 Hello, and welcome to Working Together on Think Tech Hawaii, where we discuss the impact of change on employers, workers, and the economy. I'm your host, Cheryl Crozier-Garcia, inviting you to join in the conversation. Please call in with your questions or comments to area code 808-374-2014 or tweet us at thinktechhi. Effective communication isn't blanket agreement or constant arguments. People can disagree civilly and work toward cooperative solutions. Society seems to be turning toward negativity, vulgarity, and meanness, and sadly, we don't seem to be getting good examples from our elected leaders who have hit a new low in labeling and name-calling. However, what is considered appropriate for our president or other national leaders would have damaging effects on our professional and personal reputations and may even cross the line into discriminatory language or hate speech. While we all have a right to speak freely about the issues that concern us, we also have a responsibility to communicate with respect and to tailor our language to the situation and the people with whom we deal. Joining us today to discuss how to communicate effectively, even when the topic is a difficult one, is Pam Chambers. Pam is the author of several books on effective communication and her new book, Not This Again, 18 Challenges Hawaii's Leaders Face and How to Rise Above Them, has just been released. Pam is Hawaii's presentation coach. She's worked with executives in many industries and many of Hawaii's premier organizations. Today, she will help us understand how to talk to people about difficult topics without sacrificing clarity or causing hurt feelings. Pam, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you. I was fascinated by your book. And there was one thing in particular that I found particularly thought-provoking and worth deep contemplation. And that was when you interviewed one of the folks that you talked to for the book. And they described Hawaii's culture as being one that stresses harmony over truth. Can you talk a little bit about that and how that colors the way Frank Conversation is interpreted? Yes. That was Glenn Fruya from Leadership Works. And he wrote, I asked a lot of people to contribute their essays to the book. So that was his. So I want to be sure to acknowledge that was his phrase. And what it's about is that often in Hawaii, and I've been here 37 years, we might tell someone else something that a person should have information about, but we may not tell them. And I've asked a lot of people, why did you not find a way to tell that person that truth? Oh, well, I didn't want to single them out or I didn't want to hurt their feelings or maybe I was being too picky or I didn't want them to talk about me afterwards. So there are a series of reasons, none of them valid in my opinion, that cause us to not be, as you said, frank and direct. And sometimes when we talk to people, we're so afraid of being overly direct that we start hinting instead of being clear. So I think it's because we live on a small island, we're going to see everyone at Longs or at Costco, we're going to see them again. And if we did something that made them uncomfortable, we'll be uncomfortable seeing them again. So we can't run freely, really, because of that. But the term harmony over truth, you may maintain a harmonious relationship, say, with the person that you feel like needs for turtle correction or feedback. But your inner harmony is, at that point, sacrificed. And if you talk to another person about person A's failures to communicate effectively or to perform effectively, then there's disharmony there. And it's even worse if person B talks to person A and says, guess what Pam said about you. Oh, really. And it usually doesn't get told accurately. And the feelings are still now hurt on inaccurate information. And when we don't speak our truth, we are not in harmony with ourselves. And we fret. I know people who are lying awake at 2 in the morning wondering, how should I say this to that person? How should I coach this person? Or I wish I hadn't said that to this person. We fret so much about these things that we're not sure how to deal with. And that's part of the reason I wrote this book, was here are some solutions. Which do you think has more opportunity to create Sturman-Drang in the workplace or among civilized human beings? Failing to share your truth with that person? Or over-sharing in maybe an incorrect or hurtful way? Which one's worse? Oh, wow. I think the first one is worse, failing to communicate. Because if we do communicate and we realize, gosh, I think I could have been more tactful or I could have been more complete, then we can go back and do it over, so to speak. We can say yesterday when I had that conversation with you, I'm not altogether pleased with how I communicated. May I have the opportunity to redo that? Because we can fix things, but we can't fix what we never did. Right. So do you find that there is also kind of a hesitancy to share constructive feedback? Say you have a supervisor that maybe is much younger than a subordinate. Or you have a female maybe not wanting to share with a male subordinate these kinds of things. Which types of relationships do you find are more prone to these kinds of non-communication or miscommunication? Oh, that is such a powerful question. I think if I fear that if I speak to you openly about something, there will be retribution. Is that the word I want? There will be some kind of punishment down the road. Oh, it could be retribution, sure. Right, then that's a relationship where I might not be forthright. Male employees, employers talking to females about how they're dressed, they really don't want to do that if