Today, the World is laced with conflicts. In majority of these conflicts, everyone thinks that they are right and their position is right. How can two people (or groups) be right at the same time? Is it possible? What is the reason for them to believe so? Similarly, we have many “conflicts” in our professional/personal interactions. How many times do we have a strong view point or we draw a conclusion based on our experience; and we are confident that we are right? We are so confident that when we see any other person differ from our view point, we attribute it to either their ignorance or stupidity. Why? What makes us so confident that we are right?
Let us examine ourselves. Please refer to the below diagram as I explain who we are and how we operate.
At the core, we are who we are. That cannot be changed. This has been wired in us by early childhood (and there is a great deal of science how it happens and who influences it {not parents} – topic for some other time). For example, if you are a shy person who has difficultly in introducing yourself to new people, that is not going to change despite how much ever you try. If you attend 100 parties in a year to change it, you might learn the skill of introducing yourself but every time you do it, you feel very uncomfortable. That’s the way you are. Instead, if you are a person who can work a room and make friends easily, the same task of introducing yourself to strangers comes naturally and you enjoy doing it. This is not about who is right or wrong. This is the fact that we are just different.
Next is the mindset. This is developed over a period of time, based on our experiences and exposures. More the experience, more this gets hardened. Hence, we find that the associates (or people who are starting their careers) can be molded easily but a highly experienced person will find it difficult to embrace the change. Same at a personal level, we see that the young kids in the family find it easy to adapt but many of the elder people take a long time (or find it difficult) to adapt.
Around the mindset are the knowledge and skills that we develop over a period of time. This is driven by our interest and ability to acquire (or learn) new concepts/knowledge/skills.
The above model looks very simple but is the foundation of how we operate and how we make our decisions.
MINDSET – This is the most critical component as it influences our decision making and tells us what is right and what is not. Let us examine this a little more and define what Mindset is.
Webster’s definition - ‘a mental attitude or inclination OR a fixed state of mind’;
Oxford’s definition - ‘the established set of attitudes held by someone’
Wikipedia - ‘set of assumptions, methods, or notations held by someone that it creates a powerful incentive to continue to adopt or accept prior behaviors, choices or tools’
The key part is that, mindset is developed over a period of time based on experiences that we have had. Hence, we look at the World through the lenses of our past. When two people are faced with similar situation, they could read it very differently and draw different conclusions based upon their past experiences.
However, we are perplexed when we face new situation because we do not know what is right or wrong as we are facing it for the first time. We are willing to look to others to help/guide us and are more open to learn and then react. For a situation that we faced in the past, we are very confident of judging what is right/wrong because we have had our experience in that space.
BUT the most important question is – are we willing to accept that how much ever experience we have had in our past; it is possible that there are other angles/experiences that we are not aware of? Are we willing to accept that the truth (as so we call it) or right (as so we deem it) could be the truth/right as we understand (limited by our experience/knowledge/skills) and there could be another truth/right? More importantly, can we agree that it is important to LISTEN to others, UNDERSTAND others, where they are coming from before we brand them as ignorant or stupid?
All of us have gone through many communication classes where they teach us aspects of listening. They teach us all the skills that are required to listen – bend your body forward to indicate attention, nod your head, and paraphrase what you have heard so that the other believes that you have heard him/her. But what they do not teach is WHY it is so important to listen? Not because we make the other person feel good that we listened to him/her but because we are AWARE that our experiences/knowledge/skills could be limited and by listening to others, we are developing ourselves much better. By listening to others, we are improving ourselves and more importantly, it helps us to understand ourselves much better.
Today, the World is changing at a rapid pace. New technology/innovations are revolutionizing how we live and operate. In such a World, past experiences may not hold good to learn the present or forecast the future. Hence, it is even more important that we are willing to LISTEN and UNDERSTAND; we are willing to be more open to changing our MINDSET. By doing so, many of the conflicts in this World could be addressed much better and more importantly, we can address many of the “conflicts” that we have in our own personal/professional lives. Are you willing to take a chance?
