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Complexity Doesn’t Need to Be Complicated

Subtle Differences Can Be Huge

Some subjects are complex by their very nature. 

For example, when you take a business that already has its own complexities and overlay a family system, the overall complexity necessarily increases.

But does that mean that everything also needs to be complicated?

Regular readers will recognize that I’ve re-entered the fun world of discussing vocabulary, and looking at the meanings of similar words, to see what we can discern from their subtle differences.

The world of family business, along with all its variations like “enterprising families”, “families in business”, “dynastic families”, “legacy families”, (I could go on) is complex enough already, simply by virtue of all the interdependent relationships they contain.

So how do you make sure things don’t get too complicated?

 

Complexity Without Complications?

Please recall that these are top of mind thoughts in a blog, not scientific research in a thesis. Thanks. Here goes.

Complexity is used to describe things that happen automatically or naturally, while complications are man-made and result from a person or people intervening for some reason.

So if the complexity that comes from family members working together in a business, or owning assets together, or managing property as a group, is innate or natural, then there isn’t anything we can do about that.

We need to come to the realisation that things are complex and learn to live with that reality, and deal with it accordingly.

 

What Can We Control?

Yes, things could be simpler, i.e. less complex, if we weren’t in a situation where we were managing the family relationships along with the business/financial/ownership responsibilities. 

Many families eventually get to a stage where this becomes too big of a burden and then decide to separate who owns what or how things are managed, because the complexity outweighs the benefits.

Those situations are especially unfortunate when that result comes from the fact that the people involved were simply unable to avoid some of the complications that they somehow added to the situation.

 

Man-Made Complications

My “A-Ha” moment as I considered how to write about these two words came when I realized, while in the shower, that complexity is a reality that we need to accept and live with, while complications are things that we can and should work to minimize.

By my logic here, you can’t even truly simplify complexity, since it “is what it is”.

What we can do is to try to make sense of the inherent complexity of a situation by using models to map out what’s going on, so that everyone can get a better understanding of what the complex systems are, and how they’re inter-related.

Tagiuri and Davis’s Three Circle Model does this extremely well, and has been successfully used for this for over 40 years now. 

See Three Circles + Seven Sectors = One A-Ha Moment

The Law of Unintended Consequences

Families who’ve managed to stay together through the complexity inherent in co-owning assets together over generations have succeeded because they managed to keep things as simple as possible, since they’re already complex enough.

See Stopping the Disintegration of Family Wealth

Those who cannot manage to keep the wealth of the family together often fail because someone introduced some extra complicating factors into the situation.

Ironically, this is often done with the best of intentions by someone, but thanks to the law of unintended consequences, these moves sow the seeds of the family’s ultimate demise.

 

Two Main Instigators Come Up

One of the ways the complications show up is when one family member has what I playfully refer to as a “superiority complex”.

You know the type, I’m sure. They feel like they have earned or simply deserve an outsized portion of the wealth or their say over it. 

This can lead to actions designed to allow them to benefit from this, and when other family members react negatively, things go south in a hurry.

The situation was already complex enough, but now it’s too complicated.

The other major way to overcomplicate things is to focus way too much time and effort on the financial wealth, at the expense of the human, intellectual, and social capital of the family.

Well-meaning professionals propose complicated structures designed to minimize taxes and/or limit people’s control over things, and the additional complications this introduces is enough to kibosh everything within a few years.

Enterprising families are already complex enough. Don’t make things even more complicated.

 

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On Patience and Impatience in Family Transitions

Both Are Needed, But Not in the Same Places

So many issues that families face in transitioning their wealth from one generation to the next come down to questions around timing.

You’ve got people from different generations, so you automatically have different realities relating to their current life cycles, which naturally make them feel certain urgencies that others might not appreciate.

Somehow things often go better after everyone has had a chance to share their viewpoints in ways that others can suddenly understand, but that doesn’t happen often enough, so let’s talk about that here.

 

The Bigger Picture: An Upstream View

Most of my blogs are “evergreen”, meaning that they can be consumed at any point in time, because they don’t depend on current events or seasons.

I’ve diverged a bit this year, thanks to the pandemic that had me refocusing topics this past Spring, and lately there’s been lots of focus on my summer weeks at my cottage.

One advantage to a nine-hour drive to my cottage is the time it affords me to listen to audiobooks, which are my favourite way to make the drive productive and enlightening.

On my last drive there, I listened to Upstream, The Quest to Solve Problems Before They Happen, by Dan Heath.

