Early in my career, I grew tired of listening to coworkers, couples, and family members who refused to listen to each other. I hated the “he said/she said” wars. I hated the zero-sum games. In these infantile debates, the best I could achieve was a temporary truce. More often, I felt like I was putting a temporary bandage on a gaping, hemorrhaging wound.

I had a name for the culprits in these situations: “ignorant blamers.” These were the people who treated communication as a blood sport, ranting relentlessly about another person’s failings without giving a second’s thought to how the attacked party felt. (“And Bob always lets his projects run over the time we’ve budgeted. And he never listens to my suggestions because he thinks he knows everything. And he acts like he’s so high and mighty. And nobody likes him because he’s not a team player. And here’s another thing….”)

The ignorant blamers were, above all, presumptuous: They presumed to tell both me and the other person what the score was. They weren’t the least bit curious about what their partners, coworkers, or children thought. In the mind of ignorant blamers, the goal wasn’t to share information but to expose every flaw of the other person, sit back, and say, “So—what are you going to do about it?”

Attempting to calm such people down or get them to listen to others rarely was effective. Then one day I spontaneously happened upon an intervention that changed everything.

It happened when the Franklin family came in to see me because their 15-year-old son, Harry, was refusing to do his homework, help around the house, or cooperate in almost any way. Time-outs, taking away the Internet, or sending him to his room had little to no effect and only caused him to become even more sullen. His mother, Joan, appeared to be much more upset about the situation than his father, Robert.

As soon as the three of them sat down in my office, I asked why they’d come to see me. Joan launched into a list of complaints about Harry. Robert sat quietly in a way that communicated that he agreed with Joan’s complaints, but also understood how Harry could be so ticked off at how she went on and on about them. Meanwhile, Harry sat with his arms crossed and his baseball cap pulled down over his face, signaling that the last place he wanted to be at this moment was in this room.

I had to find a way to engage Harry and also Robert without alienating Joan. So I tried something new.

“Joan,” I said firmly and assertively, without any hostility or frustration in my voice, “if I were to ask Harry why he thinks this meeting is just going to be a waste of time and money, what would he say?”

“What?” Joan replied, with her laundry list of complaints against Harry not yet expressed.

I repeated the question, adding, “Joan, please put yourself in Harry’s shoes and tell me why he thinks this meeting is a waste of time and won’t accomplish anything.”

At that point, several interesting things happened. Joan paused, Robert gave me a puzzled but curious look, and behatted son Harry loosened his crossed arms and lifted his chin off his chest ever so slightly, indicating that I’d caught his interest.

Joan thought for a moment and replied, “He’d probably say this is going to be a waste of time because all that’s going to happen is that Mom’s going to lecture me and Dad’s going to just go along with it and probably not say anything. And that’s just what happens at home.”

“Really?” I said, to emphasize the significance of Joan’s shift from attacking to understanding. Then I added: “And if I were to ask Harry how frustrated that makes him feel, what would he say?”

Joan replied, “He’d say he can’t stand it.”

“And if I were to ask him what he does or wants to do as a result, what would he say to that?” I added.

“He’d say he wants to tune it all out and try to get away as soon as possible,” Joan replied.

By this time both Harry and Robert were riveted on this dialogue between Joan and me.

I turned to Robert and said: “Robert, if I were to ask what frustrates Joan most about how you deal with the situation with Harry, what would she say?”

At this point, Joan and even Harry became interested in what Robert would say.

Robert paused and then replied, “Joan would probably say I sabotage her by agreeing on the surface with her but communicating to Harry that I agree with him about how over the top she can get.”

“And if I asked Joan how that made her feel, what would she say?” I asked.

Robert said: “All alone, with everyone fighting her and nobody helping her.”

At that point Joan began to cry and said, “I hate being such a bitch, but life is about details and if everybody ignores them Harry is going to fall through the cracks.”

At this point, I could finally make out Harry’s eyes under the hat, and he’d uncrossed his arms. I asked him, “Harry, if I were to ask your mom and dad whether they’re more disappointed and frustrated with you or worried about you, what would they say?”

Harry hesitated and then replied with a sense of revelation, “I guess they’d both say they were worried about me.”

“And what would they say they were worried about?” I asked.

“That I’d turn out to be a loser and have a shitty life … but they’re so frickin controlling I can’t breathe,” he replied.

“I know their style sucks, but stay with the first thing you said. Why would they care if you turned out to be a loser and have a shitty life?” I asked.

“Because … they love me,” Harry replied, as if realizing this for the first time in a long while.