there's a cleavage problem. I can see. It's in the book, remember? Yes, and I actually have had to counsel people, female employees, with that very issue. And sadly, I would approach the men and say, did you realize? So-and-so is violating the dress code policy. Somebody needs to have a talk with her and have senior male managers say, no, no, no, don't do that. Because if you tell her to not wear those clothes anymore, she won't. And we like looking at her. Oh, right. Oh, it's like, la, la, la. I didn't hear that. There was one client. I won't say their name. But I said, where is it too low? And the men said, it's never too low. And I thought, and these are leaders. These were managers. And there was a dress code that they didn't want to enforce, either because they liked it or they didn't know how to talk about it. So I think sometimes we have to bring in a female to handle things like that. If it's a hygiene problem, sometimes the same gender is easier than a different gender. Sometimes it's a family thing. Maybe there's a cousin working in your company that you know you're going to see at the potluck the next day or the next weekend. And you don't want that ruining the relationship. There are so many cases where we don't speak out. Yeah, they can. I know in the family circumstance, I guess it depends on the family. And the relationships say that the cousins have among each other. Because I do know, in terms of my own family, having, say, senior uncles and aunties provide recommendations for their kids or their nephews and nieces or whatever. And if there was a problem and it somehow came to the senior member of the family, it was the senior member who would go to that younger person and say, hey, don't embarrass me in front of it. I sponsored you for this job. Don't you dare make me shame. A lot of times that was all it took. On the other hand, sometimes people will say, that's my cousin. You don't get to talk to her like that. Or my relative is somehow deserving of more of a break or less of a criticism or these kinds of things. So it really is kind of a touchy kind of situation. And I think it's more here in Hawaii than just about any other place I've ever lived or visited that there's so much overlapping of relationships here. And we do run into the same people everywhere we go, it seems. And we don't want to burn bridges. Oh, there are so many reasons why we don't communicate. Yes. But many of them, if we communicate properly, many of them can be avoided. Many of the hurts, the bad feelings, the feeling of paranoia or vendetta can be eradicated if we just speak clearly and concisely. And say what hat you're wearing. I have a client who they have many, many retail stores. And many of the employees in the store are relatives. And I recommend to those leaders that they say, right now I'm wearing my coach's hat. I'm wearing my coach hat. And because I need to give you some coaching right now about something that happened earlier today. So do you get that I'm wearing my coach hat? And then other times it's the friend hat. Or maybe you have something that you can teach me. So I'm wearing the student hat. So know what hat you're wearing and announce the hat. And then at least there's a proper frame around this. Now what do we do in a situation as early as this past weekend or as recent as this past weekend? We heard national leaders, a particular one, utter some words as a way of articulating his thoughts about various countries in the world. Words that certainly when I was growing up would never have been acceptable to come from a world leader. And yet people were shocked. But nobody said brah. You really shouldn't talk like that. How do we deal with people who may think, well, the president said it so it must be OK. And then they turn around and use that same kind of language in the workplace. We have to know where our boundaries are. And we have to set them. So I need to be willing to say to a person, I will not be spoken to that way. It is unacceptable. I can't even hear you when you speak that way. So what I'd prefer that you say is and then maybe give some an example of a way that's palatable for me. And I don't see anything wrong with removing myself physically from a situation where I am just offended. I'm going to need to leave the room now and process this and calm myself down because of the way that came across just now. Or it could be after the fact. Last week when you spoke to me about such and such, you used a word that I find I can't live with that kind of word. And the word was and spell it out and maybe write it. But yes, that was utterly shocking. I mean, are we not ashamed to have a leader, our leader? A leader that we put there, we probably shouldn't go in this direction. No, we can't. And the quick answer is for me, no, I don't think it's acceptable. I had the opportunity to talk to him one on one to say, dude, come on, man, you're representing 300 million people in the world that are your nation. Not all of us voted for you, but we all want you to be successful. And when you talk like that, you make us all look like such and such. One thing I think leaders need to be able to say is something like when you do this or when you do that, I'm worried that you'll be misunderstood. I'm worried that you will be perceived as uncaring or insensitive or boorish. I'm worried that you'll be misinterpreted. And when we phrase it in that way, it's not us telling them that they were wrong. It's us expressing concern about how they may come across. Sounds like you should go to Washington, DC, and have a chat with the White House staff. We need to take a break. So we'll be back in a minute. I'm Cheryl Carrosa Garcia. This is working together on Think Tech