It was great and I recommend it, because it actually gives some great perspective on Systems Theory, and an appreciation for how important it is to look at how things are connected.

 

The Time Element in Systems Theory

If this is feeling a bit like a déjà vu it might be because I wrote From Upstream to Downstream in the FamBiz a couple of months back, and there are only so many “stream” blogs one can write.

That blog concluded with my suggestion to get moving early on eventual transitions, and that segues nicely with this week’s message.

Towards the end of Upstream, Heath has a great line about where to be patient, and where to be impatient, which bring us right back to our timing issues.

He tells us to be:

 

       Patient for Outcomes, and Impatient for Actions

 

If you’re like me, you’ll want to pause the recording for a minute and make sure you got all of that.

Pre-Digested Wisdom

Well, this isn’t a recording, it’s a blog, so you don’t have to stop listening, rewind, grab a pen, and make sure you got it all, because I already did that work for you.

Plus, now I’m going to spell out the key take-away, which I’ll gladly do because Heath, who’s written and sold quite a few more books than I have, is saying something really important, and it also happens to fit right along with stuff I’ve been saying too.

Here’s the simplest reworking of this advice into my own words:

     “Hurry up and get started, but don’t be in a hurry to finish”

I’m reminded of a blog I wrote a couple of years ago, There Is No Destination, which was inspired by a quote I had recently read, “There is no destination, it’s ALL journey”.

 

Being Impatient for Actions

Procrastination is probably the biggest enemy of successful wealth transitions in families. Put simply, people wait too long to begin the work.

It’s funny because work itself is not usually something that families who’ve been successful in building a business are “allergic” to; they’ve typically got a strong work ethic, which is how they got to the point where they’ve accumulated enough wealth to make a difference in the lives of all family members.

I’ve stated this plenty of times, going back to my first book in 2014, SHIFT your Family Business, in which the word SHIFT is an acronym, where the “S” stands for Start!

It’s impossible to start too early.

 

Being Patient for Outcomes

Transitioning wealth is not an event, it’s a process.  And while some processes are better to rush through, this is one that is better when it takes longer.

The two (or three) generations need to take their time and incrementally move decisions and actions from the NowGen to the NextGen.

When you’ve started early, you give yourself time to change course, slow down as needed, and be flexible, (the F in SHIFT) without having to start from scratch.

 

Adjusting your Timing and Re-Calibrating

This is truly a process with no real end, because even after the elders have left this earth, their wisdom will remain, to be passed to successive generations.

And we should never be in hurry to finish that job.

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Challenging the Defiant Ones

Wordplay Rears Its Head Once More

Regular readers will recognize my penchant for engaging in interesting wordplay in this space whenever the opportunity presents itself.

Thanks for indulging me once again.

There’ll even be a “sidebar” bonus, because last week I didn’t have space to include another tidbit that fits into this category, and I hate to let a juicy bit of trivia slip by. 

 

A Client’s Defiant Daughter

This one begins with a coaching client of mine who was sharing a personal story with me (as clients typically do) about his daughter.

The young woman was being defiant, and they each stood their ground.  I’ll spare you the details of what happened for privacy reasons and since it’s still a work in progress (what isn’t?).

Let’s just say that her defiance became a focus of our discussion together.

It was funny because during our previous call, before a bit of a summer break, he was pleased with some of the progress he’d been making in his relationship with her.

I’d even given him some ideas around allowing her to choose the ways that she participated in certain family projects, rather than having Dad point her in the directions he preferred.

 

Playing the Translation Game

Neither of us actually used the word “defiant”, but it was certainly an adjective that could have applied to what he was relaying to me.

A few days later, when the word defiant came up, during a meditation recording of all places, a bell rang in my head (I mean a proverbial bell here, not the one that ended the meditation).

I thought of the noun, “defy” and a close and related French word, “défi”.

The English translation of the word “défi”, is challenge.

Ding, ding, ding.

 

If the Defiant One Challenges You….

So how should you react when a defiant one challenges you?

Inspired by “fighting fire with fire”, my conclusion is to challenge them back.

It isn’t even that far off from where I had him exploring with her a while back, letting her choose her own way to be involved.

Maybe all we need to add is a bit of a challenge to it, to encourage her to not only make it her own, but to really make the most of it and outdo herself.

 

Translation Sidebar

Last week, in Stuck in the Mud? Don’t Wait for “MayDay”, it pained me to not have space to include some more “bilingual trivia”.

Did you know that “MayDay” actually comes from the French “M’aider” (roughly “help me”)?

