Joel Silverstone argues that feedback conversations fail because we act poorly, using the wrong tone and body language. Stress hormones and shallow breathing turn good intentions into clenched interrogations. He borrows three practices from acting: set a relationship-focused intention, use "yes, and" to stay collaborative, and regulate your breath and posture to keep calm and lower cortisol.
Chapters
All right, so you are in a difficult conversation or you're giving feedback and it's not going well. It's probably because your tone of voice, your choice of words, your body language is giving you away. You're not such a great actor. In fact, your acting sucks. Why are you acting like you care, acting like you're interested? That's bad acting, when really your intention is about building trust and getting to dialogue. So this is what I'd like you to do. I'd like you to think of someone that you have to give feedback to. I want you to think of that person, the situation. I'd like you to think of the outcome. You got it? The slides are a little bit off. So, our first reaction to an event is gonna be emotional. And those emotions is what's gonna flood us. It's gonna impair our ability to think straight. And so, what happens next is that that fight or flight, as we just saw a few seconds ago, our cortisol is elevated 3 times higher. And when it's elevated that 3 times higher, we believe that we are smiling when we give feedback, but all the other person sees is a clenched jaw. So, we can do this. We're going to take 2. We're going to borrow from the world of acting, and now we're up to speed. It's our mind, breath, and body. So, first thing that an actor must do, their job is actually— their intention is to move that other actor. What we want to do is we want to have an intention. We want to have a purpose when we're giving feedback, a roadmap. Where we get stuck is that we get focused on an objective. I want to change this person. And then you become an interrogator. And you start asking questions like, don't you think that? And so really, our intention, you have to ask yourself this, what is your intention? What is it you really want from that relationship? To focus on the issue, not the person. To focus on the future, not the past. Or to believe that feedback is about the continuous improvement, and that people want to be their best that they can be. So, if you go back to being objective, then you do what bad actors do, which is they force it. When bad actors can't feel it, they force the emotion, and they And you become forceful. You try to manipulate where you are trying to go. What you want to do is that you want to be able to listen. Listen to make sure that the other person feels understood. And also, if you're going to do that, you're going to listen for accuracy, not assumptions. And borrow from the world of improvisation, which is yes, and. And yes, and is about being collaborative. It means that you are not dismissing the idea, that you are open to the idea, and you're not judging it. Because in the end, you want to make that other person look good, or in feedback, make that person feel bigger, not smaller. And try this exercise. Take the pressure off of yourself and switch pronouns. So in other words, look at yourself in giving this feedback as in the third person. So, Joel is going to be more collaborative, as an example. And we talked about breath. So it's really important that you breathe, because your oxygen is going to affect your brain. Your brain needs 20% of the oxygen. If it doesn't get enough oxygen, it affects your tone of voice, your choice of words, your body language. So we're going to do this all together. Get ready. We are going to breathe in for 3. Here we go. 1, 2, 3. And exhale for 5. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. And you'll hear this. It also goes into your voice. So when we are not breathing, our voice is up here. When we're breathing, our voice is down here. And now we'll have our Zen moments, our body language. So relax your forehead. Drop your shoulders. And most importantly, stop clenching your buttocks. Final tip here is, let me ask you this. When you're really stuck, is what made you smile today? So when you're really, really stuck, and you can't get into character, think of that moment that genuinely made you smile. In this case, it may not be perfect. It may be full of mud. That's OK. That's your good moment. So think about that moment that makes you smile. Because the payoff of being genuine and not doing bad acting is that the other person's oxytocin is going to feel cared for. If they feel cared for, When people feel cared for, their oxytocin goes up, which triggers their dopamine, which is motivational reward, which is, this feedback was good. I want more of this. This feels really good. And so, ladies and gentlemen, when your breath, your mindset, and your body is all aligned, lights, camera, action. You are now ready for your feature presentation. Thank you. Thank you.
