[Advice] What to Do After You Thin-Slice

Thin slicing happens when the human mind shifts quickly through first impressions, intuition based on past experiences, and current information, and makes a judgment about a message, a person, or an idea.

Thin slicing is at the root of snap judgments, continuing conflicts, nagging disagreements, and fights that never seem to go away; it is near to the root of our “fight,” “flight,” and “fear” reactions.
Thin slicing is at the bottom of the contempt that we have for people and ideas without knowing why we feel that; it is at the bottom of the disgust response; it is at the bottom of most divorces, and other traumatic relational breaks.
Thin slicing is at the core of the old saying “You don’t get a second chance to make a first impression.”

The moment after you make a judgment—and mostly snap judgments are the first judgments made—is the most important moment, because without training and constant vigilance, thin slicing and snap judgments are often not examined, second-guessed, or unpacked.

The training, constant vigilance, and self-awareness to examine your own thin-slicing process, opens you up to feelings of empathy, understanding, and to the uncomfortable feeling of being consciously incompetent.

Particularly as you wrestle mentally, emotionally, and spiritually with a challenging idea, a person who was raised differently than you were, or to current information that supersedes past information you believed was right.

The media likes to ask the “gotcha” question of electoral candidates and celebrities, “Do you have any regrets about ‘x’ decision?” Many political candidates, and celebrities, when asked that question, tend to respond historically with words which reveal a lack of training, a lack of constant self-questioning and minimal mental, emotional, and spiritual vigilance.

Yet, here’s the challenge: If you can’t even handle being challenged on your thin-slicing tendencies on a daily basis, then expecting that a candidate running for office, a celebrity, or some other person to do what you cannot, is a childish expectation.

In a world where the penalties for making the “wrong” decision, are higher and higher, it is incumbent upon you, me, and everyone else, to start being more vigilant after we’re done thin slicing our world.

-Peace Be With You All-

Jesan Sorrells, MA
Principal Conflict Engagement Consultant
Human Services Consulting and Training (HSCT)
Email HSCT: jsorrells@hsconsultingandtraining.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HSConsultingandTraining
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/Sorrells79
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jesansorrells/

[Strategy] Different Mediums

The medium is not the message.

Or so it is said.

And if the most important thing is sending a message, what do you do when no one is using the same medium that you are, in order to hear the message, you want to send in the first place?

This is the trouble that leads to polarization in modern communication scenarios, as well as increases rates of conflicts, and escalations in the course of conflicts. It’s not about everybody speaking the same language (which we often think is the solution, either through training or codifying language in general); it’s about everybody communicating using different mediums.

And when my medium of choice for delivering (or receiving) a message of choice, is not your medium of choice for receiving (or delivering) a message you think that I need to hear, then conflicts, confusion, and escalation are bound to increase, not decrease.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Strategy] Avoiding Conflict is an Appropriate Response

Avoidance is the “mother’s milk” of conflict competency.

In the American workplace culture, avoidance is viewed as both a nicety for “just going along to get along” but it is also viewed as a weak response to conflict situations.

Many times though, avoiding conflict situation is appropriate when:

You have nothing at stake in the fight.
You are not directly (or even indirectly) affected by the outcome of the fight.
You are looking to preserve a relationship over attaining a goal (i.e. winning, beating your opponent, etc.)

Where the trouble lies for the novice, the advanced beginner, the competent practitioner, the proficient practitioner, or even the expert in avoidance is figuring out the gossamer levels of difference between the three above options.

And since no conflict is “pure” and there are many mixed-motives and levels of relationship involved in conflict behaviors, sometimes avoidance looks like the best (out of a series of bad) policies.

But in a workplace, picking the best choice out of a series of bad choices, can sometimes lead to even worse outcomes, such as bad behavior, poor decision making, organizational apathy, and confusion.

In order to create a new competency model, we have to acknowledge the presence of avoidance, the differences between it and accommodation, and recognize it as a valid choice for many people in a conflict scenario. Once we do that, we can decide what kind of culture we want to have, and who to hire, fire, and promote in order to get that culture.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Opinion] Sometimes Accommodation Works in the Workplace

In the workplace, accommodating bad behavior, poor decision making, and the outcomes of both of those processes leads directly to accusations by others of organizational apathy and confusion.

When we talk about competence though (or write about it) the general idea seeps through the page that somehow being conflict competent requires abandoning accommodation as a strategy. But it makes sense as a strategy when:

The organization is so entrenched in whatever conflict choices they are making that the only way to resolve them all is to tear the organization down and start over again
The individual who is engaged in accommodating conflict choices has little to no positional authority and views their own power stance poorly in relation to the organization’s power stance
The groups or teams that function inside the organization actually run more fluidly with accommodation as a method of choosing how to address conflicts, because the people who are at the top of the organizational chart have role modeled accommodating as a perfectly valid choice.