Hawaii. And we will be back right after we share some of the other awesome programming that our citizen journalists here in Think Tech have created for you. We'll be right after we see Obama interviewed. Welcome back to working together on Think Tech Hawaii. I'm Cheryl Carrosa Garcia, and we are talking with PAM chambers about how to have difficult conversations at work or with others and not have those conversations nosedive into arguments and negativity. You were talking earlier, PAM, about providing feedback in a way that helps people that puts the person first, the recipient of the feedback first. For example, if someone is speaking in a way that you don't appreciate or think is appropriate, then you might say, I worry that when you use language like this, you can easily be misinterpreted. I don't think you're trying to create a reputation for a vulgar language, et cetera. In your experience, has that worked? I mean, does it cause people to stop and think about what they're saying? Yes, it works really well. And I only started using that phrase recently. I've been doing this for 31 years. And it was only about a year ago that I found that approach is so easy for people to hear. I had a client who sat with his hands behind his head. This is how he sat. And I said to him after the rapport was there, I said, I want to give you some feedback about your body language. Now, most people, if you said that, would do something different with their body. But he continued to sit that way. And I said, when you sit that way, I'm concerned that you'll be perceived as aloof or disengaged or that you think this is beneath you somehow. And he put his arms down and leaned toward me. And he said, no one's ever told me that before. And I said, I know. If someone had told you that before, I doubt you'd be doing it. So I learned through that one incident that if I can put it in terms of, I'm afraid it will cost you something for you to continue to do this specific thing. I'm afraid it will stand in your way. Well, that's very caring of me to say that, as opposed to you shouldn't or scolding or being critical. Yeah. So I think that may be the other issue that we're looking at. Because often, I think there's the perception that feedback about improvement to performance is scolding. I mean, I remember having employees walk out when I was doing corporate HR. You'd have an employee walk into your office and say, I just got my head handed to me by such and such supervisor during my performance appraisal. Well, what did they say? And it, to me, did not seem to be scolding or hectoring or in any way negative. It sounded, to me, to be very developmental. But that person interpreted the words as, you're terrible. You're awful. I'd fire you if I could. These kinds of things. There's a chapter in the book about that, about, gee, I give them coaching and they accuse me of scolding them. And another word that people use a lot is I don't want to confront them. I said, why are you using that word? Why is this a confrontation? Aren't you, in fact, helping them? So I don't want to be confrontational. No, you don't want to be that. But you do want to be helpful, I bet. So there's this, I don't know, our skin is too thin. We're so easily offended. And we too easily cry. And the reason that some people cry when they get feedback is they want the person giving the feedback to stop talking. So especially, it's a very effective tool for women to cry when a man is giving them feedback. Because the man will stop. Yeah, and feel uncomfortable. Like I did something that, if they're a gentleman, I think they were raised with, if their mothers told them, this is how you treat a lady, if you make her cry, I'm gonna, there may indeed be that. What do you do when it's the other way around? When you've got a female supervisor or leader trying to counsel a male employee and the waterworks start. Because I've had that happen to me. And I just was always like, really? Yeah. Wrong tool. It is the wrong tool. It's easier if they get defensive. You can say, okay, so I'm feeling that maybe some defenses are coming up. And I want to reassure you that I am speaking this way to you so that you can reach the goals that you have. I think it's normal to feel a little stung sometimes when we get feedback. I think that's a normal reaction. But if we leave it at that and don't move through that, then we miss out on being told something that could really help us. And I teach people in my classes, when you get feedback, the first two words out of your mouth should be thank you. First, that's the first thing I want you to say. Yeah. I told you before we started, back in the 90s, I took one of your presentations. And over the years, I've had multiple opportunities to get involved with things like curriculum development and content delivery for higher education classes, online, et cetera, working with different universities. And every time I have gotten feedback, I have responded with thank you. And so invariably, it's now, boy, that's Cheryl. She has no ego where feedback is concerned. Doesn't matter what I think inside. But thank you is interpreted as I hear you. I may not agree, but I'm accepting what you say. And I would like to use it to be better. And that's always my follow-on question. So first, it's thank you. And then it's, what do you recommend I do to perform better in this kind of situation? What do you need from me? Oh, that's wonderful. And feedback can be, once you say thank you, the feedback goes in. And then you have three choices. You use it, you question it, or you don't use it. But you can't do any of those if the feedback is boomeranging off yourself because of your defenses and your tears and your fear. And they hate