Kerry Patterson

So we studied over 2,200 projects and programs that had been rolled out at hundreds of organizations worldwide. The findings were stunning. You can predict with nearly 90 percent accuracy which projects will fail—months or years in advance. And now back to our premise. The predictor of success or failure was whether people could hold five specific crucial conversations. For example, could they speak up if they thought the scope and schedule were unrealistic? Or did they go silent when a cross-functional team member began sloughing off? Or even more tricky—what should they do when an executive failed to provide leadership for the effort?

We’re so uncomfortable with the immediate conflict that we accept the certainty of bad results to avoid the possibility of uncomfortable conversation. We choose (at least in our minds) peace over conflict

What do I really want here?’”
Asking this question had a powerful effect on Greta’s thinking. As she focused on this far more important question, she quickly realized that her goal was to encourage these 200 managers to embrace the cost-reduction efforts—and to thereby influence thousands of others to do the same

What do I really want for myself?
What do I really want for others?
What do I really want for the relationship

Here’s how people who are skilled at dialogue stay focused on their goals—particularly when the going gets tough.
Work on Me First, Us Second

• Remember that the only person you can directly control is yourself.
Focus on What You Really Want

• When you find yourself moving toward silence or violence, stop and pay attention to your motives.
• Ask yourself: “What does my behavior tell me about what my motives are?”
• Then, clarify what you really want. Ask yourself: “What do I want for myself? For others? For the relationship?”
• And finally, ask: “How would I behave if this were what I really wanted?”
Refuse the Fool’s Choice

• As you consider what you want, notice when you start talking yourself into a Fool’s Choice.
• Watch to see if you’re telling yourself that you must choose between peace and honesty, between winning and losing, and so on.
• Break free of these Fool’s Choices by searching for the and.
• Clarify what you don’t want, add it to what you do want, and ask your brain to start searching for healthy options to bring you to dialogue

If you’re like the rest of us, it’s because you believed that the other person had your best interest in mind. In addition, you respected the other person’s opinion. You felt safe receiving the feedback because you trusted the motives and ability of the other person. You didn’t need to defend yourself from what was being said— even if you didn’t like what they were saying

People were always talking about how mean this guy was who lived on our block. But I decided to go see for myself. I went to his door, but he said he wasn’t the mean guy, the mean guy lived in that house over there. “No, you stupid idiot,” I said, “that’s my house

To break from this insidious cycle, Learn to Look.
• Learn to look at content and conditions.
• Look for when things become crucial.
• Learn to watch for safety problems.
• Look to see if others are moving toward silence or violence.
• Look for outbreaks of your Style Under Stress

Contrasting is a don’t/do statement that:
• Addresses others’ concerns that you don’t respect them or that you have a malicious purpose (the don’t part).
• Confirms your respect or clarifies your real purpose (the do part)

Victim Stories—“It’s Not My Fault”
The first of the clever stories is a Victim Story. Victim Stories, as you might imagine, make us out to be innocent sufferers. The theme is always the same. The other person is bad, wrong, or dumb, and we are good, right, or brilliant. Other people do bad or stupid things, and we suffer as a result