Photo by Metin Ozer on Unsplash
Don’t over-explain in difficult conversations–it tends to backfire.
I’m going to make a generalization—Women and sensitive men tend to over-explain. We all want to be understood, and it is natural to want to explain our perspective to someone we disagree with. While this is helpful in some situations, in other situations, it just makes things worse.
I’ve worked with a number of clients, mostly women, who made their conflicted situations worse by explaining too much.
Anita is a team lead in a large R&D organization. She had been severely mobbed there by a group. When she interacted with new people, she wanted to explain the whole situation to them. It sounded so extreme and crazy (because it was) that her explanation often had the effect of alienating them instead of making them allies.
Shanae is a department manager in a government agency. She has to do performance evaluations for direct reports who have criticized her extremely behind her back. When we rehearsed what she would say in the meeting and how she would handle their criticism, she wanted to keep explaining and repeating why they had to follow the guidelines for professional behavior, and for getting permission before going to conferences. While some explanation may be useful, we agreed it was better to follow initial explanation with firm statements that they had to follow these guidelines and offer options for how.
Caroline made a bad mistake at work that had negative consequences for her company. With help from some colleagues, she was able to fix it, but one of her co-workers wasn’t friendly to her afterwards. She kept trying to get the co-worker’s forgiveness and understanding, but the more she tried, the worse their relationship got.
When Alfredo was injured at the small import business where he worked in the warehouse, the owner wouldn’t address the issues with him and hired a lawyer to prevent him from getting benefits. He ended up suing and won. He definitely knew he did the right thing to sue, because he needed the money to pay his medical bills, but he had been friends with the owner, and really thought he could keep the friendship after the lawsuit if he just explained his perspective and actions well enough.
What can you do instead of over-explaining? Here is what my clients did:
Anita stopped sharing the mobbing history and stayed in the present with new people. She got support around the mobbing from me and others who understood what she had been through.
After some practice, Shanae learned to explain simply what needed to happen, listen (briefly) to Qs and concerns, give the person options where possible for how to do what she needed. For example, if they wanted to go to a conference, to check in by email or in person, whichever they preferred.
Caroline had to work on letting go of her expectations. She recognized that no amount of explaining would make this co-worker forgive her. She had to forgive herself, be polite and cooperative with them, and stop trying for more.
Alfredo had to stop expecting a friendship with someone he sued, to accept that the choice he made was the best one for him and accept the consequence to their relationship.
It isn’t easy or automatic to stop over-explaining, but with introspection and help from a coach or wise friend, it is possible. If your first impulse is to explain and then explain again, ask yourself:
Is another explanation helpful here?
What do you hope to get from explaining?
Is that realistic?
How can you let go and shift expectations if your desire isn’t realistic?
What else you can do instead?
Note: All names and details have been changed to protect client confidentiality.
Lorraine Segal has a deep passion for helping people in organizations and corporations communicate better, resolve conflicts, let go of resentments, and deal with bullying. The goal: to create a more harmonious and productive workplace. Through her business, Conflict Remedy, Lorraine creates customized training and coaching programs for non-profit organizations, corporations, and government agencies. She is also lead instructor for the Conflict Management Certificate, a professional development program at Sonoma State University. She is a contributing author to the recent book, Stand Up, Speak Out Against Workplace Bullying. She writes a blog through her Conflict Remedy website and was recently listed as one of the Top Conflict Management experts to follow on LinkedIn. Contact Lorraine at https://ConflictRemedy.com for more information, to request a free consultation for you and your organization or to sign up for her newsletter.
©Lorraine Segal for ConflictRemedy 2020