When You Say Yes but Mean No: How Silencing Conflict Wrecks Relationships and Companies... and What You Can Do About It - Hardcover

Perlow, Leslie

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1400046009 ISBN 13: 9781400046003

Publisher: Crown Business, 2003

Synopsis

We live in a culture—especially at work—that prefers harmony over discord, agreement over dissent, speed over deliberation. We often smile and nod to each other even though deep down we could not disagree more. Whether with colleagues, friends, or family members, the tendency to paper over differences rather than confront them is extremely common. We believe that the best thing to do to preserve our relationships and to ensure that our work gets done as expeditiously as possible is to silence conflict.

Let’s face it, most bosses don’t encourage us to share our differences. Indeed, many people are taught that
loyal employees accept corporate values, policies, and decisions—never challenging or questioning them. If we want to hold on to our jobs and move up in our organizations, stifling conflict is the safest way to do it—or so we believe.

And it is not just with our bosses that we fear raising a dissenting opinion. We worry about what our peers and even our subordinates may think of us. We don’t want to embarrass ourselves or create a bad impression. We don’t want to lose others’ respect or risk rejection.

We often associate conflict with its negative form—petty bickering, heated arguing, a bloody fight. But conflict can also be a source of creative energy; when handled constructively by both parties, differences can lead to a healthy and fruitful collaboration, creation, or construction of new knowledge or solutions. When we silence conflict, we avoid the possibility of negative conflict, but we also miss the potential for constructive conflict.

Worse yet, as Leslie Perlow documents, the act of silencing conflict may create the consequences we most dread. Tasks frequently take longer or never get done successfully, and silencing conflict over important issues with people for whom we care deeply can result in disrespect for, and devaluing of, those same people.
Each time we silence conflict, we create an environment in which we’re all the more likely to be silent next time. We get caught in a vicious “silent spiral,” making the relationship progressively less safe, less satisfying, and less productive. Differences get glossed over, patched over, and suppressed . . . until disaster happens.

“Saying yes when you really mean no” is a problem that haunts organizations from start-ups to multi-
nationals. It exists across industries, levels, and functions. And it’s exacerbated by a down economy, when the fear of losing one’s job is on everybody’s mind and the idea of allowing conflict to surface or disagreeing with others seems particularly risky. All too often, the conversation at work bespeaks harmony and togetherness, even though passionate disagreements exist beneath the surface.

Leslie A. Perlow is a corporate ethnographer, an anthropologist of corporate culture. Anthropologists like Margaret Mead spend years in the field studying exotic cultures. Perlow does the same, although the field for her is the office and the exotic people are us—those who work in the world of organizations. But the end result is no less surprising or rich in insight. Whether it’s a Fortune 500 firm, small business, or government bureaucracy, Perlow provides a keen understanding of the hidden issues behind what people say (and don’t say). And more important, she shows how to create relationships where individuals feel empowered to express their genuine thoughts and feelings and to harness the power of positive conflict.

About this title

About the Author

LESLIE A. PERLOW is an associate professor at Harvard Business School. She received her Ph.D. from MIT
and is the author of Finding Time, published by Cornell University Press.

From the Back Cover

“Silencing conflict is a universal problem in companies of all shapes and sizes. Yet people fail to recognize when they are caught in this dangerous syndrome until it wreaks havoc on their relationships. Leslie Perlow’s excellent book teaches you how to detect early symptoms and avoid detrimental situations. For your own career
success and for the success of your company you should start putting her lucid and practical ideas to work today.”—Adrian J. Slywotzky, coauthor of The Profit Zone

“When You Say Yes But Mean No is an invaluable resource for anyone working in an organization. People have a tremendous amount of knowledge and insight about what it takes to be successful. The challenge, though, is creating the kind of environment in which they feel comfortable speaking up and dealing directly and genuinely with peers, subordinates, and superiors. Leslie Perlow’s book contains critical insights and practical suggestions about how to create more open and honest relationships. If you put her ideas to work, the net result is sure to be a healthier and more productive organization.”—Raymond Gilmartin, chief executive officer, Merck & Co., Inc.

