Guidelines for Dialogue

By Ada Gonzalez, Ph.D.

Rules of Dialogue

• Listen to each other with respect

• No cross talk. Wait until the other finishes.

• Suspend assumptions, biases, and expectations

• Share your thoughts, feelings, and opinions (personal advocacy).

• Bring an open mind, curiosity, and humility (doesn’t always have to be “right”)

Stop: Suspend, Pause, Listen

Suspend✦ Suspend comes from the Latin suspendere.

✦ Means: "to hang below."

✦ Has to do with drawing out, or stretching.

✦ Refers to displaying our thinking in a way that lets us and others see and understand.

Suspend: Assumptions -Definition

✦ Something taken for granted or accepted as true without proof; a supposition: “He is a good person because. . . (assumption)

✦ Action point: Monitor your assumptions and make it a point to check them out. Example: You suggest something and the other person does not say anything. Instead of assuming they did not like the idea ask: what do you think?

• Bias is an inclination or preference to hold a partial perspective at the expense of a possibly equally valid alternative.

• Prejudice refers to preconceived judgments based on personal characteristics of people.

• Action point: Become aware of biases that could be coloring your thinking.

Suspend: Biases

Suspend: Expectations ✦ It is NOT about stopping

expectations from occurring. Would be impossible.

✦ It IS about developing the ability to observe and recognize expectations in yourself, and in others, from a neutral position, remaining nonreactive.

✦ Action point: When going to interact with someone, don’t go already expecting the worst. Wait, see, be open, be positive.

Pause

Definition: To stop in order to consider; to reflect; a moment of silence; a delay or suspended reaction.

Pauses are important. Stillness deepens awareness,

innovation, and integration.

Pause, Why?• Important for learning.

• Key to new insights and breakthroughs in thinking.

• Periods of silence and reflection allow for more clarity, objectivity, and discernment.

• Create a space where listening can occur.

Pause: Be silent★ Definition:

✓ The state of being silent; the cessation of rage, agitation, or tumult; calmness; to put to rest; to quiet; a period of time without speech or noise.

There are many ways to sow the seeds. Listen and in

the quiet you will hear the direction of your heart.

~Anne LeClaire★ Action point: Take time every day this week to be silent for 10

minutes. No media, no distractions. Just sit in silence.

Pause: Think• We tend to create our reality through our

thinking. Thinking leads to action. . . or inaction!

• Pausing helps us become aware of of internal thought process.

• A pause can also help us witness collective thinking and the unfolding of meaning.

• Action point: When engaged in dialogue, take time to think and to let others think.

Pause: Reflect• Reflection allows us to think about,

expand, reconsider, understand differently, develop, and transform our knowledge.

• Reflection in action = ability to see what is happening as it is happening.

• Action point: At the end of the day, spend 15 minutes reflecting on your day, and what you can learn from your thoughts and actions.

Listen

Listen: To make an effort to hear something; to hear something with thoughtful attention; to play close attention. “It is better to listen in order to understand than to listen in order

to reply”.

Listen:

• To fully understand

• For common assumptions and voices that question them

• For emerging shared meanings

• With your full attention

• With heart, ear, and eye

Listen: To understand

•Try to fully understand even if you do not agree with the other’s viewpoint.

•See things from his/her perspective.

•Ask questions that will reach deeper meanings.

•Interpret correctly. Check your understanding.

Listen: To connect• Listen to your heart and from the heart.

The heart forms connections. That’s how you show caring and respect.

• When you listen from the heart, people feel your appreciation, compassion, and empathy. These brings connection.

• Connected people communicate more effectively and work more efficiently.

• Action point: Make a point to listen with your heart when people talk to you this week.

Listen: To appreciate

• One of the most powerful phrases in the world is: Thank You.” When someone says or does something positive to you, make sure you show your appreciation.

• Action point: Listen to find something to appreciate. Tell at least 5 people every day “thank you” for something specific.

Start: Inquire, Share,

Cultivate

Inquire

• Inquiry: ✓ opens the door for new insights and

learning

✓ helps breakthrough innovation to emerge.

✓ creates doorways into new levels of understanding.

✓ reveals relationship among parts that make the whole

✓ is needed for effective problem solving

Inquire: Ask Questions• For real learning and discovery to happen,

you have to ask questions.

• Asking questions helps you have an attitude of curiosity and openness.

• Create questions that focus on possibilities and spur creative thinking. Like: What if…? What else…? Why not…?

