The Power of the Pause
This post was originally published on August 14, 2018. It was modified and republished on July 29, 2019.
What is the power of the pause? To put it to light, think about a time when two or more people were cordial and cooperative. That is until someone said something that changed the dynamic. Suddenly, someone got triggered to power up or shut down. So what happened?
Sometimes, a simple word or phrase is all it takes to send people fighting or hiding. I went into depth on this response in a post a couple of weeks back. Are you careful to notice what words or phrases might do this?
Phrases That Trigger A Negative Response
Here are some examples:
The let-down: My uncle taught me to avoid using the word, unfortunately, as in, “I’d love to be able to help with that. Unfortunately, I don’t have time.” It’s a let-down word. Notice how often customer service people use this word. “Mr. Norman, your business is very important to us. Unfortunately, we have a policy that doesn’t allow us to do that.” Ugh. Now it’s time to fight or flight.
The tee-up: The VP of sales at a company I worked for would rail on people for using the phrase “to be honest,” as in, “To be honest, I don’t think we should do this.” “Are you normally not honest?” he would ask, pointing out that the qualifier made it sound like the person usually didn’t give it to him straight. That made me wonder how often people are more guarded when I tee up an opinion with that qualifier.
The shut-down: No. But. However. A colleague of mine once quipped that “but” is really an acronym for Before the Ultimate Truth, as in, “I hear what you’re saying, but I disagree.” It shuts people down. Puts them on the offensive. Guards go up.
Life is filled with enough polarization and conflict. These can be detrimental to the workplace, at home or quite frankly anywhere. Let’s not perpetuate it with words and phrases that let down, confuse, or shut down interactions.
Use the Power of the Pause in Your Next Conversation
What can you say instead of these words and phrases? How about…nothing. Yes, the power of the pause. Just removing them and replacing them with a relaxed pause is often enough to keep everyone on the same page.
Another option is to say yes and. Perhaps you’ve heard this suggestion, popularized in improv comedy. Few activities require as much cooperation as improv comedy. It doesn’t work if people get let down, thrown off or shut down. Things need to keep building.
The same applies to any interaction. In meetings, emails, and personal dialogue, we need to use words that keep people open to listening and working together.
Let’s build on this list of words and phrases to avoid.
Do you know of any other words or phrases that might discourage cooperation? Please send me an email or comment on this post so together we can be more aware of the power of our words.
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