“This is a remarkable book that, once started, I had to read from cover to cover. The ‘don’t rock the boat’ syndrome is one of the silent killers of the modern corporation. It is a real breakthrough to learn how conflict brought out into the open can be a creative and sustainable force for the benefit of any company and its decision
makers. Everyone knows how unspoken dissent is lurking below the surface, but few business leaders have the confidence to deal with it. Leslie Perlow shows how it can be done in a well-researched and readable style.”—Alan Parker, president, Whitbread Hotel Company

From the Inside Flap

culture―especially at work―that prefers harmony over discord, agreement over dissent, speed over deliberation. We often smile and nod to each other even though deep down we could not disagree more. Whether with colleagues, friends, or family members, the tendency to paper over differences rather than confront them is extremely common. We believe that the best thing to do to preserve our relationships and to ensure that our work gets done as expeditiously as possible is to silence conflict. <br><br>Let’s face it, most bosses don’t encourage us to share our differences. Indeed, many people are taught that <br>loyal employees accept corporate values, policies, and decisions―never challenging or questioning them. If we want to hold on to our jobs and move up in our organizations, stifling conflict is the safest way to do it―or so we believe.<br><br>And it is not just with our bosses that we fear raising a dissenting opinion. We worry about what our peers

Reviews

Calling herself an "anthropologist of corporate culture," Perlow conducts her fieldwork in the office environment, studying the interactions of people in the world of organizations and examining the ways that people do and don't express honest opinions, mostly in an effort to fit in and avoid making waves. She asserts that in our natural desire to be liked and to avoid conflict, we will often say "yes" when inside we are screaming "no," leading to a dysfunctional work environment that devalues relationships and impedes creativity and progress. Yet this pattern is passively promoted by managers in almost every organization, and every time we silence conflict, the consequences get worse, as does the likelihood that we will continue the pattern in a destructive "silent spiral" that encourages anger and gossip. Perlow provides a number of stories and useful exercises that promote expressing differences while preventing the negative side effect of petty arguing, clearly showing that an atmosphere in which open dialogue is encouraged is healthy for both personal and organizational relationships. David Siegfried
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

INTRODUCTION

Covering Up Rather Than Confronting Difference

The members of Versity’s top management team seemed of one mind and ready to tackle the challenges facing their business. After a long day of team-building exercises and animated discussions about the company’s future, they remained in their seats around a horseshoe-shaped table in a nondescript hotel conference room in Redwood City, California. Nine hours earlier, Peter, the company’s soft-spoken chief executive officer, alluding to the crisis that the company faced about its strategy, had stated: “Our goal today is to all end up on the same page. We are currently moving in an unclear direction, and we need to be more clear.”

Two months earlier, Peter had joined Versity and had hired a team of professional managers to help the four young founders to continue to expand their company. Now Jill, the self-assured head of public relations, having volunteered to lead the day’s events, handed each of them a hotdog-shaped balloon, the kind that clowns give out at the circus. She asked them to take turns expressing their reactions to the day’s events, including whether their expectations had been met and how they felt at the moment. After people spoke, they were to attach their balloon to the previous speakers’ balloons, thus gradually creating a sculpture. Hal, the newly hired acting head of marketing, went first. “My expectations were met,” he said. “Jill, you did a great job. We made some great progress today. . . . It feels great. I am excited . . . passionate . . . committed to the future.” Dave, the newly hired head of product development, continued: “The consistency of vision and purpose is good to hear. We are pretty similar in what we are thinking. We are not automatons, but consistency is good.” Jim, the new chief financial officer, boasted: “I am happy. I thought today was going to be a lot uglier. I expected battles. Yet things were remarkably consistent.” Peter added: “It was a good starting point. Jill did a good job keeping us moving. I enjoyed today.” The company’s founders also expressed relief at the consistency they had heard. Clyde, the business brains behind the company, sounded pleased: “After today I am more comfortable that we are all on the same page.” And Howie, the technical guru, shared: “It was neat to have everyone in the same room together. I was quiet because I wanted to hear what others had to say. I wanted to hear from the new people, with new ideas and new perspectives. It seems we all pretty much agree on what is going on. Thank you.”

Peter ended the day’s events by suggesting that everyone go downstairs to the hotel bar and have a beer to celebrate. The meeting broke up, but before heading to the bar and then out for dinner, most people gathered to admire their balloon sculpture, with its bright colors and all its contortions, twists, and turns.

Everyone had gone into the day’s events deeply worried about a lack of consensus. They were particularly concerned that a schism was developing between the founders and the new professional managers over the company’s purpose. Yet, at the end of the meeting, they all expressed joy about their level of agreement.

Privately, though, many despaired. When the four founders gathered the next night to reflect on the “vision meeting,” as they called it, Howie snickered, “What a waste. Nothing was accomplished.” He paused, took a deep breath, and continued, “We are directionless. We used to know what was going on. But we lost our goal. Now we have no focus. We are bobbing in water. We have no momentum. We should be reacting and changing, yet nothing is happening.” The other three nodded in agreement.