If these all sound like terrible conflict modes, you would be correct. But most competency models focus on overcoming accommodation to match the dominant communication style that many organizations mythologize in the United States. Which is one of direct confrontation and attack.

In order to create a new kind of competency model, we have to acknowledge that competency at accommodation is not only a valid choice, but also one that creates space for outcomes to occur that may be suboptimal inside an organizational structure.

As a matter of fact, it would look like this:

-Peace Be With You All-

[Opinion] Conflict Management Style

From the boardroom to the bedroom, assertiveness as a mode of approaching all conflict situations, is valued above all other choices in America.

But, what is lauded in a competitive business landscape, driven by media, and advertised to a distracted public by marketers, does not represent lived reality. Reality is messy, unmeasurable down to the final metric, and unknowable all the way up to the point that we are allowed to enter someone else’s headspace.

And even then, we don’t really know anything. We just can measure outcomes.

And the reality is, many people would rather practice avoidance, accommodation or just compromise in a fight, a disagreement, or a dispute, rather than practice any variation of assertiveness.

But if assertiveness is promoted as the “be all and end all” of all possible conflict approaches; and, collaboration is confused with weakness; accommodation is seen as charitable and kind (but not effective); avoidance is paired with fear of conflict itself; and, compromising is too often framed as losing, what is the average person to do?

Well, the fact is that, many people—from the boardroom to the bedroom—rotate through all four styles depending upon the situation, or context, in which they find themselves and the goals they are pursuing within that context.

And while assertiveness may be fine when negotiating a conflict solution across the table from a manager or supervisor, it may not be as appropriate a style to adopt when negotiating a candy exchange with a five-year-old.

But with the pressures and stresses of life compounding, rather than reducing, and with conflicts over resources growing exponentially over time, the value of being able to make healthy, conscious decisions to switch from one style to another—and to let the others around you know that this is happening—is the ultimate goal.

Because in a world where the technologists are here and building a world where human agency will be reduced to a mere shadow of its former glory, in pursuit of brave, new outcomes, the human touch to approaching conflict wisely is the only result that will matter.

-Peace Be With You All-

Jesan Sorrells, MA

Principal Conflict Engagement Consultant
Human Services Consulting and Training (HSCT)
Email HSCT: jsorrells@hsconsultingandtraining.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HSConsultingandTraining
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/Sorrells79
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jesansorrells/

[Opinion] #GritFilledLivesMatter

Resiliency in the face of a constant barrage of stressors leads to addictive behavior, poor communication skills, erosion of personal relationships and leads to a reduction in the very resiliency, stressors were designed to develop.

We see evidence of this in communities torn apart by racial conflict, ethnic conflict and religious conflict. When there are too many external stressors 9and even internal stressors), individuals (and groups) cross the line from being “gritty” and resilient to taking up arms, protesting and pushing back.

Sometimes violently.

Which creates a cycle, based not in resiliency (though the other dominant party may resist the protests and pushback through avoidance, aggressiveness, or even passive-aggressive behavioral tactics) but in resistance.

And both sides will claim—either verbally or nonverbally— to be exercising resiliency in the face of unreasonable requests, protests and pushback from “the other.”

“We shall overcome” becomes the stated chant (and unstated belief) of both sides, and the first side to verbalize it, is most likely the side who will endure—or have the resiliency and grit—to make it to the end of the cycles of violence.

The critical question to ask (and answer) thus becomes: Will there ever be a way to encourage the development if grit and resilience in people, families, communities, and even in cities and nation-states, without triggering violent cycles of resistance, retribution and violence?

-Peace Be With You All-

[Strategy] Creations of Commerce

By now, you already know that “Black Friday” and “Cyber Monday” are recent marketing creations, designed to get you to buy more, spend more, have more stress, engage in more consumption and to confuse “tradition” with moving money out of your possession and onto the bottom line revenues of brands.

We didn’t get here by accident though.

The human need to persuade, convince and to sell—and idea, a process, a service, a product—is so strongly embedded in human biology, psychology and even our spiritual DNA, that we have welcomed this change, from over 50,000 years of “not enough” to the last 100 years of “too much.”

We want to be sold and persuaded; but, we want to be persuaded and sold on the things that have meaning and mattering. This is why, even before commercial brands and corporations, there were empires, governments, and tribes. And, at a level even deeper than that, there are religions and belief systems that have toppled powerfully persuasive empires.

Which brings us to the reason for the season.

Meaning and mattering doesn’t come from buying one more item, no matter what the commercials tell you. Meaning and mattering doesn’t come from consuming one more meal, though the commercials will tell you this as well (it’s no surprise that gluttony and Thanksgiving have become closer commercial bedfellows in the last 20 years). Meaning and mattering doesn’t come from throwing away abandon and forgetting the old year and old mistakes and making resolutions that won’t be kept, because they’re too hard, too overwhelming, and too meaningless.

