What are you really saying when you offer an apology for your work?

“No good apology ever included the words, “if” or “but”.
Anna Silk as Bo Dennis in Lost Girl

Years ago, there was a friend of mine that was so used to apologizing even the license plate on her car read “I’M SORRY”.

I always felt a little sad for her because she was and still is a really great person, with a shining personality, genuine self-esteem, and as faithful to her word as a saint. She truly had little to apologize for even after life dealt her some incredibly hard blows. In the face of these tragic occurrences, she never made excuses. Instead, she just dug down deep inside her well of persistent determination and gave it everything she had.

My friend saw the world as such a sunny place, that I am sure it was the reason she was always so “Sorry” for everything that happened, whether she had a hand in it or not. Perhaps we should be grateful there are good people in this world who really want the world to be a better place, even to the extent of taking the blame for its shortfalls.

I believe most people offer an apology from a sincere heart. In fact, I have operated on this principle most of my life. But lately, I have been subjected to a string of heartless apologies from insincere companies and professionals that makes me question the value and sincerity of a 21st century apology.

WHY DO WE APOLOGIZE?

In today’s world of business, the act of offering an apology has been strategically hi-jacked. Companies readily offer apologies for everything from a missed appointment to outright failure to perform. Most of these apologies are offered as a way of sounding sincere with the expectation of taking the bite out of the bark of a disappointed customer. The apology given as a corporate strategy with little or no intent to cure an error is about as empty an apology as you can find.

I’m not saying it is the wrong to apologize, I just believe it is pointless to apologize without a promise of action.

I can only think of two reasons why anyone should ever offer an apology.

• Reason #1: As the result of an action in order to establish terms for a redress of the aggrieved party.

• Reason #2: As a means of accepting responsibility while asking for foregiveness for a promise you could not keep.

WHAT ARE YOU REALLY SAYING WHEN YOU APOLOGIZE?

When you enter into a relationship with someone, whether personal or business, there exists an expectation of performance based on something called an “implied contract”. Whether you know it or not, you move in and out of these implied contracts all day long. Implied contracts are based on an expectation of intention. When you pump gas into your car, you are allowed to do so under the intention that you will pay for it. You are willing to pay for the gas because you have an expectation of performance based on the brand’s reputation or octane rating. That is the implied contract. It is an informal type of promise. Promises are the bedrock of Trust; hard to earn, easy to lose.

When you apologize for not keeping a promise, what are you really saying about yourself or your business:

•  “I overstated my ability to deliver on the promise I made to you.”

• “I made this promise to you out of desperation without considering how you might react if I could not fulfill my promise.”

• “I made this promise to you, but I figured if I could not keep my promise to you I could just apologize, and you would forgive me.”

• “It’s easier for me to apologize and inconvenience you, than it is for me to get it right the first time.”

•  “I make promises all the time with no intention of keeping them because that’s just how things are.”

•  “I specialize in empty promises.”

None of the above are acceptable responses under any conditions. If you are a leader or run a business, accept that you will, at some point, need to apologize for some shortfall of your team or business. When you do, be sincere and have a plan for erasing the bad taste of a promise broken.

HOW TO AVOID EMPTY APOLOGIES

• Do not offer an apology without a plan to make things not only right, but better.

• Do not apologize without having the intent to double down on future efforts to win back lost trust.

• If you make an apology, insist that you understand its acceptance will be performance based.

• Never include the words “if” or “but” in your apology.

In an apology, the injured party holds all of the chips. After failing to perform, an apology should not include any conditional language. A sincere apology cannot be made according to the giver’s terms. The giver of an apology has no right to dictate or negotiate its terms.

WHEN SPEAKERS SHOULD AND SHOULD NOT APOLOGIZE

Speakers tend to apologize for a lot of things including skipping a section, forgetting their place, having a cold, and so on. I once heard a speaker apologize for being boring. But, the number one thing I hear speakers make an apology for is not being “perfect.”

Remember, your speaker’s credibility is the foundation of the trust an audience confers on you. The relationship between a speaker and an audience is a fragile implied contract in which one party offers their focused attention in exchange for valuable information, motivation, and enjoyment.

