Difficult Conversations: Positions vs. Interests
In This Episode
Do you dread conflict? Do you find yourself getting defensive vs working towards a win-win solution? Listen to this episode of LifeLabs Learning's podcast, The LeaderLab, to learn about the skill of uncovering underlying interests in a challenging conversation.
Transcript
Vanessa Tanicien, narrating: Hello, and welcome to The LeaderLab, the podcast powered by LifeLabs Learning, where we study what exceptional leaders do differently. Each week my Labmates and I will 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. I'm a leadership trainer at LifeLabs, and I'm incredibly excited about the theme for our next five episodes, which will be all about difficult conversations. Difficult conversations can be anything from a workplace negotiation, a tricky feedback situation, or even an argument with a loved one.
Vanessa Tanicien: So, we're going to be exploring in the next few episodes the art and science of managing difficult conversations well. How can we turn conflict into connection? Getting us started today is Roi Ben-Yehuda. Roi specializes in the field of negotiation and conflict resolution. He's also a trainer at LifeLabs Learning as well as a regular lecturer at Columbia University and John Jay College of Criminal Justice. Fun fact for you all, Roi has more babies than kidneys and is the first employee at LifeLabs to become a parent, so we affectionately call him baby papa. Welcome to The LeaderLab, baby papa.
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Thank you, Vanessa. It's a pleasure to be here with you and our listeners to discuss one of my favorite topics in the world. I'm one of those weirdos who believe in the motto to never let a good conflict go to waste, and I want to share with you all some of my favorite tips for managing conflict and difficult conversations well.
Vanessa Tanicien: We're all ears. And I know that you have limited time because your babies are literally banging on that door. So let's get to it.
Roi Ben-Yehuda: All right. So, the key to successful conflict resolution, you ready for this?
Vanessa Tanicien: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Roi Ben-Yehuda: This is a secret, is paying attention to the right conversation.
Vanessa Tanicien: Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. So you're already telling me that there's more than one conversation at play at once?
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Yep, there are a number of conversations. And we need to train our brain to recognize and differentiate between the what they said conversation and the why they said conversation. And it's the latter conversation that we should really be mindful of.
Vanessa Tanicien: Okay, so the why conversation. This is ringing a bell. Is this the same thing as positions versus interest? I know that I'm not completely lost here, right?
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Yeah. Positions are what people say they want, and interests are why they want them.
Vanessa Tanicien: I see. So what is the value of making that separation?
Roi Ben-Yehuda: It allows us to separate the signal from the noise and help us become more creative with our problem-solving efforts. Research shows that training people to make this separation, differentiating between the what and the why, allows them to create more value for themselves and for others. The thing is if I only concentrate on what you say you want in the conversation, which is what most of us do in these difficult conversations a little bit, "I want more of this, I want less of that," then it really limits my ability to be creative in meeting your needs. But if I understand why you want something, if I understand what are your core interests, then I can be a lot more creative with coming up with multiple options for mutual gain, not just for self gain.
Vanessa Tanicien: That's a very sexy way of saying creating a win-win. Am I right about that?
Roi Ben-Yehuda: I am sexy. You are right about that.
Vanessa Tanicien: I mean about the question. We're creating a win-win.
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Oh, sorry.
Vanessa Tanicien: Okay. So I'm curious, what are some examples of this in the world of work?
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Sure. Let's say that your position is that you want a promotion, which of course can be a really difficult conversation to have with your boss. What's the interest behind that position? Now, most of us I think will naturally think, well, it's money, right? That's what it's all about. And most of us with the then stop there, but I want to suggest there's probably more to it than just money and we shouldn't just get stuck with money.
Vanessa Tanicien: What do you mean? The great poet P. Diddy said it's all about the Benjamins, right? Isn't it always about money?
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Be that as it may, I would first want to know, why do you need that money? And for example, currently, I need more money because we are rehiring our nanny and I need to cover that cost. The thing is maybe you, my employer, don't want to actually increase my salary, which would be your position because you're afraid of creating some inequity amongst the team, which would be actually your interest. Now if we both actually know this about one another, and assuming I'm not the only parent in the company, then we can again get really creative with coming up with options that meet our needs outside of those positions, like possibly creating a future daycare in the office for example, so that way there's no inequity and my needs are met.
Roi Ben-Yehuda: It could also be that I'm asking for a promotion because I need more recognition in the work that I'm doing or maybe that I feel like I'm not making enough progress in my day-to-day work, and I'm thinking that a promotion will satisfy that particular need. And now if these are my interests, say recognition or making progress, then of course there are a bunch of other ways of satisfying those needs in addition to a promotion or outside of increasing my salary.
