Overcome Defensiveness in Difficult Conversations

Courageous Conversations
DEFENSIVE: Who ME?
Facilitator:
Janet P. Schmidt

What do people want from
mediation….
• The other person to take responsibility
• The other person to change
• Work to not hurt and feel safe again.
• The past to not repeat itself
“Past behaviour is the best predictor of the
future behaviour.”

Therefore what needs to happen
in the mediation process….
• Both parties must be open to see the situation
differently (and understand that they only have it
partly right)
• Both parties must take some responsibility for
what has happened.
• Both parties must learn something about
themselves and live differently in the future.
• Both parties must learn the wisdom of where to
accept differences and where to insist on change.

• Defensiveness is a behavioural response to a
perceived threat or attack to ones face or self-
esteem.
• It is the result of what and how something is
communicated.

View Clip
• Place yourself in the clip. The meeting leader,
Louise, Dave and their colleagues.
• What do you physically feel? What are you
thinking?

Privat
e
Action
Effect
Intent
Public
Assume
Words – 7%
Tone – 38%
Body Language – 55%
COMMUNICATION 101

Case Study (part 1)
• Think about a recent conversation where you
felt defensive.
• What happened in your body at that
moment?
• What did the other person say/do that
triggered that feeling?
• Why did you feel defensive? How did you
interpret the situation?

Why were you Defensive?
• We are embarrassed
• We are humiliated or feel stupid
• We don’t see ourselves that way
• We feel betrayed
• We don’t think that the person has the right to give us that
information
• We are reminded of earlier negative experiences
• We feel a sense of failure
• We feel forced to make a change, and change is difficult
• We grew up in an atmosphere where negative feedback was
experienced as a bad thing.
• Other….

How long does it take for you to get defensive?
How many people on earth do you think get
defensive?

Two Pathways of the Brain
1. The first path is thoughtful one through our
consciousness that allows us to become
aware, feel the emotion, comprehend its
meaning and ultimately choose an
appropriate action.
2. The second path (much faster) is designed to
take immediate defensive action, focusing on
bodily responses. This happens
unconsciously.

“Our civilization is still in a middle
stage, scarcely beast, in that it is no
longer guided by instinct, scarcely
human in that it is not yet wholly
guided by reason.”
Theodore Drieser

Cognitive Dissonance
• Dissonance occurs when there are two
attitudes or an attitude and behaviour that
conflict.
• This feeling of dissonance causes discomfort
and depending on the larger context can be
extremely disorienting (and even painful).

Two Contexts….
1. When you have invested time, money, reputation,
effort, or pain in some activity or some belief that
turns out to be wrong or baseless or foolish.
2. When a central element of our self concept is
threatened i.e. competent, kind, hard working.
The more important the belief is to us, the more
central to our self identify and feelings of self
worth the harder it will be to accept dissonance
information

Most people have a reasonably positive self-
concept, believing themselves to be
competent, moral, and smart. Their efforts at
reducing dissonance will be designed to
preserve their positive self-image.
Mistakes Were Made (but not by me), Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson, Harcourt, 2007

Sigmund Freud claimed that defensiveness
happens when we are presented with an
‘unbearable idea’. An ‘unbearable idea’ is
one, whether conscious or unconscious, that
makes us unacceptable to ourselves.

Three Core Identities
Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most by
Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton and Sheila Heen Penguin, 1999
1. I am competent
2. I am a good person
3. I am worthy of love
1. Am I competent?
2. Am I a good person?
3. Am I worthy of
love?

Case Study continued (2)
• How would you be experiencing cognitive
dissonance in your scenario?
• What core identity is being challenged?

Typical Responses
1. Surrender
• Giving in, blaming yourself, making excuses for other
2. Withdraw
• Avoiding talking about it
3. Counterattack
• Responding by making excuses
• Attacking the other person’s position
“Taking the War Out of Our Words” by Sharon Strand Ellision

Specific Defensive
Responses…
1. “But you don’t understand….”
2. “It’s not my fault…”
3. “No one else does it” or “I’m not the only
one”
4. “You didn’t….”
5. “They are out to get me.”