And that’s all it took. The rest of the session continued in a cooperative and collaborative fashion, free of vicious attacks and underhanded shots and unvoiced rage. The Franklins actually talked with each other like people who cared about each other, instead of tearing at each other like rabid dogs.

After that breakthrough I started using this technique to bridge communication gaps and repair rifts among law partners, senior managers, managers, and subordinates. (You’ll see a good example at the start of Chapter 5, where I employed it with two warring attorneys.) I call this approach “empathogenic communication” because it instantly fosters empathy among people who’ve previously only known antipathy or even outright hatred. Think of it as the Empathy Jolt.

HOW IT WORKS

Empathy is a sensory experience; that is, it activates the sensory part of your nervous system, including the mirror neurons we’ve talked about. Anger, on the other hand, is a motor action—usually a reaction to some perceived hurt or injury by another person. So by taking people out of anger and shifting them into an empathic behavior, the Empathy Jolt moves them from the motor brain to the sensory brain.

To put it another way, anger and empathy—like matter and antimatter—can’t exist in the same place at the same time. Let one in, and you have to let the other one go. So when you shift a blamer into empathy, you stop the person’s angry ranting dead in its tracks.

And what about the person who’s on the defensive? Initially, this human punching bag is frustrated because no matter what he or she is trying to mirror outward——I’m sorry, I’m confused, I’m scared, I had a good reason for what I did—the ignorant blamer is blind to it. As a result, the person who’s under attack is usually in a state of quiet, barely controlled rage.

Suddenly and unexpectedly, however, the blamer knows just how sad, angry, scared, or lonely the defender feels and spontaneously turns into an ally. When the defender feels understood by the blamer and that they are on the same side, there’s nothing to defend against. The defender’s wall, and with it his unspoken rage and frustration, dissipates. The relief from no longer feeling “fear or loathing” toward the blamer spontaneously triggers a tremendous rush of gratitude and—miraculously—the person’s quiet rage turns into forgiveness and, beyond that, a willingness to work toward solutions.

WHEN TO EMPLOY THE EMPATHY JOLT

The Empathy Jolt is a powerful intervention to use when two people in your life are beating on each other brutally instead of communicating—or when at least one person is more interested in attacking than in listening. Use it at the first sign that a conflict is getting out of control.

Here’s an example:

MANAGER OF A SOFTWARE TEAM: We’ve targeted this release for next week, but I hear there’s a problem.

SIMON: Yeah, there’s a problem. Kim didn’t give me enough time to work on it. Her targets aren’t realistic. Nobody could get this done in time.

KIM (FURIOUS): Simon could if he did what I ask of him. We’re late because he spent three extra days adding a bunch of graphics bells and whistles that nobody cares about. We have to sell this product but instead we have a bunch of worthless features and no product to sell. Don’t blame me for this mess.

SOFTWARE MANAGER: Okay. Before we talk about what’s going on with the release, I’d like to do something first. I know that both of you are extraordinarily good at what you do. In fact, you’re two of the strongest performers I’ve ever worked with. And I also know that it’s very hard for you to work together. So I’d like to ask each of you a question, with the goal of seeing if we can make this situation work better for both of you.

KIM AND SIMON (BOTH DEFENSIVELY): Okay.

SOFTWARE MANAGER: Let’s start with you, Kim. Here’s the question: If I were to ask Simon what frustrates him most about working with you, what would he say?

KIM (SURPRISED BY THE QUESTION): Um. Well. Uh … I think he might say that I don’t respect his talent. Or that I’m more interested in setting deadlines than in making the product as good as it could be.

SOFTWARE MANAGER: So, what does that make him want to do?

KIM: Get mad. Because—look, I know he’s really interested in making this product the best one on the market and he can’t. And I understand that, I really do, but the company doesn’t work that way.

SOFTWARE MANAGER: Thanks. I appreciate that. And now I’d like to ask the same question of Simon. Simon, If I were to ask Kim what frustrates her most about working with you, what would she say?

SIMON (DISARMED BY KIM’S UNDERSTANDING): Well … um … okay, I think she’d say that upper management expects her to meet deadlines and she gets blamed if we’re late because I spend time adding stuff that management didn’t ask for. And I really do understand that. I mean, to me it’s wrong to send out a product that’s not as good as it could be, but I can see how that’s a problem for Kim.

SOFTWARE MANAGER: And how does that make her feel?

SIMON: Probably scared that they’ll can her. Or mad at me for screwing things up for her.