Meaning and mattering comes from remembering (and acting on) three core principles this holiday season:

Thanksgiving is a time for being grateful and seeking silence from the noise that doesn’t matter more so than for being gluttonous.
Christmas is a time for seeking redemption, giving the gift of forgiveness and seeking reconciliation with those who have harmed us, more than it is a Saturnalian bacchanal of commercialized shopping, glorious getting and begrudging giving.
New Years is a time for seeking resolution and closing the circle on gratefulness, remembering what we have gained in the previous year and looking forward with excitement to a new set of experiences, rather than a drunken brawl and a hangover riddled future.

Meaning and mattering.

Let’s focus on that this holiday season, rather than on the latest deal from the largest corporation.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Advice] Absorption

This Thanksgiving, let us be grateful for the moments of silence, inside and around the moments of noise.

The most important voices, and the most attention, go to family on this day. And while there may be things left unsaid, conflicts left unaddressed and fights left unkindled, today is the day of absorbing less of the noise that doesn’t matter and more absorbing of the silence that does matter.

Have a Safe and Happy Thanksgiving.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Opinion] On Fences, Boundaries and Good Neighbors

Does the admonition my mother gave me during my childhood still ring true in an era of refugees, immigration and fears?

Natural boundaries have existed since the dawn of human existence to separate “them” from “us” and, once Dunbar’s Number kicked in at scale, political boundaries existed as stories that developed into myths designed to separate “us” from “them.”

In the 21^st century though, the illusion of noise as communication has convinced many people that boundaries (natural and otherwise) are the provenance of a time long past, and a people long dead.

The ability to erect an artificial barrier(anyone remember the Maginot Line) or to manipulate a natural one (“Don’t bring troops across the Rubicon River…”) has always acted as a trigger in the human psyche to the prelude for greater conflict. This is not necessarily always cast in military or political terms but, as human beings are conflict prone and naturally political, it often comes across in such ways.

And then we throw race, gender, national origin and culture into the mix and things get really dicey.

Which leads me back to my mother. When I was a child and my two sisters and I would have a conflict, unless we could work it out between ourselves (most often we could) my mother would separate us with the admonition that “Good fences make good neighbors,” and would put use each in our rooms—with the doors closed. This would precipitate a “cooling off” period before the real negotiation/resolution would begin.

Political boundaries existed as symbols, designed to protect and grow cultural stories around “us” and “them” and to allow people in charge to manipulate power, create conflicts, control resources and at the furthest end, start larger conflicts.

This all seems so illusory in an era of the 24/7/365 news cycle and the false dichotomies of conflicts. But in the world that average people live in, fences, borders and boundaries are still fiercely enforced, from families to neighborhoods and even at scale. And without such stories—which is all that those political boundaries really are—the chances of conflicts arising and becoming more virulent as those stories change and grow due to the reactions to the human choices to make war, migrate, emigrate or to have fears, is more and more likely.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Opinion] The Decay of Power

Everyone “knows” what “it” is, but we often confuse the outcomes of “it” with the source of “it.”

Everyone “knows” that “it” is shifting geographically, technologically, morally, ethically, physically, mentally and spiritually, but no one “knows” why this shift is happening at this moment in our global historical consciousness.

Everyone “knows” that “it” is what makes “the world go around” but no one can really describe why “it” has so much ability to make things happen.

Everyone “agrees” that “something” must be “done” by people with more of “it” than themselves, but no one can successfully articulate why those with more of “it” would do “something” more with “it” than what they are already doing–or not doing.

Everyone “knows” that corporations, big businesses, governments, nonprofit organizations, parents, school systems, and even banks have too much of “it.”

Everyone also “knows” that the people who operate at the top of those organizational structures feel more and more under siege everyday as they look around and see “it” evaporating away from the siloes they’ve built to protect, use and exploit “it.”

Power is a curious thing. As it decays and moves, from one geographic or generational “space” to another, the fear of losing “it” (or the fear of gaining “it”) drives more conflicts than ever before.

Everyone (the royal “we”) “knows” what to do about that shift and how to resolve that fear, but, apart from talking in coffee shops, writing blog posts, or creating long form journalistic critiques of “it,” no one really has a clue about how—and why—this shift is happening.

But when a state of influence, such as power, which is so often confused with its outcomes (money is an outcome of power, not power itself), is seen to be decaying before everyone’s very eyes, the fear of loss—and the accompanying panic—generates a focus on escape and hiding.

Which is why, in conflict scenarios, whether between a husband and a wife or between a student loan holder and a bank lender, the energy that should be expended on getting to resolution, is instead expended on getting to escape, using power as a weapon, and/or hiding from the consequences of bad/poor behavior.

Which, of course, “everyone” can see…

-Peace Be With You All-