Silence is Deadly: Giving and receiving feedback around challenging topics

When people are silent about the subtle exclusions that happen in a workplace, the culture suffers. When people speak up but the feedback is ignored or met with defensiveness, the culture also suffers. In this episode, Michael Baran outlines some of the best practice guidelines for having productive conversations about these insidious interactions. He describes how to “call in” rather than “call out” someone when they inadvertently cause exclusion, a skill especially essential for potential allies who can speak up without the same risk as those directly affected. He provides several real-life examples of times that speaking up like this went poorly and times it went well, explaining that there is no simple one-size-fits-all way to do it but that we can all build these important skills.

When someone says something that makes you feel bad, how do you speak up? When you see something that might make someone else feel bad, how do you say something as a potential ally? When you get feedback about how you made someone feel bad, how can you respond in a productive way? 
In this episode of The Culture Advantage, host Michael Baran provides some best practice guidelines that organizations can use to create a speak up culture, where we can have challenging conversations that are productive, where resentments don’t build up, and where trust is built. 

Michael begins with a real example that happened to him, when a CEO committed a subtle act of exclusion in front of 70 global leaders. Michael was on stage at the time, speaking to the group at their annual retreat. What should he say in this situation? How should he say something in a “calling-in” way rather than a “calling-out” way?  

There is no one-size-fits-all way to do it. Nonetheless, Michael provides best-practice guidelines for speaking up in a productive way, either as the person experiencing the subtle act of exclusion or the person witnessing it and speaking up as a potential ally. He describes (1) pausing the action, even when we don’t know what to say, (2) assuming good intent, if the intent was actually good, (3) exploring the situation together rather than creating an adversarial interaction, and (4) explaining the impact, or the feelings involved.

Does this always go well? No, it doesn’t, and Michael describes a time when we followed all these guidelines and it did not go well. Where these interactions usually fall apart is in the way that the person getting the feedback responds. 
Because of that, Michael gives critical best practice guidelines for responding to feedback like this: (1) getting in the mindset of gratitude, (2) understanding the impact rather than defending intentions, (3) using the opportunity to learn and grow, and (4) following up with the person. Michael revisits the opening story, describing how that CEO responded well to Michael’s feedback. As the 70 leaders saw how he responded, they learned a powerful lesson about culture at this organization, and they learned how they could respond to feedback like this as well. 

This episode provides practical conversation skills that can be useful in situations like this or in any challenging conversation. It will be useful for people at all levels in an organization, and can also be used outside of the workplace to build trust and deepen connection with anyone.

Transcript

Silence is Deadly: Giving and receiving feedback around challenging topics

Is your company struggling, navigating through high turnover, toxic leadership, or a culture that's holding your team back from reaching its full potential? Well, you're not alone. So here's your host and guide, Michael Baran.

Michael Baran: Hello everyone. Welcome to the podcast. I am going to dive right in today with a story. Picture this, I am giving a talk to a group of around 70 leaders at a global organization. People flew in from all over the world for this annual retreat, and I'm giving a talk. I finish my talk and I'm taking questions.

The CEO asks the question, he raises his hand, asks the question. He was trying to [00:01:00] understand where the line is between somebody who's complaining and somebody who's speaking up, trying to actually improve things like creating a toxic atmosphere with complaining or speaking up to make things better.

But he didn't use the word complaining. He used a different word that starts with b. Okay. You get what I'm saying? So I'm up there on stage. I'm trying to figure out, should I say something here, what's the risk if I do, if I embarrass the CEO in front of all these leaders that report to him or work with him?

Some of the eyes of the people in the audience are looking at me like, what's he gonna do? What's he gonna say? What would you do in that situation? What would you do if you're leading a meeting and something happens where subtle act of exclusion like this is, it happens and you're. Trying to figure out what to do.

People are looking at you, wondering what you're gonna do. Okay? That's [00:02:00] the situation. That's what we're gonna talk about today. Responding to subtle acts of exclusion. And first, I wanna make sure that people know that sometimes exclusions aren't subtle at all, right? Sometimes they're overt, they're blatant, they're intentional.