Likewise, the term “Pan Pan” that was also featured last week, also comes from the French “panne”, which is roughly a “breakdown” for example regarding one’s car (“mon auto est en panne”).

Hats off to any creatives who thought the “pan” in Pan Pan was about being in the pan just before going into the fire of “MayDay”. 

End sidebar.

What Do the Defiant Want?

Let’s get back to the matter at hand, i.e. finding appropriate ways to handle family members who are defiant.

First off, it may be worth taking a moment to think back to how we might have handled situations when we were their age.

This spring when many people had young adults return home unexpectedly, many of us got to live a situation that had both positives and negatives.

When my wife was less than thrilled with the reactions of our two homebound college students, I quickly reminded her that if I had been forced back home at their age, I might be a bit churlish too.

 

I’m Impressed. Please Continue.

I’ve shared with anyone who will listen how impressed I am with today’s young people. I’m hopeful for the future of our world, largely because I have faith in our young people to do a better job than those who are running things now.

For those of you who agree, and who are lucky enough to have young adults in your family, I think you should share that feeling with them.

“I’m Impressed” is something most people enjoy hearing.

“Please continue” to impress me, might just be the kind of challenge that will keep them moving forward.

It seems like something worth trying, and is clearly a Win-Win.

And it sure beats trying to deal with constant defiance.

There’s energy in defiance, and if you can harness it like a martial artist, maybe you can even make it work for you.

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Choosing your FamBiz Tour Guide

Preparing for an Important Family Voyage

Regular readers know that I have a certain penchant for metaphors, so this week’s blog post won’t be too much of a surprise.

Having previously shared my frustrations with what people who do my kind of work should call ourselves, (eg. “No Dad, Coaching Is NOT ‘Helping Losers’”) we’re back here once again, if only to demonstrate that we’re no closer to a resolution.

But let’s just say that the word “guidance” has always had a nice ring to it for me, so this week we’ll be talking about the value of a good tour guide.

And since families who own assets together have embarked on a long voyage together, I hope you’ll agree that my metaphor is apt.

 

 

“Coaching” Continues to Grow, Including On Me

It has taken me a few years, but the idea of referring to myself as a “coach”, first and foremost, is growing on me all the time. 

It probably has to do with the maturity of the industry and the fact that I recently completed my long delayed coaching certification process.

That process included many interactions with lots of different coaches who ply their talents and expertise is a vast array of fields.

Very few of them specialize in working with families who are either in business together or who own significant assets together.

This really is a niche inside a niche.

 

A Good Coach Can Help Anyone

It is true that a good coach can help anyone, assuming that person is up for it, and not afraid of doing the work.

There are plenty of examples of coaches who know little about any particular domain who have been able to help their clients make great strides despite the coach’s own lack of experience in their client’s particular field.

Going back to the idea of the coach as a guide, I think you’ll agree that someone who’s familiar with the terrain that the client is coming from, the ability of the coach to “get” the client, and truly understand what they are experiencing, is much greater.

A drawing of a tour guide leading a group

That NYC Tour Guide Knew Her Stuff

Imagine visiting New York for the first time and going for a tour. You get lucky and end up with the most personable and knowledgeable tour guide you could ever have hoped for.

So next year, when you decide to go on an African safari for your vacation, would you try to find that tour guide and ask her to lead that “tour” too?

I wouldn’t think so.

When I shared this metaphor with a colleague recently, she noted that she would never go see a male OB/GYN for the same basic reason.

 

“OMG! You Understood in Five Minutes”

I’m flashing back to a phone call I got last year from someone who had heard me as a guest on a podcast and who then felt compelled to contact me (that’s ALWAYS nice!).

As she related her situation, where she had recently been promoted over her brother, I noted some of the challenges that I guessed she was now dealing with, and she said “Oh my God, you understood in five minutes what nobody else seems to understand!”

Family members who work together have interdependent relationships that are unlike those of family members who do not, it really is as simple as that.

But as I always say, simple is not the same as easy, in fact, in cases like this, it is anything but easy.

 

Coaching Is Not Just a Skill

Learning to become a coach is something that just about anyone can do, but as with most such pursuits, there is a lot of “self-selection” bias, meaning that a group of coaches can often feel a bit too homogeneous. 

And while the type of people who are good at coaching can use their skills to be a great resource to just about anyone, there’s something about the “lived experience” that no amount of training can buy.

Some skills translate to any situation, but others are just part of who you are, based on what you’ve lived through.

