Worthless pesky trespassing scum

Oh the irony.

So, I am on my way home from delivering my Grudgeology workshop in London.  It has been well received,  I’m going to be home within the hour and all is well. I then become aware that we have come to a standstill, the train has stopped.

No station.

“Look, there’s some kids out there!” shouts a passenger, and there they are, just up on the embankment on the left.

There’s an announcement from the train conductor.  We’re going to be delayed because of trespassers on the track.  And that is all it takes for my own Grudge gland to kick in, and I’m off.

“Worthless pesky trespassing scum” is what I am thinking to myself (edited).  Now I’m going to be late because you losers have got nothing better to do than play on train tracks.  How frikking selfish can you be.

I’m feeling mean, irritated. My stress is rising.

I then have a “physician, heal thyself” moment.  I think back to the course I have just taught.

1. Do not take offence.  Of course, idiot.  I am choosing to be offended by these children’s games.  Why?  Relax.  It’s Friday evening.  Go and get a beer from the canteen.

2. Take responsibility for your feelings.  Another good lesson. I allow myself to be ashamed for a brief moment about my thoughts for these (very young) children.  That’s not on.  Where’s the curiousity?  As soon as I’m curious, I am not feeling the grudge.  You cannot do it.  You cannot be curious and mean.

3. Don’t tell grudge stories.  As I walk through a couple of carriages to get a beer, the seats are full of similarly indignant, righteous and delayed passengers, stirring each other up.  It is clearly not helping anyone.

I’m feeling much more at ease with the situation as I pay for my beer and sit back down.

There’s another announcement.

“Ladies and gentleman, we’re going to be here for another ten minutes or so.  The good news is that a couple of the trespassers have been arrested…”  A cheer goes up and the conversations change.  People are now fantasising about retribution and revenge.

“Hah, it’ll be the escorted drive home to their parents for them…”

“I hope they get what they deserve…”

Worse of all “I would have driven the train straight through them”  Sir, these are children!

I sip on my beer.  These grudges that we can all fall into do not serve us well at all and it is so hard to resist them.  We have to make conscious decisions to do so, but these are decisions that once  we know, then we can take them really quite easily.

Full stop. End of.

Have you noticed this pattern; Someone asserts their point, often over asserting it, and they then add on this strange comment at the end.  ”Full stop.” or “End of story” or even more bizarre, the abbreviated form of that which is reduced down to just “End of.”

Yesterday saw Theresa May, the UK home secretary being barracked at her speech to the Police Federation conference in Bournemouth.  That is not remarkable.  It is a current vogue within our news media to report on ministers being heckled at conference. Only the day before we had Andrew Lansley receiving a similar welcome at a different conference.

There was one such “Full stopper” at the police federation yesterday.  I think it was the same person who is reported in the article I have linked through to above who said

“Home Secretary you may not like this but we no longer trust you in the police service.”

Having heard the clip on the radio last night I cannot recall if the next words were “Full stop. End of story.” or if there were some intervening words in the middle.  The point remains.

Why do people say this and what is the impact of doing so?

It seems the speaker is attempting to shut down debate.  We’re all familiar with and guilty of Lastwordism.  If I declare that my statement, my assertion is the end of the discussion, and helpfully, generously signpost that with a verbally explicit full stop, I can then go even further and declare the end of the story.  Full stop.

I love the abbreviated form; “End of”

It almost suggests that we are so at the end of the story that the story has already finished, the tape has stopped running, the page has ended, even before we get to finish our own over assertion – and certainly therefore, before you get to rejoin the debate with your counter-argument.

But what does it say?

Full Stoppers are very often arguing from impassioned positions, very proximate to the issues at hand.  They are right in the firing line and often face the direct consequences of whatever issue is currently being debated.

Within the vocalised full stop is a plea that sounds more like “Make this stop.  I don’t want to talk about this any more.  I am all out of patience, curiosity or courage to keep exploring what might happen or what changes are required.”

I hear “I don’t like it.”

I hear complexity avoidance.  Disengagement.  Small “C” conservatism, change resistance and an opt-out of the very difficult conversations that will still have to be had even though we have declared the end of/…

I hear an individual who has reached the very end of the their tether and their current willingness to tolerate the debate and the pressures within it.

