Fake Facts and Opinions With memes and social media re-posts these days, no one is checking the veracity of ideas put out into the public. This predates the current day but it is more commonplace now. The current US president is good at this one. Newspapers have slashed their editorial staff because they are competing with the Internet. Hence, not even newspapers are properly checking their facts. Repeated ideas swim around in cyberspace become truth. An example of this that pre-dates the internet are the stats on communication that only 7% of communication is from words, 38% is tone and 58% is body language. Even Albert Mehrabian, who conducted the 1967 research that gave rise to those numbers, says he has been misquoted ever since. But even worse than fake facts are opinions. Unless you are a renowned oracle or your opinion is based on relevant empirical evidence, then your opinion is simply that. Opinions are valid provided they are substantiated. At the same time, we need to be aware that empirical data is sometimes based in a context. If we only run from historical data without questioning context and sticking to vision, we will never go forward. Getting a balance of this in decision making is important. Breaching Confidentiality Trust is one of the most important elements of good communication. It goes without saying that breaching another person’s confidence will be an enormous killer of trust in your relationship moving forward, yet people still do it. If their faith in confiding in you is disregarded, they will be less trusting of you next time it comes to sharing important information. Hence you may be stemming the communication flow. Blame avoidance and its cousin The cousin of blame avoidance is blame attribution. If everyone is looking for somebody to blame, then not too many people are taking responsibility and accountability. If this goes on within workplaces or families, what ends up happening is a blame avoidance culture. No one wants to take ownership for fear they will get their head chopped off. The cousins feed into each other. People purposefully create an out-clause in actuality or in their own mind at the start of a project. As a result, greater project failure is a likely outcome. Blame avoidance and attribution are huge cancers in organizations and families. Interrupting or finishing This could probably be labelled a poor listening habit like the shotgun. Interrupting others, or finishing what they are saying because we assume we are understand or know what they are trying to communicate, is a patronizing and potentially hazardous process. It may speed up proceedings, but both these poor habits stifle the potential of useful contributions in the future. That may result in helpful pieces of information never emerging. If you see your ability to communicate as superior and jump in over the top of others, remember communication is a two-way street that involves reception as much as broadcast. Not checking out/ lack empathy It is so easy for miscommunication to happen. As has been said, we don’t listen properly, we assume we know what others are saying, we prize our own opinions over others, and we enter situations with predetermined notions that our way is ‘right’. If you look at the communication filters that each of us run our incoming information through, it is a wonder we can understand each other’s intended meanings at all. Lacking empathy will get in the way of understanding others. That doesn’t mean you have to agree with them but acknowledge your understanding with more that “I get where you are coming from,” or “I understand.” Checking out means we take steps to assure that the meaning we have taken away is the intended one. Not checking out assumes we understand what the other person has said and can lead to errors in communication and costly mistakes for organisations. Simple stuff, I know, but because it is so simple, laziness and pride often get in the way of this occurring. Significance battles Significance battles occur when egos clash. It is probably one of the most common communication problems in any setting: workplace, personal, social. Everybody wants to feel a level of significance in relationship with others; it is one of the six fundamental human needs according to Human Needs Psychology. Respecting another’s views generally flows into mutual respect. When a significance battle occurs, both parties are looking to win over the other, rather than trying to find a true win-win. Inside an organization this battle wastes time, leads to passive aggressive behavior and can derail or limit outcomes. But difficult conversations need to be had in all relationships so understanding how to negotiate significance battles is important. Tim Higgs is a Narrative Psychologist and author of the International Best-selling book Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence. Available here....
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If…inspiring but impossible???
