Relationship at Work: How to Build & Repair Deep, Trusted Bonds at Work & Life | Dr. Carole Robin

You don't have to agree with me, but I have to feel fully heard. You might not agree with me, but you're going to have to suspend judgment and get beyond the judgment. If you care about us, then whatever the issue is has to become secondary and we have to become primary. And our relationship is what's got to matter more than the issue. Foreign.

Welcome to the Happiness Squad podcast. On today's episode, I sit down with the extraordinary Dr. Carol Robin, award winning teacher of interpersonal dynamics, also lovingly called touchy feely, co author of Connect Building exceptional relationships and one of the world's leading experts in helping leaders build trust, communicate effectively and lead with heart. We unpack in today's episode. What makes a relationship exceptional, not just functional. Why emotions at work are not a liability, but a leadership superpower and how to repair trust when it breaks. Carol walked us through game changing practices from the if you really knew me check in to the 15% rule and the three realities model of feedback that can transform how teams connect, collaborate and flourish. Whether you're leading a company or just trying to show up more fully in your own life, Carol's insights are a powerful reminder that exceptional relationships aren't reserved for the lucky. They are built one small, courageous act at a time. Carol, I am so excited to have you on our podcast today. Thank you for spending time with us.

Well, likewise. I am thrilled to be here with you. And as I was mentioning before we got started, it's very clear you've done your homework and it's always a pleasure to work with somebody who has.

Well, of course, I'm a huge fan. As you know. I want to just start. You know, you cover a topic as we were discussing that is so relevant today. It was relevant when the book got published. Obviously, it's been a core part of your work. You're, you know, a big chunk of your life's work. But I think it's never, it's. This is more relevant today than ever. And the book is on the topic of relationships and really not just building relationships, but exceptional relationships with family, friends and colleagues. So bring that to life a little bit. Carol, why you feel, especially at work and in our life today, relationships are the key to flourishing.

Well, you know, there's a reason that the course on which the book is based is taught at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. It's not hidden away somewhere in a psych department. And that's because the fundamental premise is that people do business with people. Not, you know, yes, ideas matter and money matters. And strategy matters. They all matter. But in the end, we do business with people. So unless we get the people part right, we're going to be somewhat limited in how successful we're going to be. Plus 50 years of this course being taught at Stanford. And by the way, I didn't invent it. A lot of people think I invented it because I became known as the queen of Touchy Feely, but I didn't invent it. I'm not that old. I'm old, but I'm not that old. But what became obvious in all the reports from all the alums over the decades is that being interpersonally competent, having the skills to develop relationships that are robust and functional and exceptional is actually a determinant of professional success and personal success. By the way, because I get as many calls and emails and visits from former students who. And now participants from Leaders in Tech, which I co founded with. I just became a CEO. I owe it all to you. I raised my third round. I owe it all to you. We'd expect that. But I get, I'm pretty sure your class and now your book just saved my marriage. And those are the ones that make me feel even more thrilled that we took the time and the energy to put this out into the world so that you don't have to be, you don't have to go to the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University to learn all this stuff.

Yeah, no, I love that. In fact, as I was sharing, I think I plan to use this book over the next 12 weeks with our own team. You know, we've got about seven people now and literally, you know, every week read a chapter or two, do the exercises and really use that to build a more connected team.

So, yeah, I hope you'll keep me posted on how. On how that went.

Absolutely. So tell me, you know you already shared this powerful story. Right. Of what you've been hearing feedback on from people who've done it, both in the personal and professional life. Can you share a story of a leader, you know, who truly, you know, use. They saw a massive transformation in their team.

Yeah.

When they started focusing on relationships.

Yeah. This is the one that comes to mind for me most immediately. And there is a little recency effect here is. So after I left Stanford, I started Leaders in Tech. I co founded Leaders in Tech, which basically brings the whole Carol Robin, touchy feely curriculum to Silicon Valley Tech leaders now, beyond Silicon Valley, but I had a CEO founder from my program from Leaders in Tech who wrote to me not that long ago Maybe a year ago, he'd gone through our program and he said, carol, I just had to share this with you. So one of the things that he had learned in the program was an activity called if youf really Knew Me, which is basically, we start our groups that way. And so he decided to start his staff meetings with his direct reports that way, with 10 minutes, with each person taking 90 seconds or two minutes to say, if you really knew me right now, you would know. And then, and then he had. He had shared the vocabulary of feelings, which is core to the. That's called touchy feely for a reason. We can get back to all that, but they had to include feeling words. And he said, and he had started this team up, restarted this team up during the pandemic, and they remained remote. And so they had never met in person. And he called me to say that one of his direct reports, a gentleman had just called him and said, you know what? I have never felt this connected to all the people that I work with, and I've never even met them in person.

