In the Organizational Well-Being class, I’m taking at my alma mater, George Mason University, to help my executive coaching clients field high-performing teams, I’m learning about three levels of communication known as transactional, positional, and transformational. The late Judith Glaser – an organizational anthropologist, business executive, and academic – once noted that mastering these levels can trigger “vital instincts,” the mechanism hardwired within each of us for greatness. The objective is to co-create conversations and reach a point where they transcend what she called “telling, selling, and defending.” Glaser’s battle with cancer, which she lost in 2018, led her to new discoveries about how conversations within organizations can be used for healthy growth.
Here are four tips leaders can use to apply this concept, and in the process, supercharge their organization:
1. Be aware of your conversations. When talking to others within your organization, pay attention to which of these levels describes those conversations, but always try to make them transformational, which will encourage collaboration and creativity.
2. Encourage others to have transformational conversations. By thinking and defining reality together, your team will take on shared responsibility for the health of the organization. Collaboration and creativity ultimately will give way to innovation and growth.
3. Create a safe environment for dialogue. Getting people to feel comfortable sharing their thoughts and ideas requires trust and mutual respect. That means leaders need to be open to receiving feedback and criticism.
4. Model healthy dialogue yourself. A willingness to listen openly without judgment, sharing thoughts honestly, and valuing opinions of others will encourage others to do the same.
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