Business / Emotional Judo Mats / Improve skills / Leadership / Significance v Insignificance
‘If’ by Rudyard Kipling, is one of the most inspiring poems but almost impossible to live up to completely. It touches on many qualities desired in business and community leaders: vision, humility, courage, ethics, time-management and the reason for this post – emotional intelligence. My grandmother introduced the poem to me when I was nine. I received an autograph book for Christmas (they were a trend back then) and asked her to sign it. She wrote: If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it, And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son! Later I realised it was just one verse of many. I have since grown to love two lines that typify emotional intelligence and are important of objectives of my book, Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence. If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, and, If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch, Being able to speak up in times of conflict and disagreement without being overcome by anxiety or losing your cool is a skill that can be learned by having the right structure and knowledge. Further, being able to keep your humility and not come across as overbearing or arrogant, as you move up the ranks. Or not be threatened by the seniority of others, so you can contribute your valuable information, is a virtue for you and your workplace…or family and social group for that matter. The significance scaffold helps you master the right ingredients to get people on board, up, down or across. Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence, was recently endorsed in business magazine Inc.com as one of the top twelve books on Emotional Intelligence to read before you turn 50. It available on Amazon ....
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Are smart phones making you dumb? Is tech blunting your memory?
Business / Emotional Judo General / Improve skills
Here are a few tips to improve your recall and be remembered by others as well. 1. Three is the magic number 2. Chunk 3. Use Mnemonics If you lost your phone and had to call someone important in an emergency, would you remember their number? Do you find information hard to recall at crucial times? The key to being remembered is to understand how people digest information effectively. It helps others remember information you impart to them, and if you use the same principles for yourself, it will help you remember better as well. For the past twelve years I have taught a course called Think on Your Feet®. It helps you be concise, brief, and memorable when you speak, by revealing ten structures behind good communication. It is an excellent course, so when I wrote my own book, Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence, I incorporated some of the concepts. It’s been a best seller on Amazon for four months, so hopefully I did something right. (If you want info on either course, contact me here.) People often forget the diplomatic way to say things when they get anxious or irritated in a difficult conversation. So, any training they have in this area needs to be memorable and on call! Three is the magic number when speaking to another. One point may not be enough to get an argument over the line. Two points may be oppositional. Three points is enough information to influence and not too much that it will be forgotten. When posting blogs or writing emails you may be able to stretch it to five because the reader can remember more when the information is written. But what if you have eight steps or fifteen, how does that fit? This was an issue I faced in Emotional Judo® with an eight-step formula for bringing up potentially volatile issues with people. It’s called U WIN/I WIN. I couldn’t just bury three steps; it wouldn’t work for the user or receiver! You can probably guess how I solved it. Remember how you remembered eight-digit phone numbers before mobile phones? Chunk them! So, eight steps becomes two parcels of four. Fifteen would be 3 points x 5. To be remembered or remember for yourself break down your info into larger topics with sub topics under them. And for the final icing on the cake. To really remember at times of importance or stress, create mnemonics. (Silent first m.) A mnemonic is a structure that helps you remember information. It could be an acronym, a rhyme, an associated fact or visual (good for remembering names). There are many kinds of mnemonics. So, U WIN/ I WIN is chunked as well as being a mnemonic. And even the mnemonic is special because apart from each letter of the acronym prompting each step, the idea held in the acronym itself, you win first then I can win, helps the user remember the overarching premise. So if you can, use three, chunk, and use mnemonics. And a bit of repetition doesn’t go astray either…haha. Next blog. I’ll share the eight steps of U WIN/ I WIN. If you want info on either Think on Your Feet® or Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence, contact me here.) ...
