If you’re like me, you spend most of your time at work in conversation: talking, listening, talking, listening, email, email, text, call, call, call. Even with all of this back and forth, you routinely leave the most important words unsaid. You’re afraid to say them.
But what if you had to go over to your co-worker, your boss or your employee right now and say all of those things? You’d probably feel nervous, scared, and like you wanted to jump into a big hole to avoid doing it.
Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Many people are naturally inclined to avoid these difficult conversations, and the potential conflict that goes with them. And while it’s a nice sentiment to want everyone to get along, sometimes not having those challenging discussions can actually hold you (and those around you) back from progressing. It’s one of the biggest barriers to success in business and happiness. So why do we do it?
We Are Afraid Of Conflict
When you get right down to it, most people will avoid a difficult conversation because they’re afraid of the conflict it will cause. We see it with employers and employees throughout our work. They worry things will become awkward, that they will upset someone, or get upset in return. That the boss will be annoyed, or that there will be repercussions for them. It all centres around fear of the consequences of that difficult conversation. So the reaction of many people is to avoid it, to leave it alone and hope it goes away on its own.
But it eats away at every other aspect of the relationship. And that means teams can’t perform well when this is happening because, unaddressed, things like negative attitudes, judgement, territorial behaviour and sub-par performance are accepted by default as OK.
By not having these difficult conversations, all we’re doing is trading short-term comfort for the long-term health of our business and our teams. If you’re naturally inclined to avoid difficult conversations then it can be difficult to know where to start. There’s a great TED talk on exactly that, which we highly recommend. Our blogs have lots of ideas about this too.
Could we help you with a conversation you’re avoiding?
Get in touch today.
