The Importance of Meaningful Conversations

The first three months of the new year have found us in lockdown once again, from which we’re now slowly emerging.  However we verbalise it, the sense from many seems to be that this has been a really, really tough few months, on the back of a really, really tough 2020.

Rachel Morris, executive coach, has been reflecting upon the dramatic changes over the last year, and the impact it's been having on us:

The most common start to many conversations with clients recently has been ‘it’s felt a lot tougher this time around’ or words to that effect. Is that your experience too?

Are we losing balance?

A recent survey published by Harvard Business Review (HBR) of 1,500 people across 46 countries has found that nearly 90% of workers say their work-life balance is getting worse. 

Workplace burnout is one of the most widely talked about aspects of modern mental health. Yet, despite the phrase first being coined in the 1960’s people still struggle to define it, let alone determine where the responsibility lies for managing it. It seems that it was only in 2019 that the WHO added Workplace Burnout to its International Classification of Diseases Index. 

The survey published in the HBR also found that ‘62% of the people who were struggling to manage their workloads had experienced burnout “often” or “extremely often” in the previous three months’ and ‘57% of employees felt that the pandemic had a “large effect on” or “completely dominated” their work’. 

In my view this makes for sobering reading, but completely mirrors the experiences clients bring to their coaching sessions.

The Squeeze on Meaningful Conversations

My feeling is that this has been caused in significant part by the squeeze on meaningful, rewarding conversations. In coaching sessions, clients are increasingly sharing frustrations that they are having fewer – rather than more – meaningful conversations with their bosses, colleagues and teams. Can it be true? That at the very moment meaningful conversations are more significant they are actually happening less? I think so. 

Psychology research from the University of California shows lots of insight into the impact of this, including highlighting the structured task or goal focus of most virtual interactions. It highlights what is lost in these interactions – namely the interpersonal needs that are only satisfied by more fluid types of interactions. Researchers are evidencing that our virtual shift and the loss of those reciprocal ‘water cooler’ moments are having a big impact on workplace wellbeing.

Clients constantly tell me about not only the exhausting, but the transactional ‘back to back’ nature of their virtual calls. They share stories and anecdotes of the volume of ‘functional interactions’ they have to engage in. As the research is starting to show, using virtual platforms for communication increases mental fatigue, as the cost-reward equation is different – Zoom makes you work harder at communication, yet you get less back in return, in terms of connection and interaction.   ‘Zoom Fatigue’ is now a widely coined phrase, albeit one that is only beginning to be explored and understood.

Our conversations are becoming less meaningful and rewarding at the moment we need that meaning and reward most.

If we chose to acknowledge this and respond to it, what advantages could there be? To us, to our colleagues and ultimately to our businesses?Conversely, what happens when we ignore this problem? It seems to me that some burnout risk sits with not engaging in meaningful dialogue.

The Meaningful Dialogue of Coaching

Part of the solution to workplace burnout lies in the types of dialogue we are having with people. The important conversations where feelings, thoughts and behaviours are explored in safety and without judgement. The types of conversations where focus and solutions are found. Coaching conversations, with time, space and the opportunity to talk about the issues that matter. 

By definition coaching is a relational activity based on the core interpersonal skills of listening and understanding, which means we’re focused on maximising the benefit of every conversation. 

We acknowledge that because of current restrictions, we may have to use Zoom or Teams ourselves, when we conduct our coaching work.   It means as coaches we need to pay close attention to the verbal and non-verbal communication cues, and if anything sharpen our focus. We have to recognise that things are taking place around and beyond the screen, and look for and ask about those factors in our conversations. We have to do our utmost to take onboard our understanding of the extra burden of videoconferencing to minimise its impact.  This is what will allow us to focus on the meaning and reward in every conversation!

If you’d like to know more about meaningful coaching conversations, and how small changes in attention and focus can have a significant positive impact, please get in touch.