Difficult Conversations: The High Five Statements
In This Episode
Ever at a loss for what to say during a difficult conversation? In this episode, learn the High Five Statements that you can apply to any challenging conversation to move from conflict to connection.
Transcript
Vanessa Tanicien: Hello and welcome to the Leader Lab, the podcast powered by LifeLabs Learning. Each week, my Labmates and I distill our findings into powerful tipping point skills (the smallest changes that tip over to make the biggest impact in the shortest time). The result? you become a better leader faster. I'm your host Vanessa Tanicien, and I'm also a leadership trainer at LifeLabs Learning and I'm so excited about this month's topic on Difficult Conversations. We're going to be making this easier for you one skill at a time. To help us do that today is our Co-CEO, a motion psychology researcher and soon to be pig parent, Tania Luna. Welcome back to the lab, Tania.
Tania Luna: I'm so excited to be back and excited to be talking about difficult conversations because you know, when you feel really defensive and frustrated, your hand balls up into a fist and maybe, just a little bit, you want to punch people in the face.
Vanessa Tanicien: Yeah. I feel that a little bit more often than I'd like.
Tania Luna: Okay. So next time you feel that, what I want you to do is actually unfurl that fist and create a high five. Because what we're going to be talking about today is the High Five Statements method. Okay, so each of the fingers on your hands is going to represent a statement that you can make to have a really big impact on defusing tension and frustration in that conversation. So I'm going to walk you through each of those five statements really quick, and then we're going to put them together.
Vanessa Tanicien: Great. Let's do it.
Tania Luna: Should we start with the pinky? The cutest of all the fingers?
Vanessa Tanicien: Oh, that's a weird thing to say, but sure. Pinky, let's go.
Tania Luna: Okay. Let's start with the pinky finger, so please go ahead and lift it up as we're talking, listeners and Vanessa, so that you can remember this more quickly, more easily. So the pinky finger looks like an, I, because that is your reminder to make I statements. So these are statements where you're using I pronouns. Like, I notice that or I feel that. Versus using a lot of you pronouns. It sounds touchy, feely, and woo woo but actually there's some amazing research behind this done by psychologist and linguist, James Pennebaker, who found that when we feel really powerful, we use a lot of, you, language and we drop our I statements. So when we use I statements, it's almost like this unconscious signal that we're sending to each other saying that on the same level.
Vanessa Tanicien: Ah, this completely explains why you statements can feel so triggering. It's activating a power dynamic.
Tania Luna: Exactly. Exactly. So the pinky finger stands for I statements. Next up we've got our ring finger and in many cultures, this is where we wear a ring that symbolizes care, because this finger is a great reminder to make care statements. Care statements are just statements that take you out of focusing on the task and remind the person that you care about them as a human. So saying something like, I just want to make sure that we come up with something that makes you feel excited about the resolution.
Vanessa Tanicien: Okay. So now we're on to the middle finger and I'm pretty excited about how you're going to recontextualize that. What does this stand for?
Tania Luna: So you will never look at the middle finger the same way again. From now on, think about it as meeting in the middle. This is your bridge statement reminder. Bridge statements are statements about, we have common ground. So saying something like, what you and I both really want to see is X.
Vanessa Tanicien: Gotcha. So this is reminding me of that negotiation technique of us versus the problem instead of you versus me.
Tania Luna: Exactly. Right. It's, what do we have in common?
Vanessa Tanicien: Okay. And that leaves us to the index finger, the pointer finger.
Tania Luna: Yes. The pointer finger, because you are pointing out impact. So this finger's all about making impact statements. These are statements like, this matters to me because or I mention it because.
Vanessa Tanicien: Ah, so this reminds me of that classic Ellen Langer study back in the 70s, when we used to have to make copies and libraries, she wanted to test out a specific theory. So in this particular library, she shut down all of the printers except for one. And of course lines started to form and she had two distinct groups try to cut in line. So the first group, I know, dangerous, right? So the first group was to say, excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine? Shockingly 60% of people were like, all right, you can go ahead and cut in line.
Tania Luna: That's nice.
Vanessa Tanicien: However, they upped the ante. They wanted to see if they could do better. And they said for the second group, you have to say, excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine? Because I have to make copies. Like, that's kind of a no brainer, we're all in line to make copies. But what was interesting was that 93% of people let people cut in line with that statement.
Tania Luna: Wow. Just because of the ‘because’.