Wow.

So that would be an example of the way this can translate into action and then into results.

And so he starts his every meeting every week with that question. If you really knew me right now, you would know.

You would know.

A 90 second share.

At leaders in Tech, we start every one of our meetings that way when we're having a staff meeting. And it's not a super long thing, you know, there are six of us, we each take a minute and a half, maybe two, we time it. And if you really knew me right now, you would know that I'm thrilled to be on this podcast. Very few things are more important to me than to share this work and let people know that these resources exist. If you really knew me, you'd know that I believe I was put on this planet to help people learn how to connect. If you really knew me, you'd know that. I don't think that's ever been more important than right now. That's what it sounds like.

Yeah.

And of course, once you get to know each other, then it's like if you really knew me right now, and then it's an opportunity to tell people what's going on for you right now in the moment.

Well, I'll match that. Carol, back to you. If you really knew me right now, you would know that how excited I am about this conversation with you. You know, our framework Pearl relationships is one of the fourth element in our PERL model. And I'm so excited because Relationships are at the heart of flourishing. And relationships right now are under so much pressure. Relationships between colleagues. Relationships between colleagues and bosses. Relationships between employees and company. Relationships between employees and customers and suppliers. Given all the tariff thing that's happening. Right. How much do I push back? How much do I pass forward? Yes. And relationships between, you know, people and their families and loved ones, when you carry all that stress.

Political divide. Absolutely.

Or different sides of the political divides in community. And I'm holding all of that. And I am so excited about this conversation. Yeah. So thank you.

Well, thank you.

I love that you call out not just build relationships, but exceptional relationships.

Yeah.

So talk to me a little bit about what defines an exceptional relationship rather than just getting along.

So it's useful to think about relationships as existing on a continuum. And at one end of the continuum is contact and no connection. Those are your thousands of Facebook friends. At the other end of the continuum is what David and my co author and I came to call exceptional. And it's what we saw over and over again happen and get created in this course that we taught interpersonal dynamics, AKA touchy feely. And as we started to analyze what is it that happens as a relationship moves along this continuum, by the way, it turns out that along the way you get to robust and functional. So even that is better than contact and no connection.

Yep.

And in fact, it takes a lot of work and effort to get to exceptional. And we're not suggesting you. The goal should be to turn every one of your relationships into something exceptional that's A, impractical and B, unnecessary. But it turns out that once you know the skills and competencies to get there, you know how to get to at least robust and functional.

Yes.

And so a relationship that's moved along the continuum and gotten at least there has a number of characteristics. The first three have to do with being more known to each other. I allow myself to be known by you, you allow yourself to be known by me. And we trust each other. We trust that our disclosures won't be used against us. And there are some skills that are attached to that. And the second three characteristics have to do with basically honesty and productive conflict. We are honest with each other. We keep it real, so to speak. We deal with conflict productively. And I'm going to underscore, deal with rather than run away from. And we're invested in each other's growth. And when you have all of those characteristics, you've moved along the continuum to at least robust and functional. And to the extent that you Have a lot of depth to each of those. You've gone into exceptional territory, but you've at least gotten some of the way there.

You've gotten the way there, and I love it. Right. So in our work, we talk a lot about really knowing the full iceberg of the person rather than just making sense of them on their behaviors. We don't even inquire into the thoughts that inform the behavior. Forget about the fears, the needs that are belief systems that are driving them.

The mental models we have. Absolutely Right.

So I love that notion of really looking at the depth. And then the second piece is this is the other part about exceptional that I loved. What you're just highlighting is it's not just about getting along and not actually having conflicts, but it's about having them the right way we use the word constructive conflicts. How do we actually have. Right. Conflicts on topic, not people. But I. So it's so cool around these two elements. And hence it makes sense that you can't invest the time to really know everyone and so you have to make choices. Right, Exactly. But the skills should help you, as you highlight, in getting to even robust functional relationships with those you work with. You should at least have those. Right? You should at least have those. So, look, as you said, you didn't invent touchy feely, but you are the queen of touchy Philly. And touchy feely is legendary. So for those who haven't experienced it, give a little bit of details around that course, why it's so transformative. Yeah, share a bit on that.

