Question: what percentage of your working week do you think you spend:

a)      “Conversing” with your computer screen

b)      Having actual face-to-face conversations?

You always remember a great conversation (with a person rather than a computer!). Think of the last great conversation you had. Who was it with? Was it planned or spontaneous, with someone you knew or with a stranger, at work, at home, at a dinner party, on holiday? What did you learn about the other person, their culture, values and norms? What did that make you reflect about your own world view? Conversations have the power to change our thinking, change our course of action, and even change our lives if we engage in them fully.

One thing to try today at the office:

As you walk around the office today notice the balance of people having face to face conversations and people sitting at their desk “conversing” with their computer screen. Often people treat email as an alternative to a conversation – it isn’t! In fact when things get difficult or you reach an impasse sometimes all that is missing is a conversation. Stepping outside your day to day list making and action taking to have a conversation creates different networks, relationships and ideas.

So how do we create the conditions for having powerful conversations and how do we engage in them fully. In her book Time To Think Nancy Kline says “…the best conditions for thinking are not tense, they are gentle, they are quiet, they are unrushed” She goes on to say that “…when you are listening to someone much of the quality of what you are hearing is YOUR EFFECT ON THEM. Giving good attention to people makes them more intelligent. Poor attention makes them stumble over their words and seem stupid”

Getting to a powerful conversation: 5 techniques

1. Generous Listening: First and foremost a powerful conversation involves, as mentioned above, listening well. Mentoring conversations are a safe place to practice developing your conversation skills. When a person knows they will not be interrupted it is magic – it enables their mind to roam free, to soar, to make believe, to chase ideas wherever they go. If you can create that relaxed atmosphere by listening well while someone thinks in your presence they will think well.
2. Enrolment ¹: This involves engaging with people and generating excitement, enthusiasm and a sense of ‘aliveness’. For example: “That project team you worked in sounded fantastic, what was going on there that made it such a good experience for you?” . Following it up with “What elements of that previous project team would you like to bring into your current role?”
3. Acknowledging ¹: This centres on the mentor and the mentee saying out loud the qualities or values that they experience in the other person, this must be genuine and honest for it to have impact. “It can’t have been easy to challenge the team in an open forum – that took real courage” People love to be acknowledged and you will notice an immediate impact on the quality of your conversation by doing this authentically.
4. Championing¹: This is where you recognise the potential and capability within the other person and remind them of what you see. “I know this feels difficult and I know you can do this – come on”. It is about reminding the person you are talking to of the strengths you see in them when they are lacking in confidence or self belief.
5. Challenging ¹: This involves getting the other person to stretch beyond his or her self imposed limits and shake things up a bit. In the spirit of maintaining a non tense atmosphere challenging like this involves the person who has been challenged having the opportunity to put forward a counter offer that is greater than they would have initially thought of.  The exchange could look like:

“I’ll enrol on that programme next year”

“I challenge you to start it within the next 3 months”

“I’ll research short and medium term learning options this month and talk to my line manager about my capacity for taking on learning in addition to my day job”

Is the voice in my head bothering you?

There is another conversation that goes on sometimes continuously and that is the conversation we have with ourselves. More often than not it’s not a powerful conversation but a disempowering conversation and goes something like: “Why did you do that? It didn’t work last time, when will you learn, dumb idea – STUPID!” or words to that effect.

Often we can be our own worst critic; we get into negative challenge mode and get stuck. Next time you “hear” yourself taking to yourself like this – pause. Ask yourself if you’d talk to a colleague, a friend, a loved one, a child the way you are talking to yourself and try to change the conversation in your head to one of enrolling, acknowledging and championing. It is powerful stuff; a quote from Gandhi captures the essence of this.

“Keep your thoughts positive because your thoughts become your words. Keep your words positive because your words become your behaviours. Keep your behaviours positive because your behaviours become your habits. Keep your habits positive because your habits become your values. Keep your values positive because your values become your destiny”