Giving Structure to Constructive Interaction

[John Windsor]

GOAL
To give teams a model and common language for how to better handle difficult interactions.

ISSUE
Constructive Interaction is something every team is challenged by, even High Performing teams. How to handle these interactions in a supportive way is not often clear. Where does one start? How do we know we’re being constructive and not just dumping on another person?

Books like Crucial Conversations provide useful ideas, but Radical Candor by Kim Scott goes further by presenting a model for constructive interaction that makes it much easier to see when people are in or out of sync, along with a prescription for consistently being in a constructive zone in their interactions.

BACKGROUND
Kim Scott’s framework is based on two dimensions — Caring Personally and Challenging Directly. When seen together in a quad diagram, these two dimensions create four boxes:

     · Obnoxious Aggression
     · Manipulative Insincerity
     · Ruinous Empathy
     · Radical Candor

With the vertical axis being Caring Personally and the horizontal axis being Challenging Directly, that puts Obnoxious Aggression in the lower right quadrant (they challenge directly, but don’t care about others), Manipulative Insincerity in the lower left (they don’t challenge and don’t care), Ruinous Empathy in the upper left (they care personally, but don’t challenge others), and Radical Candor in the upper right — the place where someone both cares personally about another and about the team, and also challenges others and the team directly.

The subtitle of Scott’s book is “How to be a kickass boss without losing your humanity”, but it’s not just a book about being a leader. This is really about creating a culture of open, honest, and supportive communications, and that’s the work of everyone on a team.

To find out more about each of the quadrants and how to apply this model to team interactions, get a copy of the book. For now, here’s an exercise to help a team understand and begin to internalize the four dimensions of the Radical Candor framework.

SET UP
     · Ideally this is done in person, though it is possible to adapt it for virtual coaching.
     · There is no limit to the number of people participating.
     · Have a flip chart or whiteboard for capturing the team’s initial comments.
     · You’ll want people on their feet and moving through the quadrants, so you need a space big enough to do that.
     · Put down two long strips of tape to define the two dimensions and four quadrants.
     · Create cards or signs for each of the four quadrants: Obnoxious Aggression; Manipulative Insincerity; Ruinous Empathy; and Radical Candor.
     · Timing for this exercise is 20-40 minutes.

PROCESS

1) Spend a few minutes talking about the importance of constructive interaction. Have the team offer ideas for what supports constructive interaction and what defeats it. Write these items on flip chart pages or a whiteboard.

2) Introduce the concept of Radical Candor (about both caring personally and challenging directly) and, where possible, connect this with the things already discussed and recorded.

3) On a flip chart or the whiteboard, draw the model and label the four quadrants. Don’t spend too much time delving into any of the details, but instead get the team up and into the space marked out on the floor.

4) Orient them to the two dimensions — Caring Personally and Challenging Directly — and then have everyone step into the square for Obnoxious Aggression. Put down the card for that quadrant to help define it.

5) Get the team talking about that quadrant, with questions like:

     · “How and when does this show up?”
     · “What does it feel like to be on the receiving end of this approach?”
     · “What are the advantages and disadvantages of this style of communication?”
     · “How do you want to be when confronted with someone like this?”

     The more the team can embody or feel what this zone is like, the richer will be the recall.

6) Repeat this process through the other three quadrants. Stay aware of timing so that the team can experience every box and still have a few moments to land the learning.

7) Once the team has explored each of the quadrants, explore how they want to use their insights from this session in their team interactions. As well, ask how they want to be accountable to each other for being radically candid in their interactions. This may require adjustments to their team agreements to ensure safety and trust.

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