Vanessa Tanicien: Just because of the ‘because’. So it leads me to think that impact statements spark this empathy and possibly motivate people to care.
Tania Luna: That's exactly right. And then last but not least, please give me a thumbs up. The thumb represents validation statements. So you don't have to agree, but a validation is validating that what the person is saying or feeling is valid. It's saying something like, yeah, that makes sense. I could see why you would feel that way.
Vanessa Tanicien: Yeah, absolutely. I could see how validation statements are exactly that way, right Tania?
Tania Luna: Did you just validate my validation statement?
Vanessa Tanicien: I know. So meta.
Tania Luna: Oh, so meta.
Vanessa Tanicien: Anyway, let's summarize these High Five Statements that we got going on. So we have, I statements, care statements, bridge statements, impact statements, and validation statements. So how would we be using this in a difficult conversation?
Tania Luna: Yes. Okay. How about we start with you trying your best to imagine something, that seems impossible, being upset with me about something.
Vanessa Tanicien: Oh, no, I can never imagine that, Tania. Okay.
Tania Luna: Give me something like, just so that we can role play it a little bit. What might be something you could say out of frustration?
Vanessa Tanicien: So I have to get mad at you for like 30 seconds right now.
Tania Luna: Yes.
Vanessa Tanicien: Okay.
Tania Luna: Or like 10 seconds is also fine.
Vanessa Tanicien: That's all we have time for. Okay. Got it. So, Tania, I really don't understand how we have let this project go off the rails this way. We should have talked about it a lot more before we started and understood what needed to get done before we started doing it. We wasted a lot of time and it's really frustrating, honestly. I don't understand how this keeps happening.
Tania Luna: How's that?
Vanessa Tanicien: Whew.
Tania Luna: That sounds very convincing. So let's do this. I'm going to call out a few statement types and see if you can tell which of the statements I'm making and listeners, please do the same and hold up the finger that you notice me using.
Vanessa Tanicien: Okay. Let's do that.
Tania Luna: Okay. Let's start with this. Vanessa, thank you so much for bringing this up. I also really care about saving time and being efficient.
Vanessa Tanicien: I smell a bridge statement, middle finger in the air in the best way.
Tania Luna: Thank you. Love that you just gave me the middle finger literally in my face. Great, that's a good bridge statement. How about this? Vanessa, I really want to make sure that we come up with a solution, I want to get to a place where you feel really great about doing this work.
Vanessa Tanicien: Okay. That feels like a blend to me. I'm hearing some I statements and I'm also hearing care statements, which honestly feels really good for my little soul.
Tania Luna: Yeah, exactly. I am trying to pepper in those I statements and definitely tried there with a care statement and maybe let me do just one more. Yeah, it totally makes sense that you would feel frustrated. Thank you for bringing that up.
Vanessa Tanicien: Validation statement.
Tania Luna: Exactly.
Vanessa Tanicien: Okay. So it seems like they don't actually even have to go in any particular order, but nearly every tough conversation could include one, if not all five of these High Five Statements.
Tania Luna: Exactly. Yeah. And we didn't talk about impact statements. What's an impact statement you could have made in your comment to me?
Vanessa Tanicien: Oh, okay. Turning the tables on me, Tania. I guess I could have said, I'm mentioning this dynamic because in the future, I want to make sure that we can deliver these projects on time and that we are prioritizing our time effectively. I want to make sure that we are happy in this project that we're working on.
Tania Luna: Great. So that's an impact statement where you're talking about the task and you're also talking about how we feel in working together. So that's a really helpful statement to help me understand why I should be motivated to come up with a solution.
Vanessa Tanicien: That's great. So, that brings us to our LeaderLab listener experiment of the week. So Tania, what should folks be trying out in their laboratory of life?
Tania Luna: My experiment for you this week is to pick just one finger. So decide on one statement type and make sure that you're weaving that in, into every single conversation you have this week.
Vanessa Tanicien: Challenge accepted. So in difficult conversations, rather than fight or argue, un ball that fist and use the High Five Statements. And that's a wrap of another episode of the Leader Lab, which is powered by LifeLabs Learning. Make sure you subscribe so that you don't miss an episode and share so we can all make tough conversations, easier for each other. Share insights and feedback with us on Twitter @lifelabslearn or on LinkedIn @lifelabslearning and to bring training to your team head on over to lifelabslearning.com. See you in the lab next week. Bye.
Tania Luna: Bye!