The challenge presented is then an interesting one.

How do we re-engage the Full-Stopper who has opted out?  How do we lift ourselves and our colleagues, peers or adversaries back up into the dialogue and extend all of our tolerances and understandings of each other’s positions and, dare I say it, fears?  What skills will we need to develop and how will we do that?

A brief moment of disclosure;  I cannot stand Theresa May.  Her own “Full stops” and “End of”s are only slightly more veiled and just as unhelpful.  Her patronising “Stop pretending” admonishments are an embarrassment and her declarations of what is and is “Not on the table” are similarly closed positions.

…As for that picture, and the Police Federation positioning Theresa May in front of that backdrop, well, that’s just rude.

Have you heard the one about the Israeli conflict resolution expert and the trade union?

Conflict is complex.  No doubt about it.  One of its complexities is the way it can quickly turn in on itself, seducing us all, even the experts, into its destructive ways.

I’m grateful to my friend and book designer Ayd Instone, for bringing this article to my attention.

It tells the story of an Israeli conflict resolution speaker and expert who had been due to speak at a Manchester NHS event until he was cancelled because of the Trade Union Unison’s objections.

On first reading I was taken by the irony of such an expert being banned because he was deemed to be a part of the “Enemy” camp; the union, Unison, it is alleged, support a full ban on Israeli bodies in their stated policy support for the Palestinian People.

I had a sense though that the article would soon reveal more complex lessons about conflict.  And it does.  Let me list the ways.

1. Polarisation, the good guys and the baddies.

The most obvious conflict dynamic is the incredibly crude, but often prevalent tendency to polarise between the good guys and the bad.  This dynamic is often seen and rarely helpful other than to steel resolve and allegiance to one camp or the other.  It is the “If you are not part of the solution then you are part of the problem” or “If you are not with us then you are against us.” rhetoric.  It is the Cowboys and Indians mentality and even as I write that it feels offensive, such is the prejudicial impact of such polarisation.  It ought to be a thing of the past.

We have little hope of being able to effectively engage in conflict and disputes when such crude rhetoric is employed.

Instead we should be vigilant.  When it emerges then we ought to find ways of calling it out and asking ourselves “What attitudes does this indicate and what are the alternative approaches?”

2. The drama triangle

An extension of the good guys bad guys dynamic is the drama triangle. Here we have an added role.  The drama triangle sees villains, victims and rescuers.

Try it.  How do the protagonists and camps fare in this light?  Where would you position the Israeli speaker, the palestinian people and the union?  Who is victim, villain and rescuer?  Now how sure are you of that?

The great thing about the drama triangle is that our positions within this map are never fixed and instead we all shift around, creating a vortex, a whirlpool of relationship and uncertainty.

The union appears to have adopted the rescuer role.  But have they spilled over into villain by cancelling this speaker and denying him not only his appointment and speaker’s fee, but also even the possibility that he could have something to offer?

Is the speaker himself, Moty Cristal, villain as a part of the Israeli machine, as the union seem to infer or is he victimised by this as the article tries to depict?

Perhaps he has fallen into the expert’s trap of trying to play the rescuer?  Consider part of his response to the cancellation;

“I am confident that the only way to resolve conflicts, let alone the Israeli-Palestinian one, is through effective communication and constructive dialogue, rather than violence or boycotts.” Very helpful Mr Cristal.  But conflict is complex.  Now consider the full quote provided by the article;

“Values-wise, unlike you, I am confident that the only way to resolve conflicts, let alone the Israeli-Palestinian one, is through effective communication and constructive dialogue, rather than violence or boycotts.” – my emphasis. See how that “Unlike you” comment shapes the dynamic?  What kind of name calling has happened here?  Two things being points 3 and 4.

3. Seduced by conflict

Conflict sucks us in and we end up playing by its rules.  I suggest that has happened here.  The “Unlike you” comment comes across to my eyes as indulgent and, I suspect, irresistable to Mr Cristal.  For all of his expertise, which I do not doubt, we see that he has been seduced by conflict into some specific conflict type patterns.  There is a name for this particular pattern.