SOFTWARE MANAGER: Thanks for answering that so honestly. Now, I know that for right now we want to focus on getting this release done as quickly as we can. So let’s work out a schedule and see if we can still meet the target date. But would you two be willing to meet afterward and see if there’s a way to get Simon’s goal of making the best possible product to mesh better with Kim’s need to meet our targets? Because I’m confident that you can come up with some good solutions together.

When you use the Empathy Jolt, avoid the mistake of interjecting your own opinions during the process—even if they’re positive ones (“I certainly agree about what you’re saying about Simon’s talents”). Your goal is to get two people to mirror each other, and they can’t do that if you’re standing between them. So facilitate, but don’t butt in.

Also, understand that you’re not trying to solve the problem that’s on the table right now (a kid who’s violating curfew, a coworker who’s missing deadlines, etc.). Instead, you’re shifting people to a place where they can solve the problem—and the next one that comes up, and the one after that.

Do this right and you’ll all have fewer problems to solve, because people who experience an Empathy Jolt will have less desire in the future to rip each other apart and more desire to make things go right for each other. That’s because they’ve actually “been” each other, for at least a moment, and now they know what it feels like.

THE POWER OF ANALOGY

Often you can use the Empathy Jolt to get another person to understand your own feelings. For example, say to a coworker who frequently leaves you in the lurch on projects, “Isn’t it frustrating when a client promises to send a check on time and then doesn’t, and we need to worry about whether the person’s going to stiff us—but we still need to be polite because we can’t risk offending the person?”

When the person says something like “Very,” say, “And doesn’t that make you feel angry and even scared about doing business with the person?”

After the person says “Yes,” gently say, “Knowing how it feels to be blown off that way, would you want to do that to someone else?”

Most likely you’ll get a “No, of course not,” which is when you can say, “Well, you know, that’s how I feel when I need to count on you to get a project done and I’m not sure you’ll come through. I don’t want to hurt your feelings because I respect and like you, but I feel frustrated and scared when I’m not sure I can count on you.”

Odds are, the person will take this lesson to heart—and your brief Empathy Jolt will earn you far more cooperation in the future.

USING THE EMPATHY JOLT ON YOURSELF

Are you an ignorant blamer? The truth is that we all are, at one point or another in our lives. If you frequently find yourself in vicious arguments where you wield anger and blame as weapons, take action: Awaken your own empathy.

Here’s how.

1. Think of someone who frequently frustrates, angers, hurts, or disappoints you. This may be someone in your family, someone at work, or a friend.

2. Imagine that person doing one of the things that frustrates you. Select a behavior that, on an aggravation scale of 1 to 10, is at least an 8. Get this picture fully in your mind and be conscious of how it makes you feel as you think about it.

3. Now, put yourself in the other person’s shoes. Imagine what the person would say if I asked what angers, hurts, or frustrates him or her most about you. Imagine you are the other person and say what this person would probably answer, such as, you’re hypercritical, you’re judgmental, you always want to play the martyr, or you’re controlling. Be honest about the negative things you do in this relationship.

4. Next, imagine that I ask this person how much it upsets him or her to be so frustrated and upset with you. Again, put yourself in this person’s shoes and say, “A lot.”

5. Now imagine me asking the other person, “Can you describe something hurtful that this person (you) has done?” Think about any hurtful acts you’ve committed in this relationship, and how they made the other person feel, and answer as if you’re that person.

6. Finally, on that same scale of 1 to 10, rate how you now score your level of aggravation with this person.

What happened? Most likely, you felt angry at the beginning of this exercise, but the intensity of your anger dropped as you put yourself in the other person’s shoes. Typically, when I do this exercise with audiences, they start out at 8 or 9 and end up at 3 or 4. That’s because you can’t experience what another person is feeling and be angry at the person at the same moment in time.

So the next time you feel like ripping into someone who’s making you angry, take a deep breath, find a quiet place, and do this exercise first. Odds are you’ll save yourself, and the other person, a lot of grief.

  Usable Insight

You can’t be curious and on the attack at the same moment.

  Action Step

To make empathy come more naturally to you, give yourself an Empathy Jolt every day or so. For instance, when a coworker you don’t like much is on the phone with a difficult client, observe the situation and ask yourself, “How would I feel if I were him right now? Would this conversation make me angry, frustrated, or unhappy?” Or if your boss is brusquer than usual one day, ask yourself: “How would I feel if I had all of her responsibilities and worries today?” The more you do this, the less stress and frustration you’ll feel with the people around you—and the better you’ll be at getting through to them.