• Questions that take us to new places: How, When, Where, and What.

• Action Point: When interacting, ask at least 3 questions before giving your opinion.

Inquire - Discover• Discovering meaning together creates

trust and develops the present.

• Finding connections among distinct and different perspectives can give rise to creative and innovative combinations.

• For discovery to happen you need time to ponder the questions, to mull them over, to reflect and consider.

• Action point: Meet with others in your group for lunch. Question, share, discover different perspectives and ways to improve something.

Inquire - Learn• Definition (Wikipedia)

Learning is acquiring new:

✓knowledge,

✓behaviors,

✓skills,

✓values, or

✓preferences.

• Make a point to learn something new this week. Even if it is small.

Share

• When you are willing to become vulnerable and share the complexity of your thoughts, feelings, and dreams (including ambivalences), the dialogue is enriched.

Share: Thoughts

• Oftentimes it’s easier to share material resources than to share what is inside you.

• Sharing creates connection. The more connected you are, the more effective you will be. Connection creates positive energy and more efficiency.

• Action point: When talking to others, share what your real thoughts are.

Share: Feelings

Why is it important to share feelings? “Not sharing them creates barriers.” “Not sharing them isolates you.” “Not sharing negative feelings results in augmented negative feelings” . . . .

Action point: At least once this week, share what you feel in an appropriate way. Don’t “bottle up.” Aim to start doing this more often.

Share: Dreams

➡ By Sharing dreams people can:

✦ Develop new visions of reality.

✦ Construct a viable future together

➡ Action point: Take time to share your dreams for your department with at least one person. Then also share a personal dream.

Cultivate

•Open your mind to new ideas, methods, and opinions.•Show the same curiosity you exhibited as a child.•Flexibility will smooth the path of dialogue and understanding.

Cultivate: Openness

•Openness involves active imagination, aesthetic sensitivity, paying attention to inner feelings, preference for variety, and intellectual curiosity. • Action Point: Next time you are tempted to think “I’m right, you are wrong” open your mind to other possibilities. Ask “what if. . .”

Cultivate -Curiosity

• Curiosity is the desire to learn or know about anything. A spirit of inquisitiveness. •Action point: Remember a time when as a child you exhibited curiosity and as a result learned something exiting. Rekindle that type of curiosity and use it to help you on the job.

Cultivate -Flexibility

According to Webster, Flexibility is:1 : capable of being flexed: pliant2 : yielding to influence: Tractable3 : characterized by a ready capability to adapt to new, different, or changing requirements <a flexible schedule>

Action point: For at least 1 week try to be flexible in everything possible that does not go against your principles. Think “Why not?”

Sustain: Build, Embrace, Evolve

Build• Trust helps make a strong “container.”

• By showing respect, even when you don’t agree, relationships flourish and communication flows more easily.

• Competence breeds respect, trust, and success. If you are competent, others listen to you more.

Build a deeper and more efficient dialogue together. Teams will work more efficiently, relationships will be smoother, and productivity will increase.

Building Trust• We learn to trust only by repeatedly and

increasingly taking personal risk and experiencing positive outcomes.

• Interpersonal trust can be viewed as having five components: Truth, Respect, Understanding, Support, and Trustworthiness.

• Action point: Brainstorm with others: What specific action do you need to take to increase trust in your work/department group?

Building Respect• To receive respect you have to give

respect.

• Action point: Think about and share a story about a person you highly respect. Include:

✓ Your relationship to this person

✓ What characteristics of the person inspire your respect.

✓ What characteristics you share with this person.

• Make a point to practice every day those characteristics that inspire respect.

Building Competence• Competence is a combination of

Knowledge, skills and behaviors used to perform well.

• Competency grows through experience and the extent that you learn and adapt.

• Action point: Which areas you feel competent in? Where do you need more experience or learning to be more competent? Make it a point of development (finding a mentor, taking a class, going to a seminar, or any other learning activity). Start today!

Embrace

For dialogue to work, you need to be willing to embrace the mutuality of the process, and the honesty it requires.

Then you can joyfully embrace the ideas and bring fun to the process. Positivity and appreciation smooth the path to Dialogue

Evolve: Accept, Grow, Transform

• If we are not evolving we are in decline.

✓ Accept where you are now

✓ Make a plan to keep growing

✓ Persevere until you get liberated by transformation

Dialogue will transform the way you interact with others and take you into amazing places!

Question

• What is one question that if asked could make the biggest difference in creating more trust inside your organization?