Pitfalls in Getting Your Ideas Across
Communication is hard work, particularly so in the fire service, as amplified by our dual role of daily management/administration tasks in a quasimilitary organization. It takes just as much work to be a good communicator as it does to be a good planner, administrator or fire fighter.
The trouble is everyone thinks he is doing a good job of communicating because almost everyone confuses talking (noise) with communicating (conveying).
Ironically, people who exert their effort and intelligence to solve complicated business and organizational problems are often incredibly lazy and short when it comes to their own communication skills. For example, the most common error is making snap judgments by reacting to the first thought that comes into their heads. They make judgments about other persons, what they mean, what they can do, what the problem is, etc.
Cost of snap judgments
In a business venture, you can’t make snap judgments and remain successful because most snap judgments result in a direct loss to the enterprise and the practice becomes highly visible because widgets are produced and are accurately measurable at the bottom line.
However, in governmental operations and the fire service in particular, people who make snap judgments often receive great credit when in reality what they are doing is costly in negative benefits. This is difficult to prove because the consequences of their reactions are diffused in the maze of the bureaucratic structure. There are no widgets measurable in dollar profit or loss because the public sector is service-oriented rather than production-oriented.
Just as one cannot afford to make snap business decisions, one cannot make snap communication decisions. Most breakdowns in communications are caused by faulty reaction patterns in people who are trying to communicate. These breakdowns occur at all levels in our day-to-day communications with our subordinates, peers, superiors, friends and family.
Problem areas
I would like to discuss some problem areas in communication that 1 find are typical of the fire service.
- Snap reactions,
- Allness,
- Either-or
- Assumptions and
- Inferences.
I have found that fire fighters as a group tend to make snap reactions when they hear someone speaking on a familiar subject. They assume they know it all because, after all, they are the experts. The possibility that the speaker has a new fact or point of view does not occur to them.
Fire fighters who are in conflict are intent on shooting down each other at the expense of neither gaining any information nor new ideas. Instead, each is looking (thinking) for powerful rebuttals or weak, vulnerable places to attack the other. It is more important for one to be “right” than to solve the problem at hand.
Others have a propensity to fly off the handle. This can also be called the signal reaction or condition response. The person literally responds as if he were a programmed machine triggered by a signal from someone. This causes the thinking process to be bypassed. In some cases, it is almost as though a person was helpless to control his own behavior.
Awareness is first step
The first step in eliminating these types of snap judgments and reactions is to become aware of them. Pay attention to the reactions of other persons; try to spot reactions in yourself. Try pausing before responding. Allow your higher-level thinking process to come into play. Delay evaluation of a person. Wait and watch a while before forming your opinions. Take the trouble to listen unemotionally and you might find areas of understanding and agreement.
Some fire fighters speak and act as though they know “all” about everything. If we really think about it, we realize we can never know “all” about anything. Words such as all, always, everybody, every time, never, etc., are called “allness” words because they convey an impression of totality, and statements containing “allness” w’ords are symptomatic of “allness” thinking, i.e., “all fire trucks should be painted red.”
The trouble I find with allness talking and allness thinking is that it tends to block the kinds of thought processes that are beneficial to effective communications. Allness leads to categorical ranking in the skill called thinking! This in effect clamps chains on our thought process. The word all turns listeners off and prevents any comunication to and from you regarding differences or similarities in relevant issues.
Allness talking is quite common:
Today’s young people are …
All women (men) are …
All officers are …
Hippies are …
Everything is bad!
You can’t trust anyone!
All politicians are …
Everyone should …
All fire fighters are …
In everyday communication situations, the allness tendency can have damaging effects when it gets out of hand and goes undetected. A conscious effort should be made to drop allness words in written communications as well as in conversations. Pay attention to values when evaluating. Use terms that elicit cooperation and participative thinking, such as to me, from my point of view, so far, up to a point, in my opinion, etc.
Our speech is contagious. Therefore, our style can have a dramatic effect on the final outcome.