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6 out of 8 High-Performing Team Characteristics Turn Up Accidentally
Emotional Judo General / Teams / Trust
I didn’t design this, it’s a happy accident. This applies to any team that wishes to function better, and that includes families. When I read the recent LinkedIn post, where Tim Baker put forward his eight characteristics of high-performing teams, I thought hold on! Six of these characteristics can be found in my best-selling book Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence. (Grab it on Amazon) To me, numbers one and eight are ethics fostered by the leader or founder of the team. The other six are skill-sets/behaviours. While it’s nice to know what the characteristics are, it’s even better to know how to develop them. In my experience of working with tens of thousands of people on communication and leadership over the last 16 years, many people struggle with some of these skills/behaviours. Here are Tim Baker’s eight characteristics with some of my notes on how you can develop the skills. The take-away is in bold at the end of each one. Sense of Purpose – Ethic and vision. Open Communication – Certainly there is more to open communication than having a difficult conversation. But most people find difficult conversations tough because of the emotion that usually exists. Being able to openly disagree with the leader and other team members and come to satisfactory resolutions is a very important component of open communication. It ultimately has people feeling their views are respected and they are valued. Having communication structures to support this process and giving people the confidence to have open communication without recrimination is what Emotional Judo® seeks to achieve. Use structures to aid your open communication. Trust and Mutual Respect – Trust is a feeling as well as a logical conclusion drawn from various variables. It is the cornerstone of open communication. We also need to be able trust that people will fulfil what they have committed to. The five ingredients A, B, C, D, E of trust are outlined in the book: Authenticity Behaviour Consistency Dependability Ethics Respect is a “behaviour” and included in this ingredient. Absence of respect, generally prompts defensiveness or apathy and that is a disaster for high performing teams. A stepped process on how to get more trust is included in Emotional Judo®. Examine your existing relationships and see where they can improve within the five ingredients. Shared Leadership – this characteristic is not discussed as “leadership” in Emotional Judo®, however, most of the ten communication tools seek win/win outcomes and as Tim Baker points out, this is about being consultative. The significance scaffold is the crucial tool to use in these circumstances. Your ability to step down from significance and not feel at threat when someone you lead takes it, is an important leadership skill. There is an online assessment accessible from the book. Don’t monopolize significance; pass it around. Effective Working Procedures – in Emotional Judo® Rules, I mention that, like regular martial arts, if you do not have established rules and norms, people will generally “make stuff up” to advantage themselves. It is important to have explicit norms and procedures. Building on Differences – differences are an important component that make teams more robust. Embracing and building on differences is important. Differences can also bring up frustration and intolerance for some people. Having tools with structures to help work through differences is vital for team performance. That’s what Emotional Judo® does. Use structures to work through difference and create better outcomes. Flexibility and Adaptability – being able to work with others to find best outcomes and allowing yourself to relinquish “being right” and fixed in your views for the sake of best outcomes is important in a high performing team. Again, Emotional Judo® provides structures to do this. Entertain that there may be better ways than “your way” and use structure to invite discussion. Continuous Learning – Ethic If you haven’t done so already, grab Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence on Amazon. You can read it on any device as an eBook and it’s available as a paperback. ...
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Is Emotional Judo® claiming to boost Emotional Intelligence a scam?
Uncategorized
Despite the title of my Amazon Best-Selling book, Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence, there is not a lot written in there about Emotional Intelligence. Isn’t that misleading people? Is it a scam? Absolutely not; it’s practical. Judo in Japanese means “the gentle way”. Its founder, Kano Jigoro sought a way to maximise effectiveness through minimum effort; a smaller opponent with good technique could then beat a larger one. Working on that principle, I developed Emotional Judo®. It provides you with 10 tools to help you manage difficult conversations, to gain effective outcomes with good technique and less effort. You don’t need to know how cells respire and muscle is built, for you to get fitter and stronger. You can simply do exercises and lift weights with the right form and repetition and you will become fitter and stronger. If you master the Emotional Judo® tools, you will become more emotionally intelligent. It’s that simple. But, it may be useful for you to know… Emotional Intelligence is generally thought to have four parts: Understanding our own emotions Understanding others’ emotions Managing our own emotions Doing things to emotionally impact others positively Just like different exercises will work different parts of your body. Different communication and emotion tools and exercises will build the various parts that make up emotional intelligence. And like physical exercise, the more you do it the easier it gets. Understanding how you position yourself in relationships through the metaphor of the Emotional Judo® Mats, will help you develop in all four of emotional intelligence. Building your capacity to empathize will help you not only understand others’ emotions but connect to them to positively impact them. And of course, to be able to empathize, you need to understand emotion in general – your own included. These are just two of the ten Emotional Judo® tools. Check out the book on Amazon. You don’t need a kindle; you can read from any device....
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Have you changed your story?