4. Attribution

We attribute malevolent, unattractive characteristics against those we find ourselves in conflict with and attribute noble righteous characteristics for ourselves.

We see this in play with the “Unlike you” comment.  It is not clear what evidence Mr Cristal has based this upon and in many ways the presence of evidence or otherwise is irrelevant. Once we attribute a characteristic, or in this example, assert the lack of a characteristic that Mr Cristal claims for himself we make dialogue less, not more likely.

There are other attributions in play.

The oppression of the palestinian people is seemingly attributed against all Israelis.

The Israeli embassy has attributed motives for the decision.  It is a “Racist policy in every way…” and the decision is also referred to as being “shameful.”  There is more within the very same paragraph.

A characteristic of incompetence is attributed against the decision makers;

” It seems that those who canceled it are in urgent need of such training.”

5. Resistance to resolution

Conflict is resilient at very adept at negating attempts to resolve it.

We can see this here.  The speaker’s possible contribution and expertise is roundly dismissed as an irrelevance to “The working relationships within a local NHS trust”

His appointment is rendered “Inappropriate” and we can see our final dynamic emerge also…

6. “…and another thing!”

We have all played this one.  If we are in a conflict or argument make sure you win it.  If that means that you scramble around for extra justifications to support your point, any justification, then do so.

The Union’s final quoted objected draws upon the “Inappropriateness of funding an international speaker at times of such austerity, when front line staff in the Trust are at risk of redundancy.”

This is a clear “…and another thing!” justification.  Given more time we could probably come up with others.

Thank you once again to Ayd Instone for such rich source material.

Let me know if you have seen yourself palying out any of these dynamics.  They are entirely natural and predictable.  they are not raised here by way of criticism, merely by way of observation.

The problem is then when they creep into dialogue and relationships then we greatly prejudice one another, ourselves and the prospects of effective dialogue.

As you read this there will be a temptation on your part – which side am I on?  that itself is a complex conflict dynamic.  I may have fallen unwittingly into my own conflict patterns.  Please do feel free to point that out if so.

 

 

 

Getting It Wrong

Ever made a mistake?

Where on earth do they come from?  How do they happen?

Look at this picture I took this morning on the train to work.  I call it Rainbow and Cow; View From A Train.  I’m quite pleased with it.

There were a few things I was really pleased with.  I thought I had missed the chance to shoot the rainbow which in real life was much more vivid.  We came from behind some trees and ugly farm buildings and there it was again so I took a quick snap.

I was then pleased that having been able to tweak the contrast quite a bit, and having saturated the colours and cropped the shot that it was reasonably pleasing on the eye.

I liked the incidental cow in the picture giving the shot a multi-dimensional feel.  I love how haphazard composition happens sometimes.  But most of all, top of the list, I loved the idea of Rainbow and Cow and the childish glee in playing with merging those words.  RainCow maybe.  I opted just to stick with the current title, mocking arty pretensions… Rainbow and Cow; View From A Train

 

Think for a minute.  Do you like the picture?  Is it pleasing on the eye, despite it being a bit blurry, glass reflection from the train window and the rainbow itself still being a little disappointing, almost elusive?

What else did you think?

I managed to get it posted on Twitter – after some peculiar difficulties and was astounded to receive this response…

@NeilDenny    looks more like a horse…….

…

 

… …

 

Duh! Horse. It’s a horse, of course it is.

But why did I think it was a cow?

A couple of things that I can remember thinking…  I was worried that the buildings and the yard, most of which are now cropped out, were working farm stuff, with which I equated cows.

I had been seduced with my own silly play on words.  Seriously. That ow thing.  Rainbow.  Cow. Rainbough (bough as in tree and sounding like Cow) and Coe.  These were the silly word patterns – visual with the letters and auditory with sounds – that I was mildly pre-occupied with.  And those thoughts had seduced me into perceiving a cow to the exclusion of what is quite clearly, and disappointingly so far as my word games are concerned, a horse.

The lesson? Sometimes we want to see things that are not there, in order to fit in with very quickly, preconceived ideas.

I had even noticed the cow was wearing a coat and thought nothing of it.  I must have subconsciously subverted or discarded that logical objection.