That said, every speaker has the right not to be perfect. No audience has the right to expect perfection from a speaker.

Whatever you think you need to apologize for as a speaker, think about what you might be saying to your audience when you do. Are you saying:

• “I lost my place because I did not put enough preparation in to this effort.”

• “I left out that section because it was probably not that important.”

• “I’m not that excited to be here talking about this stuff.”

• “I was up all last night getting plastered at the hotel bar.”

When you speak, only apologize for those things beyond your control. Everything else, the stuff within your control, requires your full intention in order to deliver on the promise of your speech. How you fulfill this promise is up to you.

I will make no apologies for this blog’s content. I trust you enjoyed it and it will help you to avoid making future empty apologies in your personal and professional life. I appreciate your support as a reader of my blog and I welcome any comment on this post or suggestions you might have in the comments section below. As always, please feel free to share this post with a friend or colleague.

Bringing Positivity to Everything,
The Brain Tamer

Why the sheer brilliance of using a deep conversation to create a high-value relationship is utterly priceless.

"Deep conversations with the right people are priceless."
Anonymous

As of late, the art of conversation has been taking a beating. We all know it and, most importantly, we all see it. People still meet for lunch or dinner, but they don’t talk much to each other. Instead, they just immerse themselves in technology, only occasionally sharing a tweet or text. It’s all very surface level and hardly ever goes deeply into what really matters. While they are developing relationships, many of these people are missing out on the priceless value deeper conversation offers.

THE ART OF THE PRICELESS

For many years, I have been coaching my leadership and speaking clients to get out of their ivory tower and talk to their people. If all you know about a person is what is on their resumé, you “don’t know nothin’” about them. The same thing goes for colleagues as well. I once worked at a communications agency where we were prohibited from talking to each other except as it related to work.

A communications agency!

Hard to believe? Not really.

In many corporate circles, conversation is considered a waste of time. Idle chatter. The devil’s playground.

But, research has found that practicing the art of conversation is a sound business strategy. Even without the research, having deep conversations with clients, colleagues and audiences is a fundamentally sound behavior. After all, when you take a business and separate the processes and product from the enterprise what you have left are the people that work there. The same people that will spend endless hours pouring their souls into a product or service can hardly be bothered to explore and discover what matters most in their professional, public, and personal lives.

For many leaders, conversations may appear to be an unnecessary, costly expense. But what they are destined to learn when building a high-functioning team, is that deep conversations between the players is critical. This may not be news to some, but it is certainly a revelation on the state of human nature to many. What some leaders and speakers may view as a costly extravagance is actually a priceless experience.

Recently, Joe Maddon, World Series winning manager of the Chicago Cubs, has begun taking to dinner players who may be struggling or underperforming. It is his belief that getting to know the player better through deep conversations is a critical part of his job. He knows there is a postive benefit when the player knows his manager has concern for more than what happens between the foul lines. Maddon is it in for the long game, because winning is the result of lots of small wins collected over time. He knows winning in life has a direct correlation to winning on the field. He sees a manager’s role as not just managing how a team plays but managing the people who play on the team as well.

Deep conversations are the very foundation of a strong relationship. To build a strong lasting relationship all parties have to be invested in the process. Or, as our giraffes in the photo accompanying this blog demonstrate, sometimes you have to be willing to stick your neck out to get results. To build a strong relationship through deep conversations you must be willing to give details and disclosures about yourself (company) as well as receive the same in return from the other side of the relationship. Deep conversations really are priceless.

THE RELATIONSHIP DEVELOPMENT CYCLE

A while back, I developed The Relationship Development Cycle, a model for helping all of my clients learn how they could build stronger relationships. Stronger relationships with their clients, teams, and audiences. Through the use of this model, my clients are able to deepen the relationships they have with themselves (as leaders and speakers) and with others in the course of doing business, enhancing their communities, and enriching their personal and family lives.

The Relationship Development Cycle has five stages (Desire, Exploration, Discovery, Negotiation and Acceptance) that continuously revolve around a central hub (Trust) for stability. The engagement of this model can help anyone develop a deeper understanding and relationship with any person, place or thing. You can apply it to a skillset or a dataset. It works the same so long as the first stage (Desire) is present in the relationship. Without Desire, all relationships crumble through entropy and eventually cease to exist. It is one reason we tend to lose friendships over time. Without the Desire to maintain the relationship, it has a natural tendency to falter.