So the course is actually called Interpersonal Dynamics. Nope. You know, very few people remember that's what the course is called because the students call it touchy feely. Touchy feely. Emphasis on the feeling, not the touchy. And I say that because it turns out that feelings and emotions are a core element and of building relationships, sharing those, understanding those, understanding them in yourself, becoming aware of them in yourself, and then, you know, allowing someone else to know that that's how you're feeling. Those are all really, really important elements of this. Moving down this continuum. The. The pedagogy of the course. The way the learning happens in the course is through something called T groups. The T does not stand for therapy. It stands for training. And they were invented a long time ago, I want to say 70 years ago or something, at a place called NTL Labs. They're very difficult to explain to somebody who's never been in one. It's like trying to explain skiing to someone who's Never seen snow. Very hard to understand what a T group is. It's a learning laboratory, essentially. And the idea is that you bring 12 students together in this learning laboratory and their only goal, and they each have learning goals, and their learning goals are different from each other. Because maybe I'm learning how to be, to leave a little more space for other people to speak up, because it's very easy for me to speak up. Maybe you're learning how to get in there a little sooner with your ideas and your thoughts and not hold back so long. So how great that we find ourselves in the same interdependent learning situation. Because I can't work on my learning goal unless you work on yours. So the learning happens in these learning laboratories. And what ultimately is learned. Yes, people learn how to give feedback in ways that are much more likely to be effective and productive. Yes, people learn how to have more productive conflict. Yes, people learn how to, how to manage the dynamics of disclosure. They learn a lot about feelings. But what they ultimately learn is they learn how to learn about others. And one of the most fundamental lessons is what it takes for me to connect with you and for you to trust me and for you to be influenced by me may be different than what is going to take the person sitting right next to you, because, you know, it's not a one size fits all. And so what they learn is they learn what builds trust, what creates mistrust, what builds influence, what creates care, you know, and what does care look like? And it looks very different for you than it looks for somebody else. And that's what's so powerful for them. In the meantime, I like to say every interaction with another human being is an opportunity to learn about yourself. It's an opportunity to learn about them, and it's an opportunity to learn about interpersonal dynamics. So imagine a quarter long class where that is all that is happening. Interactions with 12 other human beings. You're learning a lot about yourself, about them, and about interpersonal dynamics.

Yeah, and what I love about that, Carol, is you're not just learning in the traditional sense. Right. Somebody's talking at you, you're reading a book, you're listening to a podcast. You are learning through practice.

Exactly. In fact, T groups are the purest form of experiential learning.

Yeah, I love that. And I think I also love this notion of there is. Everybody is practicing their own, you know, how different than one size fits all trainings that are part and parcel of learning and development in organizations.

Absolutely right.

90%. It's the same content in the same way. And everybody needs to have this.

Yes, yes. Well that's limited in my humble opinion with regard to that.

So I love that. I think it's almost an invitation to be able to use this because it is also a meaningful time investment. It's a quarter. So how can you find the people who can benefit the most with this? Put them together now? Look, everybody can, but I think there will always be some who can potentially benefit more than the others or they are prioritizing this learning for them as the foundation for success.

That's right, Ashish. And in fact that's what we found with Leaders in Tech, which is a program that people applied for CEO founders apply for and now they don't have to be CEO founders. We've got some offerings for executives and management that's below the CEO founder level. But yes, there's a self selection to people who want to invest in themselves in service of being better leaders, being more effective leaders and building more higher performing organizations.

Amazing. So you talk about these three realities, Intent, behavior and impact. Talk to me a little bit about why this is so powerful for feedback and growth.

Well, let's back up for a moment. The three realities are. In any interaction between two people, there are three realities. There's what's going on for me.

Yep.

I know all that. There's whatever I do. So what's going on for me is reality number one. Whatever I do is reality number two. Whatever impact that has on you is reality number three.

Yep.

At any point in time, each of us only has access to two of those realities. I know what's going on for me and what I've done. You know what I've done and how it impacted you. Two out of the three, until we start more deliberately and intentionally sharing, you share what the impact was on you and I share what the intent was behind my saying or doing something. So most people, and we talk about a metaphorical net as a net existing between reality number, between my behavior and the impact it had on you. So I know that I'm speaking right now, that I'm trying to be clear that I'm hoping to be inspirational, that I'm hope or at least generate a little bit of interest. I know what I'm saying, we both know that. But I have no idea whether or not I'm being effective and I have no idea whether or not you're feeling more drawn or less drawn to the material, more likely to go look at the book or less likely to go look at the book. More likely to invest your time, less likely. So I don't know any of that until you tell me.

Yep.