Common Defensive
Mechanisms
• Sarcasm
• Rigidity
• Blaming
• Shaming
• Teaching
• Preaching
• Catastrophizing
• Trivializing
• Endless explaining
• Withdrawing into silence
• Loss of humour
• All-or-nothing thinking

Case Study continued (3)
• What did you do in response to the situation?
• What are some of your well used defensive
strategies?
• What are the consequences of these
strategies?

SelfJustification
Mistakes Were Made (but not by me), Carol Travis and Elliot Aronson, Harcourt, 2007

What you can do to
communicate differently
• Defensiveness is the result of what and how
something is communicated.
• Living and working with other people requires us
to communicate the what. The good news is
that we can determine the how.

Meaning Making…
We are meaning making people. We are
constantly creating stories about the
motivations and intentions of other people (and
they are doing the same). We quickly believe
our stories to be true and repeat them in our
heads and to our closest colleagues, not to
mention our friends and family members.

The Gibb Categories of Defensive and
Supportive Behaviors
Defensive Behaviors Supportive Behaviors
1. Evaluation 1. Description
2. Control 2. Problem Orientation
3. Strategy 3. Spontaneity
4. Neutrality 4. Empathy
5. Superiority 5. Equality
6. Certainty 6. Provisionalism

Evaluation/Description
Evaluation – You are evaluating or judging the
other person.
Description – You describe what is going on
rather than evaluate.

Example
Evaluation: “You don’t know what you’re
talking about!”
Description: “I don’t understand how you came
up with that idea.”

“Observing without evaluating
is the highest form of human
intelligence.”
By J. Krishnamurti
Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Compassion
Marshall B. Rosenberg p. 29

Feedback Often Includes
•Description
•Interpretation
•Evaluation

Control/Problem Orientation
Control – The degree to which a person
experiences the other as trying to convince or
control them.
Problem Orientation – Describing a mutual
problem and trying to solve it together.

Examples
Controlling: “You need to stay off the phone for the
next two hours.”
Problem orientation: “I’m expecting some important
calls. Can we work out a way to keep the line open?”
Controlling: “There’s only one way to handle this
problem.”
Problem orientation: “Lets work out a solution we can
both live with.”

Strategic/Spontaneity
Strategic – The conversation is experienced as a
strategy (technique) with unexplained
motivations.
Spontaneity – You are experienced as having
uncomplicated motivations, as being straight
forward and honest in response to a situation.

Example
Strategy: “My previous boss would meet with
me once a week and ask me about my ‘home
runs’ and ‘do overs’.”
Spontaneous: “I would love to meet once a
week and select priorities and do any problem
solving required from the previous week.”

Neutrality/Empathy
Neutrality - You are neutral/detached of
emotions.
Empathy – You express concern and care for the
other person.

Example
Neutral: “Sometimes things just don’t work
out. That’s the way it goes.”
Empathic: “I know you put a lot of time and
effort into this project.”

Superiority/Equality
Superiority – When you communicate that you
are superior in some way (e.g. position,
knowledge).
Equality – You communicate willingness to enter
into collaborative participative planning with
mutual respect and trust.

Example
Superior: “No, that’s not the right way to do
it!”
Equal: “If you want, I can show you a way that
has worked for me.”

Certainty/Provisionalism
Certainty – You are perceived to be absolutely
certain about your facts and interpretations
Provisionalism – Person appears to be exploring
issues rather than taking sides on them, to be
problem solving rather than debating.

Examples
Certain: “That will never work!”
Provisional: “I think you’ll run into problems
with that approach.”
Certain: “You don’t know what you’re talking
about!”
Provisional: “That is a new idea. How did you
come up with that?”

Defensive and Supportive Behaviors
Defensive Behaviors Supportive Behaviors
1. Evaluation 1. Description
2. Control 2. Problem Orientation
3. Strategy 3. Spontaneity
4. Neutrality 4. Empathy
5. Superiority 5. Equality
6. Certainty 6. Provisionalism

“The truth is that many confrontations fail not
because others are bad and wrong but
because we handle them poorly.” p. 46
Crucial Confrontations by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan, Al Switzler, McGraw
Hill, 2005

Remember….
Process trumps content
Put another way….
It is often not the what it is the how.