The hub of Trust acts to align the relationship based on the truthfulness of the information exchanged throughout the relationship.

If (when engaging this model to develop a deeper personal relationship with yourself about a skill, emotion or experience) you cannot maintain complete honesty, your self-relationship will spin out of alignment due to an imbalance of honest information. Since we often “lie” to ourselves as a defense mechanism many of us don’t often have the best relationships with ourselves. Don’t you deserve better?

You are one of the right people. Have a deep conversation with yourself.

The ability to build a strong relationship is not a “just add water” activity. It takes time, sincerity, honesty, creativity, and bravery to expose yourself willingly to another person (including yourself). For western thinkers it requires the ability to allow yourself time for reflection. Something the western mind tends to struggle with grasping.

In a recent commencement address to his daughter’s graduations class, Chief Justice John Roberts urged the graduates to “to stay involved with yourself." He imparted to them the following sentiment, "My advice is, when you get to college, to set a little time aside each day to think about things instead of simply acquiring more information. Do not read more, do not research more, do not take notes. Put aside books, papers, computers, telephones. Sit, perhaps just for a half hour, and think about what you're learning."

SOUND BUSINESS THINKING

If your goal is to build better work groups with higher levels of performance and reliability, I can recommend no better way than to practice The Relationship Development Cycle. Challenge all members of your organization to learn more about who they are, what they want and what they need from the work they do by engaging this model between themselves. Once you learn what people dream to achieve, you will see how you can help them fuel that desire.

For leaders and speakers, The Relationship Development Cycle is critical to developing the deep thought platforms you seek to use when communicating concepts and processes to your audience. By engaging The Relationship Development Cycle you’ll learn to stretch your ability for self-examination, strengthen your thinking muscle, and overcome the tendency to settle for the easy answers to tough questions. Remember, your value to individuals and organizations rest solely on the uniqueness of your vision and your ability to effectively articulate that vision with authority, brevity and clarity.

Click this link for a free copy of my one-page document about The Relationship Development Cycle and feel free to share it with colleagues, friends and partners. Most importantly, share The Relationship Development Cycle with yourself. Start today to begin building a strong relationship with yourself on a host of topics through deep intrapersonal conversations. You’ll soon see the most amazing transformation begin to happen when you stick your neck out just a little.

While you’re at it, stick your neck out a little and please share your comments on this post or suggestions in the comments section below. As always, please feel free to share this post with a friend or colleague.

Bringing Positivity to Everything,
The Brain Tamer

Why you must avoid the hidden pit falls of group think when leading and speaking.

One of the greatest dangers for a leader or speaker is to grow increasingly numb to the pit falls of group think within their organization and the speeches they deliver.

Today, the whole world is listening and the things you may think you are saying in confidence might easily show up on YouTube, Twitter or SnapChat. This does not mean you should be disingenuous when you speak, but it does mean you must consider the larger audience who might hear what you are saying.

Sometimes, when we’re in a like-minded group it is easy for us to become comfortable saying the things we’d like to say instead of the things we ought to be saying. This is a lesson learned painfully by many politicians, athletes and celebrities. Some professional speakers and business leaders are guilty of this as well.

UNDERSTANDING GROUP THINK

Groupthink is a term coined by social physiologist Irving Janis in 1972 to classify a negative feature of people in groups. Group think is defined as a psychological phenomenon that occurs within a group of people, in which the desire for harmony or conformity in the group results in an incorrect or deviant decision-making outcome.

Recently, while coaching a candidate for state legislative office we talked about speaking to audiences. My caution was to avoid the pit falls of group think by continually remembering that even people in your own party reserve the right to change their mind or to differ in opinion.

Group think has not only snared the famous and infamous, it also has a tendency to stifle open and honest dialogue between well intentioned people and among well-meaning groups.

Group-think is a paralyzing phenomenon predominately practiced from the halls of academia to the corridors of legislatures to conference rooms throughout the world.