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This blog applies as much to those who have bought my best-selling book Emotional Judo®, as to those who are still to read it. It is as applicable to personal relationships as much as it is to the workplace. And in fact, this is an important concept for organisations undergoing change. I was recently coaching a mid-level manager in a tech organisation. We were talking about his career prospects, his eight-year tenure with his current organisation, which he loves, and what might need to happen for him to get to the career role he covets. This prompted him to talk about his CV and he suggested he needed to dust off his old CV and add what he had done in the last eight years. I have had this conversation with many coachees and training participants over the years because it occurred to me when I was “brushing up” my own CV a long time ago, that I was not the same person I was when I wrote the original. Simply adding my most recent experience was not reflective of who I had become as a result of the experience. How does that analogy relate to my book? Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence, uses the metaphor of real judo, which means the “gentle way” in Japanese. Real judo was developed to achieve maximum efficiency with minimum effort; a smaller judoka (judo participant) with the right skills uses leverage to beat a bigger opponent. Emotional Judo® provides ten “invisible” structures to help you achieve maximum efficiency with minimum effort. In other words, you achieve better outcomes when dealing with difficult people and delicate or important conversations. Having the right skills can help you say what you need to say even in the face of conflict. The right skills can help you keep your cool and speak with tact and diplomacy. Or they can help you manage people who may present as difficult. A real judoka who learns the skills to be able to defend him/herself in any situation will grow in confidence, composure, and capacity. And that’s what can happen for you as you start to master the skills of Emotional Judo®. It is not simply a group of skills; it is transformative. But, sometimes we need to be reminded that the story that we hold of ourselves has changed. Just like the CV example, we are not simply the same people with a few more skills, we have become different people. It is also important for organisations to think of this idea when they are implementing change, especially if they have long term employees. If the organisation is not standing still – if it is growing and evolving – then the staff are not even working for the same company they started with, let alone the changes they will have made within themselves as individuals. As a narrative psychologist, working with individuals or groups, I have found this one of the most important concepts of lasting change. If the original story has not been transformed, people can often find a path back there at the first hint of a challenge. If you have read the book, take a moment to think who you have become as a result. Or perhaps even create a whole new CV. If you haven’t read it and would like to transform your communication effectiveness, the e version is only AU $3.99 on Amazon and you can read it on any device. Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence....
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If you get freaked out, Prince Charles can help.
Business / Emotional Judo General / Improve skills
This weekend we are celebrating the Queen’s birthday in Australia. For those of you in the US don’t tune out; you now have some connection to the royal family since Meghan Markle’s recent marriage to Prince Harry. Besides this post is for anyone who is introverted, fears public speaking or fears confrontations. The Queen’s birthday paused me to think of how it must be, if you are born a royal and you are thrust into the spotlight of public speaking. Much like those who start progressing in their careers and have to present or have more difficult conversations with people; it comes with the territory. What happens if you don’t like it? Actors, performers, and politicians seek the public spotlight, but royals inherit this role and sometimes you get the accidental manager or presenter. Of course, the movie the King’s Speech was all about that. King George VI never expected to be on the throne. It was only because of the abdication of his brother that he became king. He hated speaking publicly because he had a stammer. Wow! Despite his obvious impediment, his fears, and aversions, he was still able to make speeches that were so important to his people during some of the darkest hours of the Second World War. He was able to connect to a greater purpose that helped him break through but, more importantly he received coaching from Australian, Lionel Logue and found tricks to help him make some very significant speeches. Closer to our time, Prince Charles, the current heir apparent to the throne, also lacked confidence when younger and would get a bit ‘freaked out’ at certain times he was in public. Anyone who has done public speaking or presented in public, will know that when we lack confidence and feel anxiety there is a natural tendency to want to cover ourselves up. People fold their arms, go into the ‘toilet pose,’ or use shields such as tables, lecterns, or their notes. To help Prince Charles with his discomfort, he was coached to use a disguised arm barrier. Instead of looking like he was being defensive when he got anxious, he was taught to grab the opposing cufflink in his shirt sleeve and look like he was adjusting it. To the public he looked like he was making a clothing adjustment but to him, he got the relief of being able to hide behind his crossed arms and feel protected when he felt exposed and anxious. George and Charles’ experiences show how there are skills, tricks and ways to getting beyond our emotional obstacles. Often because we have really strong negative reactions to certain events (like public speaking), we run a mile. We assume people are just naturally good or bad at certain skills, rather than finding the underlying principles that support good practice in those skills. That is what Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence is all about. It’s not about public speaking tricks; it’s about ten invisible structures that support you in difficult conversations, an area that brings up anxiety and a lack of confidence for many. Grab it at Amazon today. Oh and one of the ten structures, EASE can help you when you are presenting, as well as when you have a tense conversation....