me. It really do. Nobody. But I think that's what people think. They get feedback, and they come out of that situation, and they say, boy, that's Cheryl. She hates my guts. She would love to see the back of me. She's trying to get rid of me. I'll fix her. And the next thing is you end up getting into those situations where the perception is the vulgar language is OK because you're talking about an enemy. You're talking about someone that isn't as good, as prepared as you are, maybe. Well, then that person needs feedback about how they receive feedback. That now is what we need to be talking about. And some people say, well, I say the same thing over and over and over again. Well, then you need to have a conversation about that. Sometimes we're fixing the wrong thing. And that's another chapter in here. We were fixing the wrong thing. We didn't identify what the true problem was. And often it's whatever is happening up at the top. Oh, say more about that. Well, for example, I had a leader approach me about doing training for his employees. It turned out the leader was the problem. The leader was the problem. He didn't come into the room. He didn't set it up properly. He sent his people to this training, sending the message that someone was wrong with them and not him. He just didn't set it up properly. So everyone was resentful that he should be here. And he ended up wasting a day. Oh, yes. And causing ill will and it wasn't effective because we were fixing the wrong thing. Right. But how do you get people to look in the mirror and see that they are at least 50% responsible for any kind of communication breakdown? I don't know. I've grappled with that my whole life. How do you get people to say to themselves, if I'm in this space where there's a problem, it's likely that I am part of the problem. I'm not in a vacuum. I'm part of this. And everyone who's part of a team is part of whatever is happening. And so what is my part in this? Yeah, that's true. And I think that that's a really hard thing for people to ask themselves. There are a few people outside, say, people in religious orders or whatever that spend a lot of time with self-contemplation and self, trying to build self-awareness about where not only where their strengths are, I mean, it's easy for people to articulate those, but where their weaknesses are and where they need additional help. Imagine for a moment, I am an employee. You're my supervisor. And I come to you and I say, Pam, I want you to know that I like working here. And I would like to create more opportunities for myself for promotion, et cetera. But I know. I'm not the greatest communicator in the world. And I know I need to improve. And what areas should I do it? I want you to tell me. And I want us to work maybe towards some kind of professional development plan or some other kind of additional training for me so that I can be better. What would you recommend? First of all, I would be jumping up and down with excitement if someone said that. What an ideal world you just created. I would say, well, good. Now, let's look at our areas of communication. We have our body language. We have our voice. We have our words. And we have our physical appearance. I'm going to look at each one of those areas with you. And we're going to identify one area in each of those categories that you can start working on starting today. Because then you'll know what your next step is. Most people don't know what their next step is. So they want to be better. But they don't know where or how. So if a leader can specify, if you were just a little bit louder with your volume, you would appear more leader-like. If someone knew that, and then they could work on their volume, everyone needs to know what their next step is. Or lower your voice slightly because you're speaking like a 10-year-old girl. Yeah, stop doing the up talk. I would do my best to imitate the behavior that I'm seeing. So up talk is where everything goes up at the end and everything sounds so uncertain. And if someone talks that way, they're throwing away their power. And I would imitate that if I am a good enough actress, which I've learned how to be, so that I can show that person what he or she is doing. And they say, do I really sound that way? And I say, yes. So let's take those question marks and put periods there instead. And now they know exactly what their next step is. Do you ever use recordings, either strictly vocal recordings or even video to help people understand what they're doing that ends up, perhaps, detracting from their message? I do. And there's something a little bit artificial about that. Because when people know that they're being videoed for the purpose of showing them something, they don't act the way they normally do. They put their best foot forward, so to speak. And so they're not really doing the thing that I want them to know that they're doing. Unless they really believe that their best foot includes those behaviors. I can say, maybe you think that you sound encouraging. When you do the up talk, maybe you think that's an encouraging way to sound. But you're actually throwing your power away. Let's listen to this. Well, Pam, time goes by so quickly. And I'm hearing from the booth that our time is coming up to end very soon. But thank you so much for joining us. You've given us good information. Here's the book. So go ahead and buy it. It's available from you at tentambers.com. Yes, it's also available at Amazon. OK. And there's a digital format, even. Terrific. Yeah. Well, I got it at Downtown Coffee. Thank you. So thank you, Downtown Coffee. And to all of you who are watching at Thing Tech Hawaii, I'm Cheryl Crozier Garcia. And we will be back in two weeks. Take care.