In my own experience, while teaching Public Speaking at a college, I challenged my colleagues who were classifying Vocal Variety as verbal communication on the course’s rubric. When I pointed it out to them that even the text we were using classified Vocal Variety as nonverbal communication because it is paralanguage their response was, “Well perhaps we’ll call it Voice on the rubric instead.”

If ever there was a case of making a deviant decision, this is one. Instead of being concerned they had misinformed their students, they were more concerned with not being proved wrong. They were lock-step in the group think.

The Titanic struck an iceberg, but it was group think (this ship is unsinkable) that sunk it.

New Orleans was hit by hurricane Katrina, but it was group think (the levees will protect us) that cost the lives of so many people.

Enron may have been led by greedy dishonest executives, but it was group think (the belief that dissent is disloyalty or stupidity) that caused it to crumble.

AVOIDING THE PIT FALLS OF GROUP THINK

There are a variety of techniques you can engage to help avoid group think. An article from Expert Program Management suggests the following:

• The Nominal Group Technique: this gives group members the opportunity to contribute individually before group discussion begins.

• The Delphi Method: this allows group members to contribute individually without the group ever having to come together. The individual may not even be aware of who the other members of the team are.

• The Stepladder Technique: this starts with a group of two, and adds one member at a time to the group, allowing each new team member to express their opinion on the solution each time, before group discussion begins.

• ·The Six Thinking Hats Technique: forces the team to look at a problem from different perspectives.

The clearest solution to avoiding group think may be found in a simple two-word slogan from Apple, “Think Different”. Regardless of how popular a solution or objective may be,  challenge yourself and your group to seek a different perspective on the idea. Examine it as if you are seeing it for the first time. Give it the old “water test”. If it doesn’t hold water, it probably will sink.

THE NON-GROUP THINK LEADER AND SPEAKER

When you create a speech, you are your own group. You develop content out of your own passion, knowledge and experiences. You believe what you have to say is really, really important. While you have great, awesome and inspiring vision, what you may lack is perspective. And this can lead to group think.

A good many speakers get ensnarled in their own little group think. They have a passion for a topic, craft a speech with lots of real neato ideas, stories and witty phrases and then send it on its way. They forget to take the time to listen to what they are saying from their audience’s perspective. They forget to “eat their speech” and end up serving something that is totally indigestible. They hit their listeners with a fire hose when a sprinkler is what is they need to nurture the seeds they have sown.

The best way for a leader or speaker to avoid encouraging group think is to listen to what is being said. Measure it against what situation it is intended to solve. Before coming to the final decision, seek the input of a trusted, impartial outside source. Ask open questions designed to expand on the range of existing thinking. Be open to change and embrace it.

As Albert Einstein said, “If nothing changes, nothing changes.”

As always, please feel free to share this post with a friend or colleague. The best way for me to avoid falling into group think within this post is for my readers to chime in with their comments, opinions and suggestions. Please feel free to share your comments on this post or suggestions for future posts in the comments section below.

Bringing Positivity to Everything,
The Brain Tamer

How you can avoid violating the safety zone of speaking discretion?

Can you keep a secret?

Most of us believe we can. In fact, we shock ourselves when we “leak” the contents of a confidential and trusted tidbit of information. Pressure, from within and without, is often the cause of our indiscretion when it comes to divulging that which we heretofore believed we would not. Peer pressure, job pressure, and the inevitable “I know something you don’t know” can create such internal pressure on the human mind the only cure is to vent the hot info being contained. But what happens when you divulge secret or confidential information without even knowing you are doing it?

Over the last 40 years we have heard a lot about leaks. From The Pentagon Papers to “Deep Throat” of the Watergate era to the WikiLeaks War Logs. It seems humans have a proclivity for divulging information they acquire confidentially. In truth, the motive to “do the right thing” is undeniably at the root of some of this behavior. I will not contest that here, mainly because truth, like beauty, is in the eye (or ear) of the beholder.

What I would like to discuss here is how seemingly reliable people innocently divulge confidential information all the time without even realizing they are doing it. Are you one of them?

CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?

Ever since the invention of the cell phone, I find that I am repeatedly assaulted, exposed, and inundated with more private information than I care to process. A whole lot of it is TMI that I would really, really prefer never to hear. Once, while waiting at the car wash, I heard a complete break-up of a relationship. Who would want to expose this most private detail in a public forum? “Can you hear me now” seems to be more of a strategy than a marketing slogan.