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A Lack of Awareness or She’ll be Right Mate?
Business / Emotional Judo General / Leadership
This blog is written mainly for Australian readers but for those of you in other countries, it may give you insight into the Aussie psyche. We can have a tendency in Australia to say she’ll be right mate. …that is, until it isn’t right, and something breaks. Historically, Australian men have been very good at doing this with their health and relationships and Aussie women can be pretty stoic too. We generally soldier on. But what about business? How is the health of your business in terms of staff engagement? How many people in your business are actively disengaged due to poor feedback and communication skills from managers? 37% according to a 2012 Gallup poll on the subject. Is this also affecting customer engagement? What could it do for your business if these people were re-engaged?… if your managers could get these skills for FREE? (Find out how below) *** Australia has only 7.5% of the population of the United States. If I take that ratio and apply it to the sales of my book Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence, then my sales in Australia should be proportionate. But despite getting Best-Seller status here in Australia on Amazon, sales are disproportionate to the ratio. They have been and are about half that. On top of that I have been posting on LinkedIn and Facebook (boosting posts) in Australia. That should mean more interest but alas my rankings have recently slid here in Oz, whereas the book still has its Best-Seller status in the US. Is it a case of she’ll be right mate, or do we just not have a need for difficult conversation skills and emotional intelligence in Australia? For the past sixteen years, most Australian managers I have trained, have nominated some of the skills in this book as being their most significant learnings and highly needed resources. Prior to that, when I was in private practice, many of these skills would help people save their personal and family relationships. Of course, it simply could be that people who have a need are unaware, or they are unaware that they don’t need a kindle to read an eBook; they can be read on any device. (There is also a physical option). What if your managers knew better ways to feed back to keep staff engaged but were also prepared for the seven sneaky tricks people do when involved in important, high stakes conversations? Even though it doesn’t help my sales on Amazon, I still stand behind Emotional Judo® as a resource, and I want to give you two mini-books for FREE. Get the FREE book Emotional Judo®: 7 Sneaky Tricks of Difficult Conversations and the link to its FREE companion Emotional Judo®: EASE for Difficult Conversations. HERE If you like the info perhaps you might buy the whole book. Happy reading!...
