Difficult Conversations
Difficult conversations are something that tends to be very hard for me to engage in. I tend to shrink back and become silent when those come up. This is why I was very excited and learned a lot from this key leadership principle.
This skill of learning how to engage in difficult conversations has helped me to become more confident in the future when those conversations arrive. I never realized that in order to have an effective conversation I needed to start with the environment and create a trusting environment before I began. The other empowering tool that I learned is that I do not have to have authority or leadership in order to have influence. I can speak up in a professional way with important information that influences the organization even without an authority position. I also really like the format to use in field placement and in my profession one day as well of CPR which helps outline what needs to be addressed in the conversation it stands for
C- content
P- pattern issue
R- relationship issue
This image is also a helpful tool when preparing to have difficult conversations:
I also think it is important to look for the early warning signs so that it prevents you from going into either violence or silence mode. But to instead catch those little hints and signs that something is off and address it before it becomes a big issue. Learning to address things while they are small before they become a big deal is a huge way to own and take leadership in a relationship, situation or agency.
Having difficult conversations is a part of life, it will come up during my educational career when I need to have a difficult conversation with a classmate who isn’t contributing equally to the group project, or with a professor when I’m in the field placement and there are issues being willing to engage those and bring them up to my supervisor or other staff at the agency.