Here’s a challenge that so many of us (including me) suffer from; so many of us do, that it feels likely endemic to human nature: more often than not, we assume that the other people we’re interacting with can read our minds.
Have you ever gotten even mildly pissed-off at, or disappointed with, someone, only to discover later it was a misunderstanding? Yes, you have. I know that not because I’m psychic—the point of this chapter is that I’m not, and neither is anyone else—but because I know that you, dear reader, are a human being. Unless it is our new AI overlords reading this, in which case, hello!
Have you ever gotten into a fight with someone when you realized eventually that their interpretation of your earlier communication was an illegitimate interpretation—even if it was a weird one because, to arrive at it, they had to think of an obscure definition of a word, not the way it’s commonly used? Yes, of course you have, especially if you’ve outsourced work to [insert name of the nameless country here].
Both of these examples, which are far too common, serve to demonstrate a greater point: lots and lots of problems in communication and client-professional and even standard employee work stem from one party saying or doing something, and then the other party making a ton of assumptions about what was just said or done. And the assumptions we make, unfortunately, tend to err on the side of “the other person messed up” far more than the assumption “I messed up.”
A great exercise to prevent this is to create your own modern version of an ancient Stoic teaching but applied to the modern world. Every time you hear something confusing or that you don’t like, first step away and maybe even go offline before responding critically to it. Usually, though, you don’t have more than 30 seconds to step away, maybe only the time it takes to walk to the water cooler. When you get back, replay it from the other person’s side. And then when you confront the other person, start the confrontation by reciting what you see from the other person’s side, in the best light.
This is easier said than done, of course. And doing this comes with two important qualifications.
First, some people think that all work problems stem from “misunderstandings.” These same people tend to think the same about politics. Re-reading what I wrote above, from someone else’s eyes and after having stepped back, I definitely see how someone could think that I could believe that. But no, not at all. It turns out, some people are just good at their role, and some are just bad at it—most of us fall along a spectrum of competence. In other words, even taking into account interpreting the other person’s words in the best light, some of the people you deal with will just be incompetent. But how to deal with incompetent clients is the subject of another chapter!
Second, this technique should not be used to avoid being critical nor giving criticism. Both are essential, especially when criticism is worded clearly and strongly, but positively. But this is just the step BEFORE giving criticism: to be sure that you guys are on the same wavelength. Once you’ve discovered that a person misinterpreted something, take it as your mission to learn how to communicate with that person, in a way that they understand better next time. And maybe that’s an impossible mission or maybe the cost of communicating with someone is too high (it takes too long to explain things in a way that the person would understand.) In that case, you two are not good partners to work together. And sometimes the best solution for client issues is to break up with the client.
