Connect: Building Exceptional Relationships with Family, Friends, and Colleagues

by Carole Robin

It’s a dilemma: You want to be more fully yourself, but what if being yourself causes problems with someone else?

fester.

When pinches are caught early, neither party is likely to be emotionally hooked. But when an annoyance is left to fester, once it’s finally brought up, it’s often grown bigger than the precipitating event and it can lead to multiple issues becoming intertwined.

ostensibly

He was in the kitchen making a cup of coffee and was about to leave when Eva said (with some heat), “Why did you leave the dirty spoon on the counter? Can’t you put it away?” It would have been easy for him to say, “What’s the big deal about one lousy spoon? And anyway, I clean up a lot of things.” Fortunately, he didn’t, because the issue wasn’t the dirty spoon. Rather, it was about what it stood for.

scullery

parochial,”

bantering,

galled

She was hesitant about raising her concerns with the group, lest they see her as “too sensitive.”

People are often hesitant to raise pinches out of concern that doing so might make them seem thin-skinned and petty.

Or you may think, It’s just not worth it. Sometimes that’s true,

Try this: Change the first pronoun to “I” or “you,” as in, I’m just not worth it or You’re just not worth it. Do you still think the issue isn’t worth raising? Sometimes you may, but often you realize there are more feelings there than you first recognized.

“If a friend of yours felt pinched by a comment you made, would you want them to tell you?” Almost universally, the student says yes. We add, “So, if you want that, wouldn’t you want to do that for them when you’re pinched?”

A final reason we resist raising pinches early on is that we assume the other meant no harm.

there’s a difference between another’s intent and the effect of their behavior. That Elena was bothered was true in and of itself—her feeling didn’t need a justification to exist.

If Elena is only pinched, she can say this lightly. If she waited until she was more upset and expressed the same sentiment through clenched teeth, Steven would more likely hear it as an attack. But because she raised it early, Elena is likely to feel better, and Steven might be more aware of what he is doing that she finds problematic. If he continues to repeat her comments without acknowledgment, she now has a basis to bring it up again, but more strongly.

Many pinches do go away, but ask yourself, Will this pinch linger? Connect to other issues? Trigger a major fight about missing milk rather than what’s really going on?

Once a pinch grows this way, it threatens to ...

Crunches are much more problematic than pinches, because in addition to the likelihood that much stronger feelings now exist, you’re also more likely to have devel...

As pinches grow into crunches, we begin to develop a story that is likely to include

negative assumptions

about the other...

None of these theories—even if never stated—are likely to help her build a positive relationship

Furthermore, once we have developed a negative story, we have a tendency to selectively collect data, or, as we like to think of it, “build a case that supports our view.” The truth is, regardless of how objective you think you are, everyone is subject to

confirmatio...

When you develop a belief, or even a hunch, you have a tendency to pay more attention to incidents that support it and di...

“Great point, Steven, and just what I said five minutes ago. I guess one needs a deep voice to be heard here.”

Humor works in these situations precisely because of its power to help people connect.

Victor Borge once said, “Laughter is the shortest distance between two people.”

“Laughter makes us more physically resilient to tensions and stressors…facilitates social bonding and increases trust. When people laugh together at work, relationships improve, and people feel more valued and trusted.”

On the other hand, humor rarely works if the joke is at one person’s expense or is an indirect way of saying something that isn’t funny at all.

jab

zingers

it’s possible this humorous comment would send a message that being indirect is how Elena and others want annoyances expressed—when, in fact, this tendency is something that Elena has found frustrating about the team.

Humor can also be a shield to hide behind if the other takes affront.

s...

The problem with using humor to convey a message is its inherent ambiguity.

Is she really annoyed or only slightly pinched? And there is ambiguity in what Steven hears and how he takes it. It’s better, especially if you’re concerned about the relationship, to have the sort of direct conversation that Elena could have if she mentioned her concerns to Steven as they were leaving the meeting.

This is not to say that humor never works. But you have to be sensitive to the context...

What kind of sense of humor does the other person have? Some people enjoy a witty response, even if it’s slightly at their expense, whereas others are likely to take it personally. You also have to consider the strength of your relationship. If the other person knows that you accept th...

disparagements.

This is now starting to move beyond a pinch, so she decides that she needs to have a direct talk with Sanjay. The challenge is how to have such a conversation in a way that can both resolve the issue and continue to build their relationship. That requires being able to give behaviorally specific feedback—a

Dealing with Pinches: Think about pinches you have felt in the past. How do you tend to respond? Do you tend to just take it, brush it off, withdraw, look for an opportunity to pinch back, or get upset?

In the coming weeks, be aware of times when you feel pinched. Do you have a sense of which ones are worth letting go and which ones are worth raising? Do you recognize any patterns in your choices? What action are you prepared to take, having recognized these patterns?

a growing pinch leaves you feeling a tad uncertain and is keeping you from being as close as you want. Strategize about how to raise it to improve your relationship, and then follow through.

In these discussions, you have begun the process of removing blocks to a deeper relationship.

She didn’t want him to feel attacked or put down. She also didn’t want him to think that she was asking something special for herself or taking advantage of their friendship.

behaviorally specific feedback.

is a crucial competence that allows you to raise difficulties in a way that minimizes defensiveness. It not only resolves interpersonal issues but also is key for personal lea...