The professional managers also had outwardly expressed pleasure about the consensus everyone voiced. However, they too felt that nothing had been accomplished. They weren’t as surprised by this result, though, since they had been through this kind of meeting many times before. While Peter didn’t mention it to anyone on his management team, he was convinced they would need to meet again to reach closure on their goals.

After the meeting the professional managers continued to question whether the core market for their educational product should remain college students or should instead become professors. Indeed, no attempt had been made to answer this fundamental question at the meeting. And deep down, they all knew they still disagreed. No one, however, dared raise the issue. The founders continued to focus on college students, the company’s target market since its start. The professional managers, including Peter, shifted their focus toward professors–the market they had come to believe had to be the company’s future focus. No one said anything about the divide. They all just forged ahead, pursuing the goal they perceived to matter most. The company, however, sorely lacked the human and financial resources to pursue these two paths simultaneously.

Still, no one wanted to confront this reality and force a choice. Rather, they wanted to preserve their relationships and their business. Both Peter and his new hires, as well as the company’s four founders, deeply appreciated how much they needed one another to make the company a success. They also recognized that speed was of the essence and that they had no time to waste. Not wanting to put their relationships or their business in jeopardy, no one spoke up. Within nine months, the company was bankrupt.

Whether between colleagues, friends, or family members, the tendency to cover over differences rather than confront them is all too common. In important relationships–from the boardroom to the bedroom–we often find ourselves smiling and nodding when deep down we couldn’t disagree more. We believe that the best thing to do to preserve our relationships and to ensure that our work gets done as expeditiously as possible is to remain quiet. What we are doing is silencing conflict.

SILENCING CONFLICT

Conflict is not by nature good or bad. Conflict simply means difference–difference of opinion or interests. Throughout this book, I use the words conflict and difference interchangeably. And I use the term silencing conflict to refer to anytime people do not fully confront their differences. Often people speak openly about their differences but do so in the hallway, or around the water cooler, or behind closed doors–out of earshot of the person with whom they differ. Sometimes people do mention their differences to one another but fail to do so in a way that they are understood.

Silencing conflict encompasses a range of behaviors, from never speaking differences aloud to ending a discussion of differences before they are fully understood. We are silencing conflict if we become quiet despite perceiving that the other party does not understand why we think, feel, or believe as we do. We are also silencing conflict if we end a discussion before we’ve done our best to understand the “why” behind the other party’s thoughts, feelings, or behavior.

THE COSTS OF SILENCE

We often associate conflict with its negative forms–petty bickering, a bloody fight, physical violence, even war. But conflict can also be a source of creative energy; when handled constructively by both parties, differences can lead to a healthy and fruitful collaboration, a co-creation or co-construction of new knowledge or solutions. With constructive conflict, the end result is different from and better than any of the initial, individual perspectives; opposing parties come together to realize their respective goals and work together toward a win-win outcome. When we silence conflict, we avoid the possibility of negative conflict, but we also miss the potential for constructive conflict.

When differences are kept quiet, we limit creativity, learning, and effective decision making. Creativity and learning require novel ideas–seeing and doing things in new ways–but when differences are considered unacceptable, novel ideas are less likely to emerge. When we don’t feel comfortable expressing our differences, we are also less likely to disclose errors and take risks, both of which are necessary for learning to occur. And when we do not share perspectives and information, decision making can suffer, because we are less apt to explore the pros and cons of various solutions.

Silencing conflict also affects individual performance. When we feel we can’t share our differences, we may lose interest in and disengage from our work. The result can be increased stress, lack of motivation, high job turnover, and sometimes even sabotage.

Even worse, although we often silence conflict because we believe it is the right thing to do, the best thing to do, the only way to preserve important relationships and get on with the task at hand, acting on this belief may create the consequences we most dread. Silencing conflict about important issues with people for whom we care deeply can result in disrespect for, and devaluing of, those same people. It can create a whole underworld in which differences become an increasingly destructive force. Each time we silence conflict, we create an environment in which we’re all the more likely to silence next time. Silencing conflict creates resentment, anger, and frustration in a person. These negative emotions turn into a powerful and harmful agent, making one feel increasingly self-protective in the relationship and therefore all the more fearful about speaking up. As a result, more acts of silence follow. We get caught spinning in a vicious “silent spiral,” making the relationship progressively less safe, less satisfying, and less productive.

In addition, when there is pressure to go fast, people are all the more likely to silence t...

Edition details

• Publisher: Crown Business
• Publication date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1400046009
• ISBN 13: 9781400046003
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 272