 

Context Is Key

The “FamBiz Context” might be one name for it. Yes, every family is unique, and every family member lives it a bit differently.

But in the end, there are plenty of similarities when you look at the relationships in one family and contrast them with those in another.

Always go with the guide who knows the terrain, and the context.

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Social Capital in the FamBiz World

Social Capital in the FamBiz World

The Human Need for Connection

Sometimes I surprise myself with a blog topic that feels like I’ve written about before, but discover that it’s still virgin territory.  

This is one such post.

Given that most of my coaching sessions with clients is spent on their relationships with other people, usually family members, and that my latest book is specifically about family systems theory, I’m actually a bit shocked that I haven’t yet addressed the subject of “social capital” in my blog.

Maybe it’s just a term whose time has come.

 

My Personal Social Capital “A-Ha”

Last week in An Uplifting Week, at Sea Level, we looked at the recent RendeZoom I had attended with a few hundred colleagues, who I affectionately called “my tribe”.

And even though this annual event was held virtually this year, I still felt very close to many of the people who attended with me.

That whole experience put the idea of “social capital” onto my radar, and yet I wasn’t sure that the term was well understood. 

I mentioned it to my coach, and even she wasn’t sure what I meant when I noted that I felt I had lots of social capital.

Sometimes you find inspiration in unexpected places, and when I searched Shutterstock for an image to accompany this post, entering “social capital” as the search term, I got a nice surprise; clearly I was not the only person who ever considered this term.

A Whole List of Sub-Topics

The image I chose contains a slew of ideas that make it pretty easy to get what I’m driving at: 

                    Belonging, Network, Participation, Trust, 

                    Engagement, Reciprocity, Values-Norms.

I think it’s simple enough to understand how in a large group of professional colleagues, especially in a “horizontal” field where many disciplines are represented, social capital can be important in maximizing what one can get out of being a member.

But where I really want to go with this is into individual families and their social capital, because there’s some good stuff to look at there too.

 

External Social Capital in Enterprising Families

Family business leaders, by virtue of their status and accumulated experience, naturally develop networks of people with whom they interact on a regular basis over the years.

These relationships are often based on trust, and that trust can and should be transitioned from one generation of the family to the next. 

This becomes one of the important assets that a family enterprise has, and smart, proactive families leverage this social capital, which often becomes one of the key advantages that family businesses have.

 

What About WITHIN the Family?

But as much as this social capital, from the family to the outside world, can be something worth cultivating, I want to talk about an often neglected area of “social capital”, namely the relationships within the family itself.

Not every family member is cut out for this role, but this field now has enough research behind it to make it clear that a “family champion” is almost always present in families who manage to keep the family together over a series of generations.

There’s a certain amount of intentional effort that must be given to the roles of engaging the whole family in the constant, long-term pursuit of its longevity as a cohesive unit.

 

Different Leadership Styles Come into Play

When you think about family businesses and their leadership, it’s natural to think about the person at the head of the business.  

The leaders I’m talking about here are different, but at some points in the evolution of the family the roles can both be held by one person.

The “Family Leader” is the one who undertakes the role of connecting with the family members, whether or not they are involved in the operations of the business.

Their concern spans areas like Belonging, Participation, and Engagement, and these leaders are constantly building Trust along the way.

 

Proactive, Intentional Steps, Over and Over

Such family leaders are very much like a “team captain” in sports, often demonstrating quiet leadership as much thanks to “who they are” as to “what they do”.

But what they do, while often hard to describe because there are so many intangibles, is keep the family working together, because they know deep down how important that is for the greater good of everyone.

A family’s legacy is as much about people as it is about assets, after all.  See Is Your Continuity PAL in Danger?

And that’s all about social capital.

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An Uplifting Week, at Sea Level

Every summer since 2014 around this time, I get to write one of my favourite and yet most difficult blog posts.

That’s because in late July every year, the Purposeful Planning Institute holds it annual conference, called Rendez Vous.

As you probably guessed, there was no “in person” version this year, so instead, I’m now coming down off the high of “RendeZoom”!

The experience was different, of course, as I didn’t have to fly to Denver this time, and instead got to enjoy it from my cottage near the Northumberland Strait in New Brunswick.

 

So Much Great Content

What makes this particular blog so hard to write is that there’s just WAY too much great content that I want to share, and even though we weren’t physically together this time, that didn’t change.

We also had a lot of the same “magnetic PPI vibe” that attendees are familiar with, but that is sometimes hard to describe to those who have yet to experience it.

