Recently a colleague was telling me about a conversation with her manager that had gone badly. She had experienced her manager speaking over her in meetings with a resulting feeling of neither being heard nor having her opinion valued. Recognising the possibility that the manager was not even aware of this, my colleague had mulled over the situation for some time before deciding to raise the issue with him.
When she finally did meet with him, she was careful to raise the issue in an above-the-line manner. That is, she was open and honest about what she was experiencing, the impact it was having on her and what she needed in that situation. While being clear that that it was important to her that she was heard in meetings, she took care not to appear that she was blaming the manager for his behaviour.
Despite this approach, she did not get the response she hoped for. Instead of being listened to and the issue acknowledged, with the manager agreeing to an ongoing conversation, he just rolled his eyes and walked away.
‘I was above the line and being honest,’ my colleague told me. ‘So why did it go so badly?’
In our work we make a distinction between above-the-line and below-the-line ways of raising issues that are concerning us.
A below-the-line response to ‘not getting your way’ would be what is generally regarded as complaining or whinging. This is the kind of talk that places blame, that closes down curiosity, that lays responsibility entirely at the feet of the other person. This behaviour has a high risk of leaving that person feeling defensive or being judged rather than listening.
The above-the-line alternative to complaining is advocating. When we advocate, we ask for what we need. We name what we’re experiencing (e.g. being spoken over in meetings) respectfully, without attributing blame. This way of engaging increases the chance that we will be listened to rather than shut down or ignored.
However, my colleague’s conversation reminded me that this is not the whole story. In some cases, the words you use aren’t, in themselves, what determines whether something lands as advocacy or as complaint.
Two people can make the same above-the-line statement to, say, their manager – ‘I need to be heard in meetings’ – and in one case it lands as a reasonable request while in the other it is taken as an accusation.
The difference here is not in the words being used. It is in where the listener is standing when they receive those words. Even if we are above the line, if the person we are talking to is below the line, things may not go where we hoped they would.
When someone is operating below the line themselves, they are more likely to be defensive, anxious or bracing for blame. When this is the case, even the most carefully worded, respectfully delivered version of ‘Here’s what I'm experiencing’ can be heard as an attack. The receiver’s inner observer isn't available to them in that moment and there is any number of reasons why that may be the case – most of them having nothing to do with us.
Does this mean we should just stay quiet and never speak up and raise our concerns, in case those concerns are not heard? The short answer is no. However, we need to remember that advocating for ourselves is not a guarantee that we’ll be heard, as we can’t control where the other person is standing.
So what do we do with that?
As a starting point, we may have to let go of needing the other person to immediately acknowledge that what we said was fair and reasonable. When we are emotionally healthy (when we are operating above the line) we have the capacity to draw on our behavioural freedom and choose our response regardless of what comes back.
What that looks like is that we can advocate clearly, respectfully and honestly yet fail to receive the response we were hoping for, and then choose not to take that personally or think that our approach was the wrong one.
Instead, we can work on understanding what may be causing our manager (in the example here) to be below the line – perhaps pressure they are under from their own manager? In this case, it may be just a timing issue and we might choose to wait and have the conversation on another occasion.
None of this resolves the discomfort that I know my colleague felt. It doesn't undo the moment where her honest, careful words met a closed door. However, it may assist in better understanding why it occurred and appreciating that staying ‘above the line’ regardless of the outcome is a more emotionally healthy place to be.
It also enables us to continue to look for another opportunity and environment where there is more hope of being heard rather than keep the other person below the line and us following them there as well.
Gayle