That's a different sort of thing. And the response to that. Is usually to, you know, report this and you probably have procedures in your organization for how to report things. I mean, the reporting I know doesn't always lead to the outcome that is right. But. That's for another episode. If it's a subtle act of exclusion.

And remember last week I dove into what subtle acts of exclusion are. So if you haven't listened to that and you're so inclined, listen to that one first. And so this one today I am gonna talk about. What do you do? Right? So you can [00:03:00] imagine when a subtle act of exclusion happens, there's kind of three roles of people involved.

So there's the person that says or does the thing. There's the person that feels the exclusion or the group of people that might feel it. Sometimes they're not even in the room. By the way, I've been in lots of groups of men where subtle acts of exclusion against women were happening. And there wasn't a woman in the room even.

Right. And then of course, there's usually somebody who sees it happening or hears it happening and they could speak up and say something as a potential ally. And that's really important because usually the person that's experiencing the exclusion. Usually that person has more risk for speaking up about it.

And so an ally stepping up and taking on some of the risk or some of the discomfort is really important. Sometimes it's hard, right? It might feel hard, it might feel [00:04:00] uncomfortable sometimes. It also feels really good to stand with people. I am gonna give you some guidelines for speaking up. Now, recognizing that it doesn't always look the same, there's no one size fits all way to respond to a subtle act of exclusion, but I'm gonna give you some guidelines that tend to help.

Okay? First. Is a mindset shift. A lot of times people talk about calling out others. People call out. Culture happens a lot on social media, for example, if you're working with someone though, if you have a close relationship, if you have a relationship that matters. Calling out is not necessarily the most effective way to speak up about something that happens.

So I talk about speaking up by calling in the person as you [00:05:00] call out the words or the actions or the behaviors calling in the person. Do you always wanna call in the person? Not necessarily right, but it's a good mindset. Now, the first guideline I would advise people. Is called pausing the action. So what that means is oftentimes a subtle act of exclusion happens whether it's happening to you or someone else.

Your heart starts speeding really fast. You go into your own head and you try to figure out, what am I gonna say about this? And you're trying to figure out the perfect thing to say. By the time you figure out what you might wanna say, you usually think, oh, well. The moment's passed. Maybe I just won't say anything, and so you end up letting it slide, right?

Pausing the action means saying something before you even know what you wanna say. Like, hold on a second. Can we pause? I don't even know yet why I'm feeling this. I don't even know yet what to say, [00:06:00] but can we discuss what just happened? Or if you're a leader maybe and you see it happen. I don't even know what to say, but I'm gonna figure out a way for us to come back and address this as a team.

Now, the second thing I would advise if you're doing this is to assume good intent in the person that said it. ~If the intent was good. ~Remember, sometimes exclusion is intentional. In that case, don't pretend that the intent was good, right? Follow your procedures for reporting, potentially talking to your supervisor, but if you think the intent was good, just saying that out loud.

Hey, I know you didn't mean anything bad by this. You probably don't even know why this would make me feel excluded right now if they're. Not hearing you, right, if they're really not even listening, denying what you're saying. Maybe it's not good intent anymore, but it's helpful to do that, to avoid some of the defensiveness that the person might feel [00:07:00] who's getting that feedback, and we'll talk about that in a moment.

Next, instead of setting up an adversarial relationship. Try to think of it as something we're doing together, something we're exploring together. Hey, this just happened. Can we talk about it? Can we explore this together? Can I share with you how this impacted me? How this impacted the team? ~And then instead of calling again, instead of calling out that person, Hey, that was racist, that was sexist, that was homophobic.~

Explain the impact on you or what you imagine the impact might be on someone else. So things like, Hey, when you said that it made me feel invisible, or that might make someone feel not normal. Those words might make it feel like she doesn't belong, right? And she does. So those can be some helpful guidelines, even if you're unsure of what to say.

Right, which a lot of people are now. It doesn't always go well. I'm gonna tell you a story about a time I spoke up and it didn't go great. Okay? This is a different story. [00:08:00] In this one, I was taking a yoga class and the yoga teacher, she really wanted us to get into the stretch, and she kept saying, don't g yourself, GYP.

