crucial conversations to clarify meaning

#CRUCIAL CONVERSATIONS TO CLARIFY MEANING HOW TO#

And people go, really? And I go, yeah, because you need to have clarifying conversations first. I think there is, and I talk a lot about, in the middle of my workshops, I say, you might not even need to have a hard conversation. So before we get into these hard conversations, is there a foundation that we can lay as leaders to almost preempt them or to make it, when that time comes makes it easier, is there a foundation we can lay? Ready for power play or something like that. There's empathy there as opposed to just narcissism? I don't know. But I'd rather have a person that has that kind of anxiety around it because it shows that you're being thoughtful. And I work with people to find ways to say things that are necessary, that alleviates it. I work with people on getting clear so that some of that stress gets alleviated. If you are not a person who is feeling the emotional, uh, kind of challenge of it, and you're just a ready fire person who just speaks their mind, doesn't have any thoughtfulness or, or speed bumps around, how might I say this? That's scary to me because it's just so, it's just so almost emotionally violent, right? And bullying. Well, and I think about tough conversations and it's almost like you feel it in your chest and I wonder if everyone feels that they are, if people feel it in different parts of their body, but that weight that comes. And so those are all the types of hard conversations that I talk to leaders about. Sometimes, and this is the last thing, people need to talk to a whole group because they're not a department, a team, a grade level, because something hasn't, nobody's buying in, you know, and they need to move on and really move a school. about some challenges that a student is facing, possibly a learning support challenge or a discipline thing. Sometimes people say, I need to have a hard conversation with a parent. And it's hard, it's hard because they're frustrated, they can't believe that they need to have it, they've got a lot of feelings about not wanting to have to have it, and so that's hard. systems, protocols, so something that's much more tangible. Sometimes people have a hard conversation with a teacher or an admin assistant or a supervisor around tasks and responsibilities.

And so it's a valid hard conversation, but it's still hard. And the answer is I do believe in any sort of job description, there's something about collaboration and professionalism. Is that something I can talk about? You know, this isn't about the performance, it's not about the task. That's a hard conversation for some people because they don't know. It could be how you work with somebody or how somebody's working with you or not working with you in a way that's really productive. And I say in my workshops that a hard conversation could be interpersonal.

So my first book was Having Hard Conversations, and I wrote that because of the hesitations that you are sort of bringing up. Can you give some examples of what is a tough conversation? What are the types of tough conversations that you coach leaders through? It’s such an important topic for leaders because there's so much hesitation around having tough conversations. and developing our ability to do that in schools.

And so what I'm most passionate about is putting onto the front burner, the importance of adult to adult communication.

#CRUCIAL CONVERSATIONS TO CLARIFY MEANING HOW TO#

We don't have credentials in how to talk effectively to each other. We have credentials in how to teach students our subjects and our grade levels. I'm interested in the work that I think is important that isn't done in schools. Can you set the stage for our listeners, Jennifer? What is the work that you are most passionate about? Cindy: Alright, thank you so much for being here.

Crucial conversations to clarify meaning