There are several reasons folks are timid about confronting. First of all, just about everyone has a history of bad experiences in confronting and being confronted…and why wouldn’t they? The world’s standard confrontation message is a You-Message and You-Message confrontation can be hurtful, can damage relationships, is terribly inaccurate, and can drive people apart.
Some people believe others aren’t emotionally strong enough to handle confrontations. I have found that this is not the case when the confrontive messages are I-Messages. It’s You-Messages that hurt. Others hesitate to confront because they think they won’t be liked if they’re confrontational. That assumption also arises from past experiences with hostile You-messages. But take my word for it. I-language provides entirely different responses.
Over and over people tell me two things that happen when they shift to self-disclosing I-Messages. First, people will often change their unacceptable behavior. Second, since their messages were about themselves, not the person being confronted, there is a much lower risk of causing hurt feelings or upsets.
Stay Current
Sometimes people learn the language of self-disclosure and decide to clean house. They make lists of people they want to confront, often dredging up old hurts better left alone. Counselors refer to this as “gunny sacking”, saving up complaints then dumping them on someone all at once, something almost anyone would have trouble dealing with.
It’s always best to stay current. Confront things as they happen. Give people a chance to change their unacceptable behaviors because hopefully they respect and like you and value your relationship.
And if your relationship with the other person is not very good, it might influence your decision to not send that Confrontive I-Message…but what if you don’t confront and you sit on it and let it fester? That seems super risky and costly in terms of energy and it will impact your ability to work with them which then impacts productivity—see where we’re going with this? And remember, if you learned and use your L.E.T. skills, you know how to Shift Gears when you hear a defensive response.
Behavior
I have learned never to be surprised when people asked to describe someone’s behavior instead come up with lots of evaluations and interpretations. Behaviors are observable. They are quantifiable and can be agreed upon by independent observers. Video records behaviors … and doesn’t judge them. Behaviors are what people do and say.
So, when describing someone’s behavior avoid assumptions, inferences and judgments about the behavior. (Remember GLOP?)
Competencies are not behaviors. Nor are rudeness, nervousness, grouchiness, generosity, humility, intelligence and hundreds of other characteristics that are often incorrectly described as behaviors.
If I am going to confront someone, the idea is to be like the video camera and not judge, just describe the objectionable behavior, what I can see and hear, in the most non-blameful terms possible. For example, it’s fairly easy for someone to stop yelling but almost impossible to stop being inconsiderate. So if I say, “When you yell loudly I can’t concentrate” the loud person is much more likely to stop yelling than if I had said, “You’re rude and inconsiderate” and left them guessing about what they did that was rude and inconsiderate.
It’s been my experience that people tend to argue with assumptions, inferences, evaluations and interpretations. If I want to start an argument assumptions, inferences, evaluations are just the thing. But if I want changed behavior, I have to talk about the behavior–what the person does or says.
And if my goal is to have productive relationships–then I want to confront in the least risky, most respectful, honest way that I can.