She kept saying it again and again. You know, because of what I do for a living, I noticed these things. So after class, I went up and I did all the guidelines that I'm telling you to do. I did them all right. Hey, I know you didn't mean anything bad by this. I bet nobody else noticed. It's my job. So I noticed these things.

But that word, gyp, it's a derogatory way to talk about gypsies, which. In and of itself is a derogatory way to talk about a group of people, and I don't know, I guess it was my post yoga endorphins or something. I kind of pictured her saying, oh, namaste, Michael. Thank you for bringing that to my attention.

And that is not what happened. Right? She could not even really [00:09:00] look me in the eyes. She just kind of walked off. I never took a yoga class with her again. She wasn't my favorite teacher, so that was okay. But I also moved outta the state. Of course not because of her. , But it didn't go great and that's where it usually doesn't go great, is in the way that the person receives that feedback.

The person that said. Or did the thing, right? So that person has a huge responsibility if we want these interactions to go well. So these are some guidelines for that person. And by the way, we're all gonna be in the position of getting this feedback, I hope. I hope we are. That means that somebody has trusted us enough to tell us a way we could be more inclusive with them.

And that's great 'cause you can't know everything about what's gonna make everyone feel excluded, right? So here's some guidelines for when you're [00:10:00] getting this feedback. And the first is getting in a mindset of gratitude. Here you are, you're trying to be the best person you can be. You're trying to be the most inclusive colleague you can be.

And it's hard and you can't know everything about everyone. And work is busy and life is busy. Here's someone gif wraps a way for you to be more inclusive with them and hand it to you on a silver platter. What a gif that actually is, right? So saying that out loud. Hey, thank you for speaking up. I appreciate you sharing.

I'm glad you said something. Now, what are you gonna be feeling when this happens? You might be feeling defensive, right? You might be wanting to say really badly. Oh, no, no, no. I didn't mean it like that. Oh no, that's not what I meant. Right? 'cause you probably care about that person and you're gonna want them to know you didn't mean them harm.

But here's where you've got to kinda recognize the [00:11:00] defensiveness and breathe through it or put it away. For a moment, it can't be the first thing you do, right? 'cause then the other person's not gonna feel heard at all. The first thing you need to do is to understand the impact for them to really hear what they're saying.

Can you tell me more about this? Help me understand how it impacts you. Or if they're already telling you, just listen. Right, and again, listen from their perspective, not yours. Don't ever think, Ooh, I don't see what the big deal is. I don't see why that would've made someone feel bad. It wouldn't make me feel bad.

Doesn't matter. It's not about you. It's about them. And you haven't had their life and you haven't had their experiences. Right. Now, is it easy to put away this defensiveness, especially when it's someone you care about. No, it's hard. I know that from personal experience, right? I get the most defensive when my wife brings up something, maybe gives me some feedback.

That's when I feel the most [00:12:00] defensive. And I know it's hard to put away, but I know also how it goes when I am defensive and I know how it goes when I'm not, and I know which one is a lot better. Okay, so the next guideline is taking that moment to. Grow to learn. You can go back to your computer and Google.

Why shouldn't I have said this thing? And I bet you, you are not the first person in history that has said it. And all kinds of great resources will pop right up that you can learn and research and then you can journal or talk with other people. Just keep learning, right? Explore, huh? Like, I wonder if there's a bias I didn't even know that I had that made it come out like this.

To this particular person that made me say that. And then the last guideline here is following up with the other person taking it seriously. It's usually not a quick one and done conversation. So following up, [00:13:00] Hey, I thought about what you said. Wanna check back in with you. And just a sincere effort to do whatever they give you feedback about or not do.

Whatever they give you feedback about. Without an over apology, we sometimes see this going wrong when people who really try hard to be good people and wanna be good people, overly apologize 'cause they feel so bad. And what that does then is it takes all the attention for them. And so the person who felt excluded, who tried to speak up and say something, then they have to take care of you because you're feeling even worse than them.