Vanessa Tanicien: Right. So, getting more positive feedback, or possibly developing new skills, or even working on some new projects.
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Exactly. That's the power of unlocking these problem-solving skills. All right, you feel like running a little experiment with this?
Vanessa Tanicien: I'm always game for an experiment.
Roi Ben-Yehuda: All right. So I'm going to throw some positions at you and our listeners, and I want you to take a moment and try to guess a potential interest behind the positions, right? So, let's try this. Let's say my position is I don't want to attend the meeting. You invite me to a meeting and I press no, reject.
Vanessa Tanicien: Yeah, I'm sure there's a lot of people out there that feel similarly, possibly because time is precious and they are working on some hard deadlines, or maybe if the meeting just does not feel useful, right?
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Yeah. So already you're uncovering some of those interests. And you can work with that, right? There's probably a conversation to be had there. What about in other positions? We need to expand our product offering.
Vanessa Tanicien: I get really excited about this one. So this is positioning the company as a thought leader, being able to satisfy our clients better, or selfishly maybe I just want to flex my product innovation skills myself and learn some new skills.
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Right. And there are a thousand and one ways of doing that outside of just expanding our product offering. And it could be by the way that's the way to do so, but now that I know the interest I can probably be more creative in how I go about and meet that need. This time let's think about negotiating with ourselves and not necessarily with somebody else. Now, let's say my position is, and this is a fight that I have every single day, my position is I want a cookie.
Vanessa Tanicien: I got a delicious chocolate chip treat. I mean, I want one right now. I guess for the moments that I grab a cookie, I'll step into this one, I'm bored or I'm looking for comfort. So my interest is to create some of that with the cookie, or maybe I just need a jumpstart, some energy, to get me through the day.
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Yeah. So what idea would you have to meet that need outside of just eating a cookie?
Vanessa Tanicien: Yeah, I could possibly call up a friend. At LifeLabs we call it a soul stroll, when you call a Labmate and have a conversation, or I might do a little bit of exercise, go for a quick run to re-energize. Now that you say there are a million and one ways to avoid a cookie if I needed to.
Roi Ben-Yehuda: Right. And that's the key point here, is that we're training our mind to pay attention to the right conversation. The right conversation we're having with others, but also the right conversation we're having with ourselves. The why versus the what, the interest versus the positions.
Vanessa Tanicien: Great. So, this is really applicable in making an educated guess, but I want to know how we can make the conversation even more robust by discovering people's true interests. So how do we go about doing that?
Roi Ben-Yehuda: That's a great question. I would say that you go about doing that by defaulting into a mode of curiosity, what at LifeLabs we call q-stepping, which simply means asking more questions, getting curious and asking more questions. Questions of yourself and questions of others. Of yourself you could ask one of my favorite questions to ask before having a potentially difficult conversation: why will they say yes to what I'm proposing? Why will they say no to what I'm proposing? Or maybe asking of them in the conversation just to understand where you're coming from and making sure that we're on the same page, what's important to you about X, Y, and Z? Or why is this important to you? Or just asking somebody, "Can you walk me through your thinking?" Now, it could be that this is a difficult conversation and the person is not really giving you too much in the conversation. And in that case, I would suggest that you disclose some of your own interests to set the tone, the collaborative tone, that you want to see in the conversation and engender some reciprocity from your conversational partner.
Vanessa Tanicien: Okay. You dropped some knowledge on us today, Roi. So let me see if I can capture it all. So, one, we want to make sure that we're paying attention to the right conversation, the why conversation versus the what, what being positions and why being interests. Two, we want to be able to separate them. And three, we can get at people's true interests and needs by getting curious with both ourselves and others. And then doing that, we're able to have a more constructive difficult conversation. So that brings us to our LeaderLab listener experiment of the week. So, Roi, what should we have folks try out this week?
Roi Ben-Yehuda: So this week what I'd like our listeners to do is mentally underline every time they hear either themselves or somebody else take some kind of stand, take some kind of position on some issue, the what conversation, and then ask yourselves what might be some of the underlying interests behind that stand, the why conversation. Train your brain to do this so that when the difficult moment arrives, and Vanessa I promise you it will arrive, you will problem solve like a pro.
Vanessa Tanicien: Wow, baby papa, I think our work here is done. And that's a wrap of another episode at The LeaderLab. Make sure that you subscribe so that way you don't miss an episode. And share this with someone else so we can all benefit from having a few more outstanding leaders in the world. Share insights and feedback with us on Twitter @LifeLabsLearn or on LinkedIn at LifeLabs Learning. We'll see you next time.