“Yes, I can hear you now. And, frankly, I’d like you to take it down a notch or two or four or even eight.”

From restaurants to theaters to planes, trains and sidewalks more and more people are screaming the details of their private lives at levels loud enough for everybody to hear; two towns over, whether they choose to hear it or not.

I was raised with an understanding of a “restaurant voice”. The one to use when you are in a discrete social setting. The only time it was appropriate to raise your voice was when you sang “Happy Birthday” to another member of your party or another diner in the establishment as a well wishing for the occasion. Now, the level of vocal pollution in restaurants and cafés from people conducting wide open discussions on the mobile devices is deafening and a good deal of it is not for public consumption.

Heck, we didn’t even speak that loud when we were kids connecting to each other over two tine cans and a waxed line.

THE INNOCENT EAVESDROPPER

During the last week, I needed to alter my routine due to the devastation from an F1 tornado and macro burst that knocked out power throughout the area where I live. While conducting business in a well-known bread eatery, I noticed many other business people taking advantage of the free wi-fi and power to do the same. One group, seated just a table away, was conducting a meeting and openly discussing business information and strategy with complete abandonment at a vocal level loud enough for me to know who they were, what they were saying, etc.

I’m sure these are intelligent, well-intentioned people. I can’t say for sure, but they might have been sharing some of the same proprietary information probably covered by the non-disclosure agreement they may have signed upon being hired.

Nice people, behaving in an easily avoidable way is quickly becoming a common denominator.

THE FOUR ZONES OF SPEAKING DISCRETION

Wise leaders and effective speakers understand the power of artfully placed discretion as a critical element of their speaking success. More importantly, they understand the appropriate range of volume to be used in each setting. They know the Four Zones of Speaking Discretion.

The Four Zones of Speaking Discretion are:

1. Public

2. Social

3. Personal

4. Intimate

Each zone has an appropriately accompanying range of speaking volume. Knowing how to apply each range effectively is a key to commanding your speaking effectiveness and enjoying the success it brings.

Let’s briefly look at each zone.

Public:

• 12 feet or more from you and your listener.

• Volume range 8 – 10
  10 is the maximum. (Sorry, no room for a Spinal Tap “11” here).

Think open forum. Cheerleaders use this voice to excite the crowd, police to issue a warning, and doctors to issue an emergency command. When people are on their mobile phones they use this volume level because they cannot see the other person. This leads their brain to processes their target as being more than 12 feet away. The fact is, with a mobile phone, assuming your recipient has the phone to their ear, you are usually less than 12 inches away (Intimate Zone)

Social:

• 4 feet to 12 feet in range from the speaker to the receiver.

• Volume range 5 – 7

This is your typical board room or conference room setting. Your voice needs to be loud enough to be heard but not so loud as to be overpowering. (Unless that is the result you intend to get.)

Personal:

• 18 inches to 4 feet.

• Volume range 2– 4

This is the space usually observed between two to four people in a closely held conversation. Confidential communication can freely be exchanged without fear of discovery by others. My group in the bread café, in this zone, were speaking with a volume between 8 and 9.

Intimate:

• 0 – 18 inches

• Volume range .25 – 1.75

This is the space that should be saved for the most private information. The Godfather new this. He would have his listener lean in real close and whisper his wishes in their ear. Everyone always got the message and meaning from the Godfather. They may have not been sweet nothings, but the whispers were effective and successful. Try to imagine The Godfather sitting in his favorite eatery communicating delicate “business” to his consigliore on his cell phone with a public voice. The authorities would have loved that – a lot.

THE BOTTOM LINE

Now that you know how to safely avoid violating the safety zones of speaking discretion, use this information to protect yourself as a speaker and leader. Every speaking opportunity has the appropriate zone of information and accompanying voice volume. Using these effectively will contribute to your confidence and authority as both a leader and speaker.

As always, please feel free to share this post with a friend or colleague. Also, please share your comments on this post or suggestions in the comments section below.

Bringing Positivity to Everything,
The Brain Tamer