COMMUNICATION IN THE TEAM – 5 TECHNIQUES TO AVOID CONFLICT

Communication in conflict is an art. Everything is going quite well for us, we effectively exchange information, we have built more than one tower out of pasta during training, and everything is fine… until. Until strong emotions take over. All the coaching models we learned disappear from memory, leaving two people growling at each other.

What to do when someone approaches and we feel an explosion is imminent? How to avert disaster at the last moment? Below you will find an overview of 5 rescue communication techniques in conflict.

Communication in the team goes quite well for us… until strong emotions take over. Because communication in conflict is an art.

How does our brain work in conflict?

First, let’s look under our skulls (yours and your team members’), to better understand what processes occur there at the moment of conflict threat, and then we’ll check how to skillfully redirect them.

• The structure of our brain illustrates how our species has evolved over the years: the elements located at the lowest and deepest levels are the so-called reptilian brain – responsible for very basic reactions in moments of stress and life-threatening situations. Turtles and snakes already have the same ones.
• What reptiles lack, but mammals have, is a more advanced level (mammalian brain) that enables us to learn and remember. Our cat, for example, can do this too.
• The cerebral cortex, the most advanced element, is unique to humans – it is what allows us to perform advanced mental operations, create macros in Excel, negotiate, and write reports.

If everything is running smoothly, we primarily use our cerebral cortex at work. However, when we feel threatened (conflict situation!), our brain lights up a red warning, disconnects the cortex, and activates the reptilian response. This is the moment when, faced with a yelling colleague, we freeze and see two paths before us: ‘fight!’ or ‘flight!’ (in office realities: ‘engage in confrontation and tell him what you think of him’ or ‘start apologizing and smoothing things over’).

And here lies the problem. Because reptiles do not communicate in conflict and do not sit down to work out a satisfying solution together, but it is worth it for us to be able to do so.
So how do we bring the conversation back to the right level?

Technique 1: Acknowledge emotions

Emotions in business seem unprofessional to us. However, let’s be clear, communication in the team is still interpersonal communication – between two people with all their experiences, beliefs, and emotions. The mistakes we often make are A. Ignoring emotions (especially if they are uncomfortable for us!) or B. Denying emotions. Both of these approaches will escalate the conflict.

If something has thrown our interlocutor off balance to the point where they are temporarily operating with a reptilian brain (in the ‘fight!’ mode), it was a sense of threat. Perhaps his performance was compromised (in work, taking care of results is equivalent to fighting for survival) or his sense of self-respect was hurt (did he feel disregarded?). It may be important to start by naming his emotions and acknowledging his right to experience them.

Try to name what you see: I see that you are really angry, You had every right to be upset, I don’t blame you for being thrown off balance…

If we sincerely acknowledge someone’s right to feel what they feel, their sense of security will increase. Thanks to this, they will quickly get out of the mental corner of ‘fight or flight’ and calm down to focus on solving the problem.

Communication in a business team is still interpersonal communication – between two people with all their baggage of experiences, beliefs, and emotions.

Technique 2 Surprise your interlocutor and… agree with them

We call this technique communicative aikido. The idea is that instead of actively resisting the attack, you use it as a gift (an attack is a large dose of energy!), and then redirect that energy to your own goals (here: to find a solution together). To achieve this, we need to find some element of the speaker’s statement that we agree with, for example:

• acknowledging the importance of the problem “you’re right, the problem you’ve identified is indeed significant”
• agreeing with the facts “indeed, an error occurred and the client received the wrong file”
• admitting that action is necessary “you’re right, we need to take action”

When the surprised speaker loses momentum for the attack, we direct their attention to the necessity of solving the problem together, thereby subtly positioning ourselves on the same side of the barricade. Just like the best aikido masters.

Communication techniques in conflict resemble aikido: we take the energy of the attack and use it for our own purposes.

Technique 3 Ask the interlocutor to tell you how they see it

Between us, he (or she) will obviously tell you what they think, with or without your consent ☺ But think about what options a person who decided to tell you ‘the whole truth’ has when you preempt the outburst and ask them to tell you everything from their perspective? Maybe:

1. Fulfill your request (the strength of the attack will be significantly weakened, and you did not allow yourself to be dragged down to the level of the reptilian brain and elevate the conversation)
2. Well, he might feel like saying ‘no, now I don’t want to anymore,’ but he probably won’t do it because he’d feel embarrassed…

The benefit for you is that if you just showed him respect and interest, he will be much less inclined to see you as an enemy. Since you want to listen to what he has to say, you might have become his ally?

Technique 4 In an ideal reality...

It happens that someone is angry about something you have no control over. Explaining to the interlocutor that the source of the problem is beyond your control will only deepen his frustration (he knows this, just like you do. But it still annoys him). This is where conflict communication techniques inspired by working with children come in handy. It also works on adults 🙂

It might sound something like this: You’re right, in an ideal world… we would receive orders with appropriate lead time / clients would read emails with understanding / regulations wouldn’t change suddenly in the middle of the year.

In this way, instead of engaging in a futile discussion, we acknowledge that we too would like the world to look different. Only in the second step do we start looking for a solution.

Technique 5 – The most important final question: What to do to?

When we have already weakened the force of the attack using the appropriate communication technique in a conflict and our interlocutor is ready to focus on the facts and the solution, the question becomes invaluable: ‘What (can we) do to..?’ It allows the conversation to shift from focusing on emotions, finding blame, complaining about factors beyond our control, etc., to asking the most important questions: What can we do to save the situation? What can we do in the future to prevent such a crisis from happening again?