And you know what, we all do this and probably much more than we let on.  Daniel Kahnemann has an excellent book on it which I will blog upon later (ie once I have read it)

How many times do we hold on rigidly to our interpretation though and at what cost?

 

Please please please share your own examples below.  We could call it “The Things I Got Wrong”

The Artisan Craft of Creating Consensus

I have been booked to deliver the keynote at the forthcoming European Collaborative Conference

I have taken on the theme of the conference; Creating Consensus and decided to give that a more directly challenging spin for the delegates.

What would it mean if we recognised what we do as “Craft?”

How does that help those of us working within collaboration to elevate what we do from merely “What we do” and lift it into the realms of nothing less than artisanship?

What pride might we feel in the services we offer, the skills we continue to develop and the value that we offer to disputants and teams working through disagreements?

It brings in notions of conscious practice, reflection, constant self evaluation and development and drives us and our communities to what?  Transformation, perhaps?

I’m excited about this engagement and hope to be able to share more with you as the date approaches.

Do not forget that you can see other speaking work of mine from the excellent DoLectures by following the link and book me to speak at your event or conference, here in the UK or North America by contacting me on 07815 727693.  You can also find me in my role as Consultant Collaborative Lawyer at the award winning Family Law in Partnership in Covent Garden.

Why conflict happens.

Surprised myself this morning.

This is (was)  my mind map I was using to prepare a conflict leadership course I have been asked to run.

It was as if I had been thrown back to CSE art circa 1986!

(Grade C, if you’re curious – it counts as a pass. Just.)

Do Collaborate

My third book has been confirmed.

It will be called Do Collaborate and will be published in the very near future by the delightful Do Book Company .

As increased demands are made on individuals and businesses to be more agile, lean and innovative, effective collaborators and collaborations are setting the commercial and creative worlds alight.

Do Collaborate shows us the clear benefits of a more collaborative approach to working and how to do it. It shows us when we may need to join forces and how to take those critical first steps. It provides an essential toolkit to ensure collaboration works and gives expert advice on resolving conflict and dealing with common problems.

Collaboration is a response to an age of rampant uncertainty. This succinct and practical book will be your organisations guide to a more open, collaborative, and ultimately successful future.

It is time to stop talking about being collaborative and, instead, get on with doing it.

 

Conflict resolution is neither rational nor objective.

I had an enjoyable breakfast with a friend recently.  He said he admired the work I do in writing and delivering training on conflict and collaboration communications because it was a more “Rational and objective approach to resolving disputes; You take the emotion out of it.”

I bristled.

For me, working with conflict is neither rational nor objective.

It is fluid, chaotic, messy and sometimes very emotional indeed.

Effective conflict leadership is rational in the sense that it has purpose and logic to it. Yet it is irrational in that it should not be a slave to hard logic based arguments.  Sometimes the irrational, the uncertain and unmeasurable holds the key to making progress.  They can certainly serve us very well as souces of inspiration or innovative thinking about how we might approach a problem.

And is it objective?

I would argue it is not.  Objective can mean distanced, aloof, dispassionate, disconnected.  To me, conflict leadership means being able to connect with the people involved and their fears, concerns and needs.  There is a balance to be struck in not becoming enslaved to those aspects but we certainly need to be aware of them, to acknowledge them and the flavours they impart to any conflict cocktail.

In that sense, effective, powerful dispute resolution does not make objects of the dispute and the people within it.  The conflict dialogue is an inherent part of that conflict drama being played out.  It is subjective, it must be.  And by stepping into these conflict spaces and contributing our own voices, questions and thoughts can we hope to build a different narrative.

By being objective, on the outside, we run the risk of not connecting.

This is not to say that dispute resolution experts should not strive to be neutral or independent.  They can and should continue to do so.

But we need to get stuck in, to be comfortable with the messy stuff and carefully, skillfully play a fully integrated role in enabling the disputants to be effective in building agreement.

Are Solicitors and Barristers really “The Full Range of Dispute Resolution Services”?

John Wotton , the Law Society President, gave a talk to the Said Business recently.  A full report can be found at Neil Rose’s Legal Futures blog here.

I found this paragraph, possibly misquoted or out of context, to be curious.

