Crucial Conversations Book Summary: How to Make It Safe to Talk About Anything

This was so helpful! Its always good to learn a new skill that builds relationships. Thanks

I love this because it is helpful. I know I have a bit to work on, because these techniques are a completely new world. But honestly, I still get a bit irritated at the advice because it comes off as validating codependency. I don’t personally believe it’s anyone else’s responsibility but mine to make me feel safe. I make myself feel safe and respectfully speak when it’s my turn nothing more or less. Being right does nothing for me, I only care about hermetically sealing that issue up. You speak however you like to and I’ll do the same then we can make a decision afterwards and be done with that. Sounds simple and with some that works, but for others it doesn’t. I won’t finish my thought 🤷🏾‍♂️ carrying on

Your mic is amazing. It's so small but powerful and it also looks very cute because it's silver like a pin. What one is it?

These are the most useful tips I found for a coming-out conversation with my parents. Thank you ❤‍🩹

Oh thank you ❤

Great detailed summary - thank you!

Truly a great book especially if you don't like having these conversations or lack skill in them

Notes / hilites from the book Crucial Conversations:
This is a highly recommended book as it teaches critical useful communication and problem soving skills. - Skills that, if learned and practiced by families / parents, relationships, workplaces and organizations, relationships, communication and problem solving can be much more effective. The book teaches how to create the necessary sense of safety so that problems can be easily communicated, understood, troubleshooted, and solved. And to help build better working and personal relationships - so they can get and be better, not worse.

1) Remember your goal (the shared goal) - which is to share a conversation in order to understand a problem - in order to figure out and implement a solution. And ideally not only a solution that works, but one that works because it works for most, if not all, the people involved.

Continually remind yourself of your goal - again, which is: to share a conversation for the purpose of solving a problem.

Don't get sidetracked and caught up with other goals - and don't get caught up in contention like needing and wanting to be right, needing to win, needing to punish others, needing to be justified. instead, keep in mind "what do I want for myself and for others and for the relationship and what do I want the outcome to be?" (the outcome you eant is a solution that ideally both best solves the problem or good enough AND that works for everyone).

Example: talking to a teen about curfew, instead of fighting over when to be home, what you really want is for them to be safe and to trust them to be responsible.

They also want to be trusted and seen as responsible because that comes with freedoms. So the shared goal of mutual trust is to get you and them on the same team and work together to figure out what time they should be home.

2) Watch for signs of stress.
When you notice yourself getting hot headed,

3) Keep your options open. Beware of false dichotomies / black & white thinking. Example: "I had to either say nothing in the meeting, or tell on my boss, or tell my boss off and lose my job".

Always think of more possible options / solutions. Ideas always trump problems and there are always more ideas. There are always more strategies, approaches, solutions, etc.

The example given of the potentially violent Viet Nam era college protest where instead of burning the flag like one group wanted, or protecting the flag like another group wanted, the college president thought up another option and they decided to do a public ritual of washing the flag. Where violence broke out on other campuses and people died, that campus had a peaceful protest and resolution because they jad thought of another option.

4) Check how you see others and how you are reacting to others. Whenever someone reverts to shutting down, quieting their voice or silence or violence, aggression, raising their voice, or arguing, etc, our natural reaction (from the older, emotional, amygdala - the oldest part, the primitive part of the brain that interprets every problem as a literal threat to survival / versus the prefrontal cortex - the logical, rational, newer part of the brain) is to double down by responding even MORE forcefully arguing our point, or getting frustrated that the other person won't participate, get our point, or hear us.

Instead, we need to see that when someone is using silence and shutting down or getting more aggressive or violent, it's a sign that that person isn't feeling safe to talk.

They feel like their point isn't being considered and the most common human tendency is to go into flight, freeze, flight, or groveling / fawning, deception, protection, etc modes and behaviors. These are automatic reactions of the primitive part of the brain to build awareness of in ourselves amd others.

When this happens, this shows they don't feel safe.

When we see this, we have to stop and ask ourselves what we can do to restore or create safety?

Crucial Conversations gives some practical steps to restoring and / or creating safety:

- The other person needs to know that you care about them and their interests.

- So show them respect by listening and making sure they feel heard and understood.

- Check yourself - are you listening and validating? Or are you acting defensive, condescending, sarcastic, unnecessarily rude, angry, and disrespectful? Are you making it about control and power and contributing to and / or creating the conditions for a power struggle?

Are you making them feel disrespected and disempowered and trying to take control, taking choices away, etc? - or are you working with them versus against them, incorporating and recognizing their wanta and needs and working together to come up woth options / more options that work for everyone?

- or are you bulldozing, talking over, being unnecessarily rude, forceful, pushy, not using basic manners, "talking over" them, without any input or buy in or cooperation from them, walking all over them, walking all over their boundaries, not even coming across as if you even recognize or respect that the person has boundaries and what they even are, etc. All these things just make the problem and relationships worse and aren't effective.

- the other person needs to feel seen, heard, understood, and that you are validating (recognizing / hearing / understanding) their feelings, perspective, and experience.

THAT DOESN'T MEAN YOU HAVE TO AGREE WITH THEM, that just means you're respecting them by giving them the necessary ingredient of effective communication commonly described as giving them psychological and emotional safety - sometimes called giving someone "psychological air" - a basic human need of everyone in any conversation and relationship but especially in conversations needed to solve problems. And unless that's there - unless people have enough psychological air / psychological, emotional, relational amd relationship safety, conversations about problems with the goal of solving them aren't going to be very productive. - Definitely not as productive or effective as they could and should be and often the quality and effectiveness of the problem solving will also not be what it should be / needs to be.

