So how do you deal with defensiveness?
Firstly you need to guard against your body language or tone of voice being interpreted by the other person as "attacking." If frustration or irritation shows through, the other person will naturally be defensive. Being personal or deliberately appearing threatening, to get the other person off balance, is of course never an acceptable way to treat people.
Even when your body language and tone are non threatening, some people will still take the defense. To defuse their defense you need to apply 3 simple steps as set out in the example that follows:
Let's assume that you have simply asked a report how they are going in completing a project you have assigned them. They emotionally respond that:
"You can't expect me to have completed that with everything else on my plate. Besides Tom and Jeanette haven't given me the dataI need."
Step 1 - Immediately stop the dialogue and say thay that your intent was not to put them on the defense.
Use informal language - for example you could say:
"Hang on. I'm not having a go at you.I simply need to know where you are at so I can give you extra help if you need it."
Step 2 - Move back to the issue at hand
Following straight on from your previous statement, focus on your real intent, in a calm rational way. Your voice and body language must begenuine:
"Let's try this again. I need to understand how far the project has progressed so we can plan the way forward. Are youOK with that?"
Step 3 - Seek ownership
Hopefully they will nowgive you a non emotional response, in which case you can seek ownership:
"What stages of the project have you completed?"
If the person's response to Step 2 is still defensive, start again at Step 1. If after a second try they are still defensive, you need to give them feedback on their defensive behaviour and how it is working against them, given your intent is not to attack them.
When you regularly apply this approach with defensive people you will find that they come to accept that they have no need to be defensive.
In the next newsletterI will cover how to stop yourself from being defensive.
To learn more about effective communication in performance management, go to:
www.developmentinpractice.com.au/solutions/performance-management.html