Now, when it comes to feedback, because when we give feedback poorly, that's when we create defensiveness. But if we use the model of the three realities and the net, when we give feedback and we stay on our side of the net, we are less likely to create defensiveness. So, for example, instead of saying, this is an example, I think it's an example I use in the book Many, many, many years ago. Cause my husband is not this person anymore. But many, many years ago, he would come home and he would collapse on the chair, and he'd pick up a newspaper, and he'd start reading. And I'd been home with two little kids, and I'd be desperate for adult interaction. And I would come running in and saying, oh, my God, you're home. You won't believe what happened today. And what he would do is he'd pick up the newspaper and say. So I would say, you're not listening. And then he would say, yeah, I am. You're all worked up because you went to that new nursery. And I'd say, how can you be so insensitive? How can you not care? All of those are examples of being over the net. You're not listening. I'm not in his head. I don't know whether or not he's listening or not. How can you not care unless he says, frankly, I don't care. I don't know whether he cares or not. I'm making an attribution or I'm imputing a motive. How can you be so insensitive? I'm labeling. None of those things are feedback done. Well, I think I'm giving him feedback. But if I learn to stay on my side of the net and say, honey, when I speak to you, and I get no response except a grunt. That's reality number two. Anybody watching a video would say, that's what happened. Carol spoke, Andy grunted. And when you do respond, the only thing you do is make no eye contact. And there's an affectless regurgitation of what I just said. Also what happened in reality number two. And when you do that, I don't feel heard. I don't feel heard. I'm entirely on my side of the net. You can't say, yeah, you do. And when.

Yeah, because you're not saying. You're not hearing me. You're saying, I don't feel heard.

I don't feel heard. Exactly. So the minute I own my reaction to his behavior, I'm less likely to create defensiveness. And then I get to say. And I'm telling you this because. Because this is an important element of a feedback exchange. Why am I telling you this? My intent in telling you this is that when I don't feel heard, I feel distanced. And when I feel distanced, I feel sad. And I also can't be here for you in the way that I want to be. Now, isn't that better than. You're not listening to me.

Absolutely. You know, Carol, I am. I'm smiling because we have a model we use. I picked up at McKinsey in my. You know, this is something we were taught very early when you joined as associates, and I now use that with my clients to, you know, in teams where you've so beautifully, in human language, articulated the model. So the model literally is called the oils. Model O stands for observation, which is objective, not subjective.

Right.

That's.

That's the data that's real.

It's your number two reality. This is what I observed. Anybody should be able to observe that. If it is not something that can be observed, then that's my kind of interpretation. Right. It's not objective. I stands for impact. And this is the invitation to stay on your side of the neck. The impact on me is this. Right. You show up late. The impact on me is I feel that, you know, it throws off the meeting.

Ah, but you see. Wait, I'm gonna stop you. I feel that it throws up a feel off. The meeting is not a feeling.

I can say I feel. I get thrown off.

Exactly. Or I feel worried or I feel thrown off or I feel distracted or.

I love that.

Now you. Now you've. That's why it's called touchy feely, because feelings are such an important part of that.

Yeah.

And when you say I feel that or I feel like. First of all, it's grammatically impossible to express a feeling after that word. I feel that angry. I feel that disappointed. I feel like sad. You can't.

In English, I feel emotional.

Insert feeling word. And there's a discipline to that, but it has a very different impact.

So that's beautiful. Right. So that's your reality number. The first reality of, like, my reality. And then we always insert a pause. And that's what the L stands for, which is to listen to the third person ask them the question of what's going on.

I love that. Because part of our model is don't forget inquiry. When you're giving somebody feedback, which is. It's easy to just think, bleh. You did all this stuff. I've got all these opinions, I got all these feelings about it. But you know, you might want to ask. Cause I was like, what's going on for you? Stuff. I've got all these opinions, I got all these feelings about it. But you know, you might want to ask. Cause I was like, what's going on for you?

Exactly. I had this play out with a client of mine who had this story about this person always showing up late.

Yes.

And quote, unquote, always being late. All he had was one meeting every week that this person showed up late. He didn't know that he is always late.

Right.

You are always late. Like based on what? Like one hour a week. But he also had the story that because you didn't respect me or you didn't think what I'm doing matters.

Right.

And that pause and asking the other person what's going on, you know, opened up the real problem. The real problem was this was an in person meeting just before this was another meeting with somebody else this person reported to that was in another building. It was physically impossible for him to show up to this meeting when there is 15 minutes separating the two places.

Yes. Yes.