- Am I showing them that I'm actively listening / hearing them - even if i disagree? Do they feel heard and understood and valued?

* This step is very powerful because we can actively create a safe environment by how we treat the other person.

** When people feel that you care about, value, and appreciate them, that invites and enables them to relax and absorb what you're saying and share what they need to.

So it makes it far more likely that you'll have a successful conversation that actually solves problems and makes the relationship stronger. Versus risking and making the problem and relationship actually worse. And even if the problem is still able to be solved or addressed, it's not as effective as it could've/ should've been, etc.


5) Creating safety.

Some tips:

A big part of creating and restoring safety is working on yourself and your end of things - watching and making sure that what you're doing is contributing to making things better and effective versus making things worse.

But there are some other specific tips and skills the book offers that are pretty straightforward that help others feel safe, understood, and valued:

a) Use "front loading". Starring off conversations gently. When a conversation is crucial we tend to get nervous and go into it tightly after avoiding it for a while.

So instead, lead into a conversation both directly as well as gently.

Example:
"Theres something i want to go over with you / get your opinion of / work on with you. But I'm worried you'll be upset when / if I bring it up / not sure youll like it. / I'm worried about your response / how you'll feel about it.

b) point out what you agree on.

c) Keep pointing out your common goal.

Example:
I really want to work well with you.

Lets

If you need to, make a tentative guess about what they're upset about. But not in a judgemental way.

c)

d)



6) "Master your stories".


Helps you see when you're interpreting situations in ways that are harming the process.

Don't be making things worse by coming out of the gate making assumptions (much less blind and ignorant ones), judging, rushing to judgement, leaping to conclusions, blaming, playing the victim / martyr, wanting to punish and persecute, wanting to go at them all guns blazing, etc.

Great summary, Emma. I would encourage you to look at the new 3rd edition with the re-arranged material and an amazing chapter 10 on rewriting one's own story, with amazing stories about lives being changed by the way feedback is embraced. NIce work. JHB

Very helpful! Thank you!

Want to sign up with your website. This is Angela and Randy Griffin

RDG

Here's a neat though experiment: What if the Shootout at the O.K. Corral had been handled using the same techniques from this book. Might we now be proudly reflecting, 140 years later, on the Productive Conversation at the O.K. Corral?

I would like to find or start a discussion group oriented around this book. Alas, no one seems interested. Sigh.

I just finished The Anatomy of Peace and now I'm excited to start Crucial Conversations..! Thank you so much!

These are gold.

This book is in my shopping cart for consideration. Thank you for this summary.

i'll add this to my reading list along with some of the others on your recommended list.

Thank you for this, loved the Vietnam war story❤️

Your summary is very insightful. Would this book be useful for personal relatrionships? I have taken two of your courses and find them so helpful! Thanks!

If the the person never feels safe with personal conversations about the relationship you’re always walking on eggs and doing the hard work while they avoid the discussion.

The Natl Guard was called to The City of Kent because protesters were burning the flag and the town.

Well Done! Thanks for the focused summary.

Thank you! Appreciate you.

One of the most helpful, safe, healthy and reassuring channels, if not the only one. Thank you I find peace and growth everytime I hear you.

This content is very informative! Thanks so much!

Thank you so much.

Been watching your channel.
It Does Help A lot ....

Awesome new ways to improve.

I have a question about #4 when dealing with a person with narcissistic tendencies - it seems like employing compassion and empathy with this kind of person quickly becomes a one-way street leading to a black hole, and the relationship never grows into anything mutual or truly respectful. Am I missing something? Does #4 still apply with narcissists?

Thank you🙂

Excellent job on putting all this information in a small, tight and very digestible package. You're my hero of the week!

By washing the flag what was the point conveyed? Can you explain please

I like your lexical.

I’ve been a poor communicator ~ this book would be good for me.

This is such valuable content, I’m blown away by how clear and distilled down you make this information. Thank you so much for these videos

Thank you for this! Very helpful!

Hey, one quick question! When having a crucial conversation, should one state the problems and add ‘I statements’ as well. For example, when you did x, I felt y’. It seems like that would solidify my argument and appeal to their better side. And, I think they need to know how much their actions effect me.

Thanks! Perfect!!

Thank you.

I subbed. Your dialect is impressive.

Educated sharing. Thank you ma'am.

Just listened to this and it is so full of great information on communication. I can always use help in that area.

This is an amazing summary. This will be my go to video that I send to (coaching) clients who are struggling with effective communicating in tough convo's. Thank you!

Great information!

Very helpful

Thank you for this recommendation! I'm a little over halfway through this book and it's been a real eye-opener. Creating safety and storytelling in particular were new ideas to me and I'm sure they would be relevant to everyone.

Love your videos and all the ways you help your viewers to grow and improve.

I love your summary of this book! Outstanding! I'm glad I subscribed to your page. Thank you!

Wow awasome this is the video i had saw no likes .. really awasome video ... verry important to me and oybers .thank you for summery this book

Thank you for putting this out there!! What a great resource! I just purchased a copy on Audible and am already feeling encouraged to work on these skills. Love your take on things!