Polarized thinking
As fire department officers and managers, we are trained (yes, even from the time we are children) to think and speak in what is called “polar terms.” W’e learn pairs of words, life/death, tall/short, black/white, near/far, wet/ dry, rich/poor, objective/subjective— literally hundreds of pairs. These polar terms convey a feeling of opposites. A thing or a situation is described as black or white when in reality it is usually a shade of gray. A group of persons is called good or bad and most groups are in the middle range. This process (short-cut thinking) is costly because it identifies the extremes and buries the middle, where most of everything lies.
An either/or position is dangerous because once you are committed to your position, you will have difficulty compromising. This can be costly because in reality, you may have been pleased with something in the middle range but your either/or orientation prevents compromise. The art of negotiating calls for the ability to avoid this either/or position and look for compromise. In a compromise situation, neither person is forced to win or lose.
Try to develop the habit of looking for the middle ground. A problem seldom forces you to choose between two completely opposite alternatives. There is usually a number of possible solutions, none of which will be 100 percent right. In everyday communication, try to spot either/or thinking and speaking in yourself and others. This will avoid fruitless debates and exasperation from trying to defend an extreme position that you really had no plans to adopt at the onset.
Assumptions and facts
The problem with assumptions is not that we make them, but that we act on them. Assumptions, of course, are necessary in the real world. We cannot get along without them because none of us knows everything about anything. We all make many assumptions about the environment we live in and the people in it. However, communication breaks down fast when a high-level assumption is made without checking the facts. A major problem in this area is that people tend to make assumptions even though the facts are available.
They just do not take the time to evaluate and select from the alternatives or they do not know how to interpret the facts of where to get them.
An example of faulty assumptions is when two people think they are communicating on the same wavelength when, in fact, they are actually talking about two different things. This is called “bypassing.”
Unverified and unadjusted assumptions can be disastrous in fire department operations or other emergency work. Outside variable conditions can affect assumptions we hold unless we have made allowances for such probable occurrences.
In everyday communication situations, be on the lookout for assumptions made by other people and yourself that can strongly influence their and your opinions. Learn to spot assumptions in yourself, particularly with subordinates. Don’t assume they understand you. Don’t assume that attitudes and work performances are poor until you have probed deeply to find the facts and analyze them. Don’t regard mutual understanding as a fact.
Inferences create problems
Inference is a common cause of faulty communication because the human tendency is to confuse inference with actual observation. A person is considered to have been drinking if his breath smells of alcohol when, in fact, he may have been taking medicine. A person’s work turns sloppy and he is considered to have lost job interest when, in fact, he may be having vision trouble and not be aware of it himself. A person may be inattentive because of a hearing difficulty. The grapevine thrives on half-truths, innuendos and inferences, so be careful of your information.
We need to examine our thinking process to determine to what extent we make inferences and to what extent we treat them as observations. In everyday communication situations, learn to spot inference-observation confusion in others and yourself. Remember that data, information and observation are vastly different. Data involves a collection, information is the intelligent use of data, and observation obtains facts.
The obvious conclusions from the foregoing are that there are many pitfalls along the rocky road of communication and there are many barriers to its effectiveness. Some are more visible than others. All are human in nature and, if recognized as such, they can be dealt with.
There is a process in communication known as one-way and two-way. Oneway is when the communicator has all the input and the receiver has none. This type of communication is fast, causes frustration, and its benefits may be questionable. It protects the communicator’s image and ego. It is less accurate and more costly.
Two-way is when there is an exchange between the communicator and the receiver. This type of communication is slower, is much more accurate, has a greater level of confidence, has a lower frustration level, takes longer and has greater benefits.
For the purpose of this discussion, these can be considered as extremes. What generally takes place is a blending of the two.
There are times when the only method to use is one-way communication, such as on the foreground or in a hospital operating room. Two-way communication works best in teaching, programming and planning, as well as in most everyday activities. The two-way method reduces errors, costs and frustration while it improves benefits, accuracy and confidence.
How well we understand ourselves, other people and these techniques will have a direct relation to our ability to effectively communicate