There were some new ways to interact that were designed to replicate the in-person feelings, which is tough to do, but in many ways the experience was even richer in other ways, so on balance, there was not much lost in the “translation” to the virtual world.

 

A Random Highlight Reel

One way to overcome the difficulty in capturing a week’s worth of learning is to just look over my notes and share some of the things that stuck with me and that I think are worth sharing here.

It’s a lot more “random” than most of my blogs, yet it still feels useful and is definitely heartfelt.

Speaking of heartfelt, I’d invite anyone whose path I crossed during RendeZoom to please follow up with me to deepen our connection, as I’d love to chat more over a one-on-one Zoom call.

The week gave me a new appreciation for my “social capital” and I’m trying to find even more ways to keep “sharpening that saw” of mine.

Likewise, if you’ve never attended, and are intrigued by what PPI has going on, please reach out for a call too.

Balloon in the sky

Steve’s Top 7 Take-Aways

  • Motivational Interviewing

I knew very little about the area of “motivational interviewing”, so the breakout session on the subject was something I approached with intrigue. 

What I discovered is that it feels like a close cousin of coaching and that there are skills and techniques I can learn from it that will make me an even better listener, coach, and facilitator.

  • Inspired by Gandhi 

My friend Jamie Forbes shared some very personal stories about his life and I applaud his courage for doing so (and he was from alone in this regard!).

But I need to thank him for reminding me of this Gandhi quote:

“Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony”

Amen.

  • Facilitation from Many Angles

Matt Wesley capped off the week with a discussion about the many facets of facilitation, many of which resonated with me and how I see myself in that role.

From being the one who brings calm, to integrating the family’s stories, to connecting the dots for them, there are many ways we help bring out their best.

  • How to “Move Forward”

Ian McDermott once again graces my list this year, for simply reminding me that just trying to figure out how to “move forward” is often the best way to look at a challenging situation, whether personally or when working with clients.

  • Made for “These Times” 

I don’t remember whom to credit for this one, but thanks for the question “How are you MADE for these times as a _______?”

Still reflecting on this one…

  • From Entitlement to Expectations

In a discussion around the theme of entitlement, we ended up switching things around and instead focused on the parents and their need to clarify their expectations.

  • Building Bridges, or Building Boats

Matt Wesley again to close…

Sometimes it’s time to build a bridge, and sometimes it’s time to build a boat.

Thanks Matt, and everyone else who inspired me once again, it was another Rendez Vous to be remembered.

 

Rendez Vous 2021 – Somehow, Somewhere

It’s too early to say for sure that we’ll be back together in person in Denver next year, and I sure hope that will be realistic. 

No matter how or where, though, I know I will be back, and I’m looking forward to spending more quality time with my tribe.

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Key Prepositions for Business Families

By, For, With

Most people don’t give much thought to prepositions as they go through their day-to-day lives.

Of course, I’m not “most people”, and neither are you!

I recently noticed some places where these short words actually carry a lot of weight in the world of business families, and so I thought I’d share them here.

 

For the Family

Regular readers know that when I talk about family businesses, I typically move quickly over to the point of view of the business family, where “family” is the noun, and carries more importance.

So don’t be surprised that I lean towards thinking about doing things “for” the family.

 

By the Family

The main thing I typically emphasize when talking about doing things for the family, is that it always helps when those things are also done by the family.

Now just to be clear, there are actually two distinct important parts to my “by the family” mantra.

The first one is that something for the family ideally comes from within the family as opposed to coming from outside. Not that I have anything against families hiring outsiders to do some of the work with them.

As long as the outsiders aren’t doing that work for them, meaning that the outsider does it instead of them doing it themselves.

The second aspect is that it’s better when the work isn’t just done by one family member, but rather by a group.

If one person does all the work, you can’t really say it was done by the family.

 

Who Is the Outside Advisor there FOR?

Let’s get back to the idea of bringing in an outside person to work with you as a resource for some of this important and complex work.

You really all need to figure out who that advisor is there for.

If they were hired by one person, ostensibly to work for the family, there can be some difficulties going forward.

If they are working with the family, they need to be working for the family.

Some advisors really get this, in their brain and in their heart and in their spirit. Some others, well, not so much.

Please be on the lookout for this.

 

Can an Advisor Work for Just One Person?

Now we’re getting to a slightly different question. In the context we’ve been discussing, my thoughts are pretty clear as outlined above.

And, I’d also like to share with you some recent experiences where I have been successfully working with one single person from a business family.

