On the road to achieving your win in a given situation or conversation, understanding the common pitfalls and triggers that can affect both you and other people, will help create awareness so that these temptations do not hinder your ability to reach your desired goal. Interestingly, all three of these temptations are similar and manifest in similar ways, but in fact are rooted in different facets that exist in each of us. The end result of all three is usually a desire to be right or prove the other party wrong, but can turn out differently.
The first of these temptations occurs when frustration has built up along the way, on the road leading to the conversation that is now happening. Due to the failure to address the root problem, and most likely focusing on the symptoms; Within all of us there is a desire to prove that our opinion or perspective is correct and the other person is wrong. However, we must reject this need of catharsis or proving the other person wrong, because very often what the end result looks like when this occurs is very different from what our ideal win looks like. These two things can be at odds, and to pursue being right over winning could end up costing you what actually matters.
From my own experience, the good feelings from proving the other person wrong will pass, and pass quickly. On the other hand, the lasting effects of not getting to your actual win will invariably create more tension, frustration, and complications. In essence, you leave the conversation feeling good, without actually resolving anything. Additionally, just because someone is proved wrong once, does not mean that you will not find yourself at odds with the same person again. In fact, in your pursuit of catharsis, you may even embolden them to even the score. And when the score is kept, no one wins. A good test, while in the moment, to help strengthen your awareness muscle, is to simply ask the question, “What matters here to me and what matters here to the other person?” Is one party trying to prove they are right, or are they looking for an outcome of substance that will create real change? If you believe this conversation is about being right, this is then a good sign to stop, think and change course. While this can be easier for you to do for yourself, just having this awareness can help you put the other party back on track as well.
The second temptation is Pride, and will most likely be rooted in the inability to admit when we are wrong. While this may seem similar to wanting to be right, it comes from a different place. Although the motivations are different, wanting to be right, and wanting to prove the other person wrong, manifest in the same way and end up producing the same result. We chase something that is not aligned with our desired outcome, and the end result of giving in to this temptation is the same as the first temptation, our awareness and ability to course correct mid conversation are different.
The third temptation is Ego, and ego has a funny way of showing up during crucial conversations. While Catharsis and Pride tend to result in a singular tangent (proving you are right or they are wrong), ego tends to be a bit more fickle and unpredictable. This is not to say that giving into these temptations driven by our self worth won’t result in wanting our opinion to be right or the other persons wrong, it just has many other faces as well. A good example of one of these seemingly endless expressions of this temptation, is the other party making what they perceive to be a rather innocuous comment. You might objectively believe it to be unrelated or irrelevant to your goal or the focus of the conversation, but nevertheless it will send the conversation spiraling out of control and farther away from your desired result. The root cause here is usually tied to a trigger, expectation, or belief that you hold.
Let’s say, for example, that you are having a conversation with a peer about the performance and ability of your teams working together. You gain alignment around what the desired end state should look like and are now discussing the possibilities of what the path to this desired endpoint should be. The conversation is going well, and is progressing as you wanted. When you reach the point about how best to provide feedback to both teams, your peer makes a comment about how they think the way you provide feedback is not the best way to achieve the desired progress you just agreed on. Just like getting hit with a golf ball that came out of nowhere, this comment smacks you right in the face. You find yourself trying to take this comment in, digest it and really understand what your peer means.
For those that have mastered keeping their ego in check, this might not phase you. However, for most people, this comment has the potential to derail the entire conversation and ruin all of the progress that was just made. In being quick to respond, you may answer in a way similar to the following, “I’m sorry your team doesn’t respond well to direct feedback, but my team operates best that way. I believe it’s your team and not me who should consider making a change to what is the best way to deliver and receive feedback.” 20 minutes later, you find yourself still engrossed in a conversation you now don’t even recognize, that is mostly unrelated to the goal you set out to accomplish. You end the conversation agreeing to disagree and walk away feeling like the progress you thought should have been made was sabotaged. You sit down at your desk and start asking yourself, “What went wrong? Why did my peer have to go off on a tangent as to the proper way to give constructive feedback? Are they stupid? It doesn’t even matter. Feedback is not our problem, the teams working together is.” As you continue down this long introspective walk to nowhere you may or may not realize what really happened, why it happened, and what you could have done to change the outcome. Most people will fail to even realize what actually happened. Let alone, have the awareness in the moment to name what happened, have a brief internal dialogue, and get the conversation back on track because you refused to be triggered or tempted down a path that was not aligned with your win. Ego, it seems, outside of protecting our self worth, tends to do more harm than good when it comes to interpersonal challenges and conversations.