“John Wotton said that with the narrowing division between solicitors and barristers, “there must be competitive advantages and efficiencies to be gained from having the full range of dispute resolution services under the same roof”.”

This indicates two things to me.

1. Blindspots.  If my understanding of this passage is correct then John Wotton indicates that the full range of dispute resolution services is comprised of the two elements that precede that statement, namely the solicitors and the barristers.  That seems to be a dangerous report from the crow’s nest.  What about mediators, arbitrators, coaches,  facilitators, legal executives and many others?  My concern is that the profession underestimates the role and value offered to the “client with a dispute” at its peril.  There is a growing range of professionals who serve clients with disputes.  The legal profession needs to recognise that and ask
   1. What are they doing?
   2. How?
   3. How do they appeal to our previously exclusive marketplace and those who come into it?
   4. How does their work reflect upon our own very well established (some will say archaic) systems?
2. The confusion within the language used.  The phrase “Dispute resolution” has diverse meanings.  The work carried out by the contentious arm of the legal profession and portrayed as Dispute Resolution is often received as being disingenious.  The reaction to it might be “This is not dispute resolution.  This is outright litigation or positional argument and negotiation carried out against a backdrop of potential litigation.”  It seems to be the case that when people now hear the words “Dispute resolution” they anticipate an Alternative Dispute Resolution process, namely mediation, collaboration, interests based negotiation, understanding each others needs and circumstances and building consensus or, at the very least, tolerable solutions.

It may well be that the derivation of the ADR brand came as being an alternative to the conventional and well established legal processes.  It is perhaps encouraging that the conventional now sounds peculiar and almost wrong.  What was once the alternative to dispute resolution is perhaps claiming the title of, quite simply, dispute resolution.  It is as though we are getting to the stage where the choice is between dispute resolution or instructing a conventional solicitor or barrister.

Of course this is too simplistic.  Many solicitors and barristers do bridge conventional and what used to be alternative dispute resolution practice.

I am aware that working in the ADR sector and being such a keen supporter of it that I might be victim to my own blindspots.

Perhaps the public perception is that solicitors and barristers represent the “full range of dispute resolution services.”

Please, please, don’t let that be the case.

What do you think?

Why Collaborate?

Businesses that do not collaborate will be fine. 

They can rest, moored up, in their backwaters and the idyllic lagoons that they know so well.

From just over the bank will come the sound of white water.  Here, the river courses over the rocks and challenges of the marketplace.  And there is another sound.  It is the sound of excitement, innovation, creativity and the euphoria of entrepreneurs and leaders riding the rapids.

These foolish, reckless businesses have not turned away from the challenges of the marketplace, The sleepy backwater is not for them, nor the dry dock to preserve or repair their position.  It is almost as if they are drawn to raging torrent of the river, to the chaos and the thrill of the ride; as if the currents that carry them along had seduced them with the promise of adventure, new shores, treasures and markets further upstream.  For them, these swirling eddies hold the promise of new perspectives.

They know that as they journey along this turbulent tide that they are just one of a fleet of companies taking this ride together. 

They know that the rocks and currents will throw them together with competitors and unexpected partners from other sectors. 

From time to time they may lash themselves together and explore how their combined mass enables them to better navigate the chaos, to ride even faster or build and launch entirely new vessels into the marketplace. 

The journey will not be easy, but it will be exhilarating, and as they emerge changed but strengthened at the end of the rapids, they will look back at what they learned and where they came from, and they will look forwards to the new horizons ahead.  They will look around themselves at the new acquaintances they have made, the partnerships they have formed and the lessons and new products borne by that journey they have shared together.

And what of the businesses that chose not to collaborate?  Well, they are still fine. 

As we look back, far beyond us, we can just make out their masts as they remain, still, unmoving and untroubled, in their peaceful, idyllic lagoon.  And now, that peacefulness is almost perfect. 

The white waters that surged past them have now abated leaving nothing but dry rocks. 

The euphoric din of those other companies recklessy riding and colliding together through the maelstrom has long faded as they coursed many, many miles ahead.  The silence is now almost complete interrupted only by the whispered but persistent question being asked repeatedly; 

“Where did everybody go?”