The work I began a little over a year ago to get my coaching certification led me on a path to find some one-on-one clients to satisfy the minimum coaching hours for the program.

This also led to some eye-opening for me, about the power of this kind of relationship.

 

Changing a System

One of the first things we need to understand is that for a system, such as a family, to change, the change may very well come from a change in just one person, at the outset.

A single person who is a part of a system of people, can change the system, if they make a change and hold to their new way of being with the other members of that system.

Holding to that change can sometimes be difficult, because the other members of that system will try to force that person back to their old ways, in order to maintain the previous homeostasis, or equilibrium.

One way for a person to gain the strength to make and hold such changes, is for them to work with an outside coach.

 

Some Caveats

I’m sure you can see that this can get tricky, and can really only work well if both the coach and the individual client agree at the outset that they would be satisfied if their relationship never progressed further, such that the coach would eventually work with the entire family group.

If it’s seen as a “foot in the door” to a larger eventual arrangement, there’s a risk that the important work they can do will be rushed or not be done seriously.

 

With You, For You, For your Family

Getting back to our prepositions, a coach is such situations is there “with you” and “for you”.

The underlying assumption is that you are doing what you are doing “for your family”.

 

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The Art of Conversation: The Key to Family Communication

When listing problems that business families face, communication is usually one of the first things people mention. 

 

Because it’s seen as a “big” problem, many people think that it requires a “big” solution. 

I beg to differ.

“100 One-Minute Conversations”

The initial idea for this post came from something I saw online recently, that talked about “100 one-minute conversations”, which in most cases are a better way to go than just having one, long, 100-minute discussion.

I wish I’d saved it so I could credit the source, because Googling it didn’t help me solve the mystery.

In any event, it lines up nicely with some of the other things I’ve talked about before, notably here: The Dimmer Switch vs. the On/Off

 

Clearing Up Any Illusions

My favourite quote about communication is from George Bernard Shaw, “The biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place”.

Let me spell it out just in case you didn’t get it.  

The biggest problem for people communicating with each other is when the person who says something believes that the receiver heard and understood them, and they’re wrong, but they assume they’re right.

Why did I take the time to spell that out? 

Because if I continued this blog while assuming that you understood what I meant, but you didn’t, then I would have been committing the exact faux pas that I was trying to explain.

The Art of Conversation: The Key to Family Communication

Conversations as a Subset of Communication

Of course communication comprises much more than verbal discussions, which are in fact only a small fraction of the entire communication “platform” that any enterprising family uses.

These families need to share lots of information to remain united enough to properly manage the assets they own together.

But while everyone can see what’s written in a family newsletter or on their Facebook page, I contend that it’s in the smaller groups, and the quicker, more regular conversations, that the most important communication actually happens.

Yes, you need to have the big formal, structural communication platforms, but, and it’s a big but, if that’s all you have, then there’s a lot missing.

 

Heart to Heart

The simplest way to make this point is to consider the expression “Heart to heart”. 

What makes family businesses different from other businesses is the family element.  Plain old communication might be sufficient for “regular companies”, but for a family business, being owned and run by a family, there needs to be a lot more heart.

I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone talk about “heart to heart communication”, by I know I’ve heard people mention a “heart to heart talk”, or “heart to heart conversation”.

 

The (Lost) Art of Conversation

Speaking of expressions, we’ve all heard about the “art of conversation”, and I contend that in some ways all of the technology we’ve been using to communicate has made conversing together a bit of a lost art.

But here’s the good news, and I even just Googled it to make sure it makes sense.

You can get better at it, with practice. Yes, I just searched “do you practice art” to make sure, and I got plenty of hits.

Whether it’s playing music, or painting, or sculpting, one improves the more one practices their favourite art.

And so it is with conversations.

 

Small Groups, One-on-One

Conversations can happen all the time, mostly in small groups or even simply one-on-one situations.

They don’t necessarily have to be structured, scripted or planned in advance, and in reality, the more natural and free flowing they are, the better.

Sometimes the hardest thing about them is just making them happen, especially now that simply picking up the phone to call someone seems to rarely happen these days.

 

Conversations With Your Coach

One of my favourite ways of actually putting some structure to conversations is to have them be regularly scheduled.

I have a call over Zoom with my coach every week, and I have calls with my coaching clients typically every other week, which seems to work well.

Having things “on the calendar” might be the best way to make sure that you’re staying in touch enough.

 

Seven Years Later

Way back in 2013 I wrote Having Conversations, Not Just Communicating. And I guess it’s still just as valid today as it was back then.

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