Let’s take a look back at the above conversation, and see what actions could have been taken to get the end result you wanted. Your peer makes a comment about how you both collectively should provide feedback to the teams, and mentions that he thinks your current way of doing this will not allow the team to reach the desired future state. After hearing this, you can feel the tension in your shoulders and your face getting warm, thinking to yourself, “What! Why would they even bring this up? They have no idea what they are talking about. Are they stupid?,” but then you pause. Next, you reflect and say, “Does this comment warrant a conversation now or later and is having this discussion now critical to achieving my desired goal?” After your 15-20 second pause, you formulate a response that may be something along the lines of, “You know, I think that creating alignment on how we give and receive feedback will be an important part of our teams working better together. However, based on the goals outlined for our conversation, I think it’s best that we have this discussion with both teams present so we can get their feedback and agree on the best way to do this.” Awareness is the key, but recognizing it in the moment and naming it will help. For example, due to my beliefs around feedback and what is best, my ego is tempting me to respond in such a way that challenges this person’s assertion, but that is not my goal for this conversation, and I need to respond differently to get to my win. This naming of the feeling, followed by a brief pause before responding, will almost always guarantee you end in a place closer to your desired goal. I never like to respond to comments like this as if it were a reflex. Even if I pause before responding, and don’t get it right in the end, I know I resisted the temptation to respond in a reflexive way that may have put me at odds with my end goal. There will always be a next time. Progress, not perfection.
Putting It All Together
You have now read through why identifying what winning looks like matters, understand how to approach a difficult conversation, and know what pitfalls to keep an eye out for so that you stay on the path to your goal. Now what? Well, the above is easy to read, maybe even easy to comprehend, but hard to put into practice. It will take time and awareness, especially of your own feelings. A good start in the beginning is the habit of writing down what winning looks like before you have a tough conversation, one that might get personal or be likely to get derailed. Over time, this will become second nature. You may not have to write it down, though at times I still find myself writing it down as this practice helps in two ways.
The first, is that when having this conversation, I bring that post-it or piece of paper with me, and try to glance at it during the meeting. This helps with our own personal awareness and can act as a flashing stop light when we are about to veer off the path to our desired goal. The more emotionally charged or personal the conversation I expect to have, the more likely I am to bring my goal written down with me and be sure to glance at it several times. I have found, at least for myself, that the more something is personal or emotional, the more likely I am to be taken off course. It’s almost as if there is a direct correlation between how personal or emotional a subject is and the likelihood of me falling victim to one of the above trappings.
The second reason I like to write what winning looks like down, is that more times than not, what winning looks like is not clear or easily apparent. When I choose to write my win down, I am engaging in an act of discovery. While something may sound right in my head, it still can be wrong. Because of this, I will choose to take the time to write it down, as I am much less capable of fooling myself when it’s on paper. Sometimes we need to excavate the real cause of the current tension and not just assume what we currently believe to be the win we want. There have been countless times where I was convinced of what my win really was, only to force myself to write it down, take a step back, and really examine the timeline and what happened that led to this point. In doing this, I usually end up changing what my win looks like at least 50% of the time. After going through this personal discovery, you will come to a much better understanding of not just how this can be helpful, but the process behind arriving at your clear and specific goal that speaks to the root challenges and informs what your real win should look like.
During the conversation, I find that above all, humility will be the best approach to getting your win. Humility allows us to not only accept where we might be wrong or have acted in a way not aligned with agreements, but also allows us to yield the smaller battles of a conversation so we get our desired outcome. Along the way, you will find that the ability to admit you were wrong, or apologize for a perceived mistake, will help all parties to leave the conversation feeling better than when the conversation started. After all, the best win is when we accomplish our goal AND all parties feel like progress was made. Find your win and go get it!