400 final
LDSR 400 Managing Conflict
Lecture #4
Crucial Accountability Pt. I
Professor R. Williams
Crucial accountability
Unless otherwise stated, all material from this lecture are curated from the textbook, Crucial Accountability: Tools for Resolving Violated Expectations, Broken Commitments and Bad Behavior (2013).
Patterson, K., Grenny, J., MaxField, D., McMillon, R., & Switzler, A. (2013). Crucial accountability. New York, NY: McGraw Hill Education.
Accountability Crucial conversations model
Before the Accountability Crucial Conversation
Readings: Introduction, Part One & Chapters 1-2
During the Accountability Crucial Conversation
Readings: Part Two & Chapters 3,4,5 & 6
After the Accountability Crucial Conversation
Readings: Part Three & Chapters 7,8 & 9
Joseph Grenny: Crucial Conversations @ the Global Leadership Summit 2014
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dKYunkN0Bs&t=111s
In Pairs or Small Groups
Take a minute, reflect on the last conflict you have had.
Was it a crucial conversation?
What story did you tell yourself in the first 30 seconds?
7 crucial skills for mastering crucial conversations
1. Start with the Heart
2. Learn to Look
3. Make it Safe
4. Master MY Stories
5. STATE my Path
6. Explore Other’s Path
7. Move to Action
What does accountability mean?
What is accountability?
Have you ever been disappointed by someone?
Did you tell them?
Have you ever been the one to disappoint someone?
Did they tell you?
Definition:
Holding another person accountable or responsible, face to face, for broken promises, violated expectations or bad behavior because there is a gap between what is expected and what the person is doing = ACCOUNTABILITY
Some quotes about accountability
Why don’t we hold each other accountable?
1. A lack of skills. We don’t know how to do it directly and safely.
2. Fear: we are afraid of damaging the relationship, or of how they will react, or of our ability to handle a potential confrontation.
If you don’t TALK it out you WILL act it out.
Acting it out is worse in the short and long run than addressing the issue head-on and solving it.
But does it work?
Patterson, et. al. (2013) have documented significant results when individuals and organizations take accountability as a mindset and practice seriously. Things like:
Improvements in protocol infractions in hospitals;
Increased productivity in large organizations that previously were caught up in unhealthy staff dynamics that related to sick days, not meeting project deadlines and staff turnover;
Increased personal satisfaction of employees with their own work, their colleagues and their workplaces. (pp.13-14)
What to do before an accountability crucial conversation
Start with Ourselves:
1. Examine “what” and “if”
2. Master MY Stories
Big idea #1 What crucial conversation are we not holding or not holding well?
The “if” question
Do you speak up and run the risk of causing a whole new set of problems or do you remain silent and run the risk of never solving the problem?
Consider the following important to deciding the ”if” question
1. When it’s clearly a broken promise.
Consider the following important to deciding the ”if” question
2. When it’s unclear if it is a broken promise, ask yourself:
if you are not speaking up when you should?
Is it your job?
Is it nagging/ bothering you?
Are you afraid?
Why are you afraid of speaking up?
Consider the following important to deciding the ”if” question
2. When it’s unclear if it is a broken promise, ask yourself:
if you are acting out your concerns rather than speaking them out?
Are your actions and behaviours demonstrating this frustration?
Are you choosing the certainty of silence over the risk of speaking up?
Are you down-playing the cost of not speaking up?
Are you exaggerating the risk of expressing your views?
Are you telling yourself that you are helpless?
Consider the following important to deciding the ”if” question
3. Are there times when we should not speak up?
Example: Coast Guard (pp. 42-43)
The “What” question
WHAT is it that you want to focus on?
What violation or violations should you address?
How do you dismantle a bundle of accountability problems into its component parts and choose the one you want to discuss? (p.18)
EXAMPLE:
Teenage daughter comes home late (p.18-19)
Signs that you are dealing with the wrong issue/ problem
1. The solution does not get the outcome you want.
2. You are constantly discussing the same issue over and over again.
3. You are getting increasingly upset internally and with every interaction.
How to get to the right problem and have the right conversation
1. Think CPR – Content, Pattern, Relationship.
Content – what actually happened – state factually.
Pattern – does the problem have a history, has it occurred before?
Relationship – how is it affecting your relationship – what’s happening to us.
How to get to the right problem and have the right conversation
2. Unbundling both CONSEQUENCES & INTENTIONS of having the conversation.
Unbundling means separating the various consequences (facts) to know which one to focus on.
We also need to check our bias to ensure we are not imagining intentions (beliefs) that are not true, accurate or helpful.
How to get to the right problem and have the right conversation
3. Prioritizing: What do I WANT and DON’T WANT in having this conversation.
Create a list of possible desires about what you want to achieve by having the conversation, and what things you might not want.
Be honest.
And think about the other person, what might they want or not want as you walk through this accountability conversation?
In Pairs or Small Groups
Take a minute, reflect on the last conflict you have had.
Was it a crucial conversation?
What story did you tell yourself in the first 30 seconds?
Did you have the right conversation?
Which tool can help you have the right conversation?
Mastering our stories
“Anyone who has ever held others accountable realizes that a person’s behavior during the first few seconds of the interaction sets the tone for everything that follows”.
(pp. 47)
PP. 50
We sometimes tell ugly stories
This is how we try to make sense of what happened.
We jump to conclusions that are not accurate.
We confuse intent with impact and create stories around the impact to us.
Those ugly stories lead to silence or violence…
Silence or violence?
Silence is approval of the behavior.
Silence is unfair to others.
Silence builds up until you explode.
Violence is costly.
Violence makes us hypocritical, abusive or simply stupid.
Violence gives us permission to justify our bad behavior.
Violence does NOT motivate people to do better!
”When people gain success through abuse, they succeed in spite of their method, not because of it. For over five decades scholars have shown that abusive leadership styles don’t succeed over the long haul, and over the short haul they’re simply immoral.
The greatest leaders, coaches, and parents studied never became abusive. And during those weak moments when they may have briefly stepped over the line, they never argued that others needed or deserved it.” (p. 57)
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For next class
READ:
Crucial Accountability- By next class you should have read up to the end of Chapters 6 (1-191).
Personality Assignment
Reflection Paper #1
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