Right. God forbid if that meeting ran over. And so then the last part is S which is solutioning. Now that we know the real situation now we can develop a solution together. I can push my meeting back. I can make it. You can join in virtually. I can reach out to that other person and say, can you move your meeting? I can move it to a different day versus me just giving you feedback saying you don't care and I don't think this is gonna go good for you.

Perfect. Because we would say the objective of giving somebody constructive feedback is to move into problem solving. Not to change them, not to make them wrong or bad, not to make them feel bad, but to move into problem solving.

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I love that. Three realities. One, two, three. You're so clearly articulated. What's going on with you? What are you observing? How am I behaving? What are the behavior, how the other person is behaving. Right. So how am I behaving? What am I noticing? And then the third is what's going on for them? What's going on for them. Thank you. Very, very cool. I want to shift to another part of the book around which really this idea in connect. By the way, here's the book. I really encourage leaders to get this copy and read it with your teams. Do the exercise, take the quarter. It'll have such an impact. So the idea I want to pick up on, Carol, is this 15% rule that you talk about. So tell us about that and how that works and why it's such a game changer. It's.

It's very popular. So when we talk about allowing ourselves to become more known, which of course involves disclosure and vulnerability, or we, or we talk about giving somebody feedback and letting them know that some especially constructive feedback, something they're doing is not working for us, that feels risky. And so one. So the level of risk can vary, but it feels risky at some level most of the time. And so the question becomes, well, how do you decide? How do you decide how much risk to take and who to take it with? So we all have a comfort zone. Think about three concentric circles, a comfort zone where you don't think twice about what you say. And then the outermost circle is the danger zone where you can't imagine ever saying this to this person. But there's this circle in the middle which is really important, which is what we call the zone of learning. So it's somewhere inside the danger zone, because if you're too freaked out, you're not going to learn anything. But it's outside the comfort zone because you don't learn anything new unless you actually step outside your comfort zone. But when we first came up with those three circles, the students used to say, but, Carol, how do I know that the minute I step outside my comfort zone, I'm not in my danger zone? You know, how do I know? I've stayed in my learning zone. So we came up with the idea of 15%. Step a little bit outside your comfort zone. You'll know it. You'll feel it in your body. If nothing else, you know, you'll feel a little uncomfortable, but you won't feel freaked out. And if I step 15% outside my comfort zone, with you and then see what happens. And then maybe you step 15% outside your comfort zone with me, and that goes well. We've redrawn the comfort zone between the two of us to being a little bit bigger, and then we can go 15% beyond that. And that's how we learn and grow and deepen relationships. We don't go from zero to a hundred in 2.3 seconds.

Yeah. It is such a beautiful application. Right. Of this comfort zone and the terror zone and this thing in the middle where growth happens. Exactly. Right. There's this beautiful quote I'm reminded of, as I hear you, which is if you want to discover new lands, you can't discover that if you never want to lose sight.

Ah, yes. Nice.

Right. You have to be comfortable losing sight. Exactly. For you to see something else, even if it's just crossing Lake Michigan. Right, right.

A little bit. Just a little bit. Just a little bit losing sight for a little bit. For a little bit. For a little while. Not for weeks.

But I also like the. The two builds there of what you just said. Number one, how do I know where you'll feel it?

Yes.

Right. And we know what terror feels like. I know what terror feels like. When I was about to jump off the bungee, my first bungee thing, that was the only one that I ever did. I never did it again. But also. Right. So we know. We feel it somatically. We feel it in our body. So just you enough that you are a little uncomfortable but not freaking out.

Exactly.

And then I also love this idea that for those that you want to build exceptional relationships or even get to robust, it behooves you to, through continuous experimentation and practice, grow that zone.

Exactly.

Because otherwise we're not growing. We're stagnant.

Exactly. Bingo. And by the way, just because we are in a good place right now doesn't mean we're exactly the same person a year from now.

Yeah.

So maybe. Maybe we got to a place where we were in a really great relationship, and then one of us has changed a little bit. Unless we continue working at it. We're not static. Human beings are not static. We're works in progress. Every one of us is a work in progress.

So, Carol, I get it, and I think. I'm sure people get it. Tell me about some of the challenges you hear from as people try and put this into practice or, like, help us. Basically, I'm asking get our listeners to go from I know it to actually doing it. Is that another ingredient there?

Well, it's a great question. Because it's not easy. It requires discipline and commitment. It's not going to just. And every single time you try it, it's not going to work perfectly. Sometimes human beings are unpredictable. But if you go into it with a spirit of adventure and experimentation, it's endlessly fascinating.