Defensiveness lingers….
That energy surge from our heighten state of
readiness (adrenalin) takes 20 minutes to 1 hour to
dissipate. During that time people will not be able
to think clearly. The time becomes even longer if
someone does something to keep it going. Which
is usually what happens.

You can’t talk someone out of being defensive.
You can prompt a different feeling so that the
physiology of the brain can shift back into a non
defensive state.

So if they are defensive....
1. Set aside you agenda.
2. Listen to their words: their fears, needs, hopes,
disappointments.
3. Paraphrase what you have heard (i.e. their fears, needs, wants
and hopes). For example, “You need me to know that you have spent a lot of
extra time on this project.”
4. Take responsibility for something (i.e. “I should have shared this
concern with you earlier.”)
5. Ask questions to understand (i.e. lowering your voice at the end
of the question).
6. And then when they are again able to engage in content,
problem solve together.

The most important thing
you can do….
If you can ask a question or make a statement in a
non defensive way the person is likely to shift
instantly – as if your presence is contagious.
This is only possible if you are non defensive and
skillful!

Managing Your
Defensiveness
If they are defensive, odds are they will
say or do something that will trigger
your defensiveness and then there are
two or more people who are
defensive!

“They started it.”
The “eternally popular dissonance reducer”

Self Justification
Comes from our need to defend ourselves and
reduce the discomfort of ‘cognitive
dissonance’.
This is accompanied with the energy that is
coursing through our veins and being
expressed in our tone and body language.

“Pain felt is always more intense than
pain inflicted.” p. 192

Taking
Responsibility
SelfJustification

So why don’t people admit to
their/our mistakes….
1. We aren’t aware that we need to. “What
mistake? I didn’t make a mistake.”
2. Our culture is mistake-phobic, linking mistakes
with incompetence and stupidity that will be
punished.

Options….
• Being defensive is our primarily strategy to
self protection.
• What are other options?
“To be open is to be vulnerable,
and to be vulnerable is to be weak.”

Three things to Accept about
Yourself
1. You will make mistakes
2. Your intentions are complex
• Conscious
• Less conscious
• Unconscious
3. You have contributed to the problem

Reasons to admit your
mistakes
• You will probably be found out anyway
• You will learn and grow
• You undoubtedly did something that resulted in
making the situation worse
• You can lead by example
• People will like you more

A story of being defensive
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1NT9RQykH4

The irony
“The mind wants to protect itself from the pain of
dissonance with the balm of self-justification, but
the soul wants to confess.” (p. 217)

So how does this impact my
mediation practice?

Translation to mediation
One on One both before the joint mediation
session and in between sessions….
•“You are a good person with positive intent”
•Replace meaning making with specific
situations/stories (i.e. controlling, bully,
disrespectful, ist) and teach intent, action effect.
•Question: “If it was true, what would it mean
about you?”

Mediation Session
Introduction:
•Show a sculpture (different stories/meanings)
•Remind them of Intent Action and Effect and
remind/invite people to not about facts
(actions) and let person share why they did
what they did (intent) and say away from
meaning making.
•You may feel defensive (you are welcome to
call a break)

Closing Mediation Session re story telling
•Need to re-story your narrative.
•Retraining your brain
•Tell your support person new information
Final Mediation Session
•Knowing what you know now what do you wish you
would have done differently (taking responsibility)
•What are you willing to offer the other person. Review
list of needs – what else do you need that has not been
mentioned.

Other
•Generally 2-4 sessions, once every 4 to 7 days
or at least overnight.
And what if I don’t like the person I am
mediating….

Metta Meditation
• May ____________ be peaceful and happy
• May ____________ be safe and free from harm
• May ____________ be protected from mental and
physical disease
• May ____________ take care of him/herself with
ease
Repeat 5 to 7 times for yourself and/or for the other
person

References
• The Emotional Brain by Joseph E. Ledoux
• Mistakes Were Made (but not by me) by Carol
Tavris & Elliot Aronson
• Taking the War Out of Our Words by Sharon
Strand Ellison
• Jack Gibb work on supportive and defensive
communication climates.
www.janetschmidt.ca (coming soon)

Overcome Defensiveness in Difficult Conversations

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