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Everything he says makes perfect sense, and is a conclusion I came to a long time ago - but I found that it didn't help much. In fact, I can't find the study n

Everything he says makes perfect sense, and is a conclusion I came to a long time ago - but I found that it didn't help much. In fact, I can't find the study now but I remember reading a (very depressing) psychological study that explained why trying to be precise seemed to have to opposite effect intended - something along the lines of "people interpret detail and precision as hostility". I've learned, the hard way, through trial and error that unless you want to make an enemy of everybody, it's better to describe a problem at a high level and then wait for somebody to ask for more detail before you provide it. It's not the way the world ought to be, but it's the way the world is.

BeetleB 5y ago
Yes, the article is great from a rational standpoint, but much of it fails in practice. I've definitely found providing more detail rarely helps with the situation, unless the other party is willing to receive it. In problematic conversations, the latter is often not the case. The article doesn't address the emotional problem at all, which is likely over 50% of miscommunications I've seen at work. Things like: Junior person talking to senior person: Senior person assuming the junior person doesn't know his stuff, and simply not processing what the junior person is saying. But if a fellow senior person uses the exact same words as the junior person, he listens. Nothing in this article will help. Person A is unsure person B will agree with him, so speaks very defensively (e.g. repeating the same stuff over and over, even though it's clear from B's responses that B understands). As a lot of communications books have pointed out, the way out of this is to have B repeat back what A is saying and ask A if his understanding is correct. This problem is so common that I default to doing this regardless of who I'm talking to. Person A doesn't trust person B or doesn't really like person B's ideas, and will act stupid intentionally (not too common but happens often enough to need to be aware of it). And there are others. Being precise is the least effective technique I've found.

BeetleB 5y ago

Yes, the article is great from a rational standpoint, but much of it fails in practice. I've definitely found providing more detail rarely helps with the situation, unless the other party is willing to receive it. In problematic conversations, the latter is often not the case. The article doesn't address the emotional problem at all, which is likely over 50% of miscommunications I've seen at work. Things like: Junior person talking to senior person: Senior person assuming the junior person doesn't know his stuff, and simply not processing what the junior person is saying. But if a fellow senior person uses the exact same words as the junior person, he listens. Nothing in this article will help. Person A is unsure person B will agree with him, so speaks very defensively (e.g. repeating the same stuff over and over, even though it's clear from B's responses that B understands). As a lot of communications books have pointed out, the way out of this is to have B repeat back what A is saying and ask A if his understanding is correct. This problem is so common that I default to doing this regardless of who I'm talking to. Person A doesn't trust person B or doesn't really like person B's ideas, and will act stupid intentionally (not too common but happens often enough to need to be aware of it). And there are others. Being precise is the least effective technique I've found.