Posts Tagged ‘Behavior’

The definition of insanity

19 June 2009

Disciplining middle schoolers. Can you imagine a more thankless task? I had a recent experience of watching teachers trying to keep 6th graders in line, trying it discipline them, impose sanctions, etc. The teachers didn’t get very satisfactory results—to say the least.

I have a 6th grader myself, so I struggle with this challenge. What I noticed about other people (the teachers and students) is that they were locked in at least one recurring pattern. Each person was repeating the same behavior and getting the same reaction from the other. Here’s how the patterns might look:patterns-for-blog1

In the first pattern, the teacher would ask the student to do something or for an explanation of their behavior, and the student would ignore or dismiss the request, even become intransigent. In the second pattern, the teacher would tell the student what to do, and the student would rebel, refuse to do the task or do something the teacher didn’t want them to do.

As the saying goes, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again—and expecting a different result. When two or more people are stuck in a pattern they are both acting “insane” because they keep doing the same thing but hope for a different result.

When you’re stuck in a pattern, not getting the results you want, there’s only one thing to do: change your own behavior. You can’t control the other person’s behavior (especially a teenager’s), but you can control yours.

In other words, try something different and see what result it has. What if you “offered,” “explained,” or “thanked” them? Chances are they’d respond differently.

It’s hard to tell when we ourselves are stuck in a pattern. It’s easier for an outsider to see it, so ask for help. Try using the diagram above to reveal the pattern.

The more you can detect you’re stuck in a pattern, identify it, and act to break the pattern, you’ll be far more effective as a influencer—whether you are trying to sway the CEO, your siginificant other, or a teenager.

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Do you truly care what others think?

12 June 2009

Last week, I taught mid-career professionals in using dialogue (as opposed to discussion) to explore issues and understand different points of view.

A brief primer on dialogue: While discussion focuses on seeing differences, justifying positions, persuading and selling (among other things), dialogue seeks to increase understanding among people, seeing connections, exploring assumptions and creating shared meaning.

Dialogue balances advocacy (advancing your point of view) with inquiry (exploring what’s underneath others’ and your own perspectives). Discussion favors advocacy over inquiry.

Back to my story: Here were a motivated group of people, who had spent a week together working on learning about themselves and about communicating effectively, and yet it was really hard for them to keep from slipping out of dialogue into discussion.

They had prepared themselves for the dialogue and identified dialogic behaviors they wanted to develop, but in practice sessions they did much more advocacy than inquiry, including interrupting each other.

Clearly, people needed more time and practice to learn how to dialogue. They were smart, motivated folks, yet the old habits still took hold.

I wonder how true that is for influence leaders in general. I know I sometimes surrender to my desire to drive home a point.

How well do you practice true inquiry and dialogue with the people you want to influence? Do you succumb to desire to advocate too readily?

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Take a walk in their shoes

30 April 2009

When someone does something you don’t understand, disagree with, or don’t like, you might jump to a conclusion about that person. You might label them as clueless, misguided, or antagonistic.

In doing so, you’ve boxed yourself into a narrow set of explanations of their behavior–and left yourself with very few options for changing the situation.

In reality, the majority of people’s behavior is due to their circumstances. The environment around a person exerts powerful pressure on people, and most of what we do is a response to those environmental pressures.

That behavior you don’t understand? Maybe the other person has information you don’t. Perhaps they are acting perfectly rationally based on what they know.

That misguided decision? Perhaps they are being pressured to make a decision when they don’t have enough time to weigh the options. Or, maybe their boss has told them what decision she expects, even though she’s “leaving the decision to them”?

That antagonism? Consider that you might not be the first, second or even third person who’s asked something of them this week. Perhaps all the priorities they care about are getting pushed aside to do other folks’ work.

You can’t know the real explanation of their behavior without exploring the circumstances each person is facing.

The task of the influence leader is to learn about the environments other players are living in. Understand the environment, and you’ll get much closer to understanding the behavior and successfully influencing it.

The tendency to attribute other people’s behavior to their personality or inherent traits is called the fundamental attribution error. It’s deadly for influence leaders, because it limits your options for action and building strong relationships.

You’ll get a lot farther looking at people’s circumstances and avoiding labelling.

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Watch what they do…not what they say

15 September 2008

When you ask someone to do something, do you get whining and complaining? This seems to be an almost universal response when people are asked to do something new or different.

There are many reasons people respond with complaints, but my advice to you is: Don’t let it get to you!

What I mean is, don’t let yourself get drawn into their whining. In fact, take a breath and a step back instead. That’s their stuff, not yours. While you can empathize with them, don’t take on their pain.

After all, you are focused on getting results. And, you may get those results even though folks are complaining. Watch what they are doing. Are they getting on board even as they complain?

If you “feel their pain” too much, you’ll get discouraged. If you hold their feelings at a distance and watch their behavior, you’ll often see the change in behavior you want. And that will be very encouraging.

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