Right? So don't do that. Now I wanna go back to that story I started this episode with right where that CEO used the B word to ask me question. I'm on stage in front of all these people. I have a split second to decide what to do, ~and this is a story of someone. Receiving the feedback? Well, because I did speak up, in that context, I didn't do all of these guidelines.~

I just said, you know, that word you just [00:14:00] said, that's not a word we use in professional context these days. I can tell you more about that later if you're interested. Let me answer your question now though, and I just kept it moving. Now here's how he responded. He just, he said, thank you, and he listened to my response.

And later, as soon as the q and a period was done, he did come right up to me and he said, thank you for saying something. Can you tell me more about that? And we had a conversation about it. Now, guess who is watching that? All those other leaders and the message they got about leadership and culture at that organization was so powerful because they saw being modeled this idea that we're not always gonna be perfect when we get feedback, we can respond without the defensiveness.

We can be curious, we can develop relationships and build real trust. We can grow. That is incredible. [00:15:00] Modeling that did more for the culture there at that organization than any talk he could have done. Right? It was incredible. And so I tell that story too, to show you that not all the times you speak up, you're gonna do it in the same way, right?

Again, there's no one right way. You've gotta think about who's around, what's the context? What are we doing, what's gonna be most effective here? Sometimes it looks like that whole conversation, all the guidelines. Sometimes it doesn't at all. Right? Another story I could tell you is, recently I was playing poker with a group of friends and there were subtle acts of exclusion flying over all over the place related to, the name of the Washington football team.

Sitting there thinking, what am I gonna say about this? How am I gonna say something? We're here having fun. What should I do? And I ended up just going on a rant and yelling about it and the guys were like, [00:16:00] yeah, yeah, good point, Michael. And in that context, right, having a beer, playing some cards.

It was a great way for me to say something because it was kind of funny and they heard it. And that's kind of the style of interaction we can have with each other. I wouldn't do that at work. But that might be a way you could respond. In some situations, you might just give a look and say, Hmm. I don't know about that.

Right? That's one if you don't know what to say, that's a great strategy. I don't know about that. That doesn't sound right. I'm not sure about that. Right. That's one I tell my kids to use is when there are a lot of subtle acts of exclusion happening with people of all ages, and that's a strategy I give my kids in terms of, Hey, what could you say?

That's not gonna be too hard, but where you can just say, Hmm, I don't know about that. Right. It still disrupts and signals you're not complicit. Different thing you could do, for example, is I often tell people about the [00:17:00] research where, women get cut off more in meetings than men, right? It happens a lot and.

When that happens, one strategy could be having a whole conversation using all those guidelines. Another, and maybe more effective one might be for someone to say, hold on a second. I don't think this person was finished speaking yet. I really wanna hear what you have to say, but let's let her finish first.

And especially powerful if it's a man that says it. Why? Because if she says, hold on a second, I wasn't done speaking, there's more risk for people to interpret that in a bad way and it could be hard for her if a man says it. He's taking on some of that discomfort as that potential ally. He's taking on some of that risk, and it can be super effective.

So that's basically what I wanted to talk about with you today. There's all these different ways you can think about speaking up, but the key is [00:18:00] actually doing it, not letting those things slide, because those are the kinds of things that can erode a culture, that can make people feel bad, that can make them.

Disengaged that can make them leave an organization, that can make them not want to collaborate, right? It's critical. Okay. Now, if you're looking for something to try this week, maybe try speaking up in some of these ways I'm talking about. Maybe in a low stakes way. If you're not used to speaking up like this, maybe try saying something to one of your friends.

If you don't agree with something they're saying or a joke that they tell, try saying something. Try not being defensive. If someone says something to you that makes you feel defensive, just try practicing some of this stuff, right? These are all building blocks for all sorts of challenging conversations that are really important to have.

Also, [00:19:00] I am going to start bringing on guest soon. I've got some amazing people lined up. I would love to hear who you think I should bring on, right? Who would be a great person to talk to about this stuff. So email me Michael at culture advantage podcast thet com. Okay, be well. Take care of yourself. I will talk to you soon.

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