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The Social Media Backstab
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In this age of social media, it is so important how you attend to customers and handle their issues. For all you know, I could be a mystery shopper rating you on your prowess. At the very least, I could simply take my business elsewhere, but more importantly, you don’t know how connected I am on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn or what I do, or whom I speak to, for a living. I stayed at a motel in a large NSW Country town on Sunday night because I was attending a funeral on Monday. The region can get rather cold, and being a few days away from winter, it was quite chilly. I shared a room with my octogenarian mother and septuagenarian uncle who had been briefed on the room by the owner. I had flown in from another state and arrived separately. The motel was clean and adequate but all night we were kept awake by a noise that went off every five minutes; a deep, sustained sound, similar to a pool pump. I tried to wake the owner at 1 am to see if we could switch rooms because the three of us in the room could not sleep. The next morning, after three and a half hours of broken sleep, I spoke to the owner about the issue. Given that I teach communication skills, I understand the importance of the way you broach difficult conversations. I used some Emotional Judo® tools to get the proprietor on side and then told him of our experience. Instantly, on learning of the issue, he bristled and denied there was a problem; it must have been outside the hotel. He did not apologise for our inconvenience or show empathy at our lack of sleep. At this point, in my old ways of dealing with such situations, I would have been peeved at that and reacted in a way that had us doing emotional karate and butting heads. Instead I acknowledged it could have been outside, it did not seem likely, and I invited him back to the room to listen. It turns out that it was the central heating making the noise. He demonstrated to me in a patronising way, as if to say, all you had to do is turn this switch off. He washed his hands of responsibility by saying that he had shown this switch to my mother and uncle. I again did Emotional Judo® to acknowledge that he may have shown them the switch and also that it was a simple fix. I also asked whether he had alerted them to the noise and whether he thought it was acceptable to have such noisy central heating in a town renowned for its low temperatures. He then countered with one of the seven sneaky tricks in difficult conversations – a shift of context. Sometimes, Emotional Judo® tactics will have people move quickly to collaboration. Other times people are stubborn to move from their karate tactics and it takes longer. At this point I had to choose, whether to continue with my Emotional Judo® skills for some resolution or spend my time on something more important. As I was tired, and we had to get to the funeral, I decided to drop the issue. It is at this time most proprietors would think the matter is over. They do not think of the longer-term implications of their behaviour and wonder why they have a decrease in patronage. In this country town, there is competition and this business can do with help. It used to be a saying that if you have a positive experience you will tell two people, and if you have a negative experience you will tell ten. These days you may tell thousands on social media, by virtue of re-posting. I am not doing that, nor am I mentioning the name of the town or motel in this blog. My uncle, on the other hand, will give honest, poor feedback about the noise and lack of care in dealing with it, on the booking site. This will lower their star rating, which may dissuade future custom. How are your staff dealing with difficult conversations? Are they cementing the customers and clients to the organisation or potentially alienating them? Are your managers doing the same with their staff? Prevention is better than cure. Emotional Judo®: Communication Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence is available on Amazon....
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Black Jelly Beans and Brussels Sprouts
Emotional Judo General / Improve skills
I only like black jelly beans, and I’ll pass on other colours when offered. There is an idea in business training like this. Focus on your strengths and mitigate your weaknesses. Do the things that you love and are good at, and find people with strengths in other areas. After all, that’s what teams are for; the sum of the parts produces more than the whole. It’s generally good advice except if you want mastery over whatever you are training in or you are training in leadership. You may have a vision. You might be very astute at your technical skills. But, unless you can build relationships, influence people to get on board with you, handle your own emotions, and handle the inevitable conflict that happens when groups of people assemble, you are going to struggle as a leader. Over the last 16 years of training Emotional Judo® tools and other skills in communication and leadership workshops, some people will devour the whole pack of jelly beans. They know they need to master the skills, despite the discomfort. I’ve also found that some participants simply want the black jelly beans. They say, “this is how I am”, or “I’m not good at that,” and only go for things within their comfort zone. We can even do this as general staff or in life in general, and these skills of being able to have difficult conversations are important for everyone. This is where brussels sprouts come into the picture. When I was growing up, I hated brussels sprouts; they were the antithesis of black jelly beans. But, we had to eat them, or we got no dessert. I would mix them with mashed potato, combine them with my lamb-chops, try and wash them down with lemonade. It didn’t matter how I tried to disguise them, I would start gagging when they entered my system. It was only when I got married that I realised it wasn’t the brussels sprouts that were the problem, it was the way my mother cooked them. She would boil them within a millimetre of their nutritional value. When I steamed them and added butter, not only were they tasty to me, my own kids would eat them, no worries. Emotional Judo®: Communications Skills to Handle Difficult Conversations and Boost Emotional Intelligence “serves up” ten tools to manage your own and others’ emotions, so you can have successful high stakes conversations. They are those skills you know you need to eat, but despite that, you go looking for black jelly beans. If conflict and difficult conversations are things you avoid, or you find it difficult to manage your own emotional reactions when stakes are high, (or you are responsible for people development in your organisation), perhaps you need to find a “palatable” solution. By having structure and memorable tools to use, you will be more confident and in control. Send me a message to start a conversation. ...
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