Sending and receiving messages

This is probably one of my more obscure wonderings, mainly for my own benefit. If you persevere with reading this, well done you!

https://www.needpix.com/photo/96126/

My reflections have been revolving around an observation I made at a recent facilitator training session: During that, two participants experienced a situation where unintentionally, they were 'speaking past each other', messages that were sent were received differently to how it was intended.

In the course of that situation, we realised that our different lenses, including cultural lenses, influence how we receive a message. An example I have used at different occasions is the way we express our manners in different cultural contexts: For example, I might ask you to pass me the salt at dinner by saying "Could you pass me the salt, please?". In a German household, it might not sound out of place to stretch out your hand and say "Salz!", leaving off the 'could you', and the 'please'. In that context, it is not necessarily impolite - which "Salt!" would be in our (Pākehā) context in New Zealand.

It is my conscious habit to use I-statements when I want to express concerns or feelings, also when I try to clarify whether I have understood what was said. In my cultural context it is a way for me to express my view point without assuming that I speak for anyone else who might disagree. You might hear me say "I wonder about the impact this might have on our audiences", or "what I do in my team is...". Other expression might include "I heard you say xyz, can you elaborate on that?", or "I can see we have a different viewpoint on this matter, ...".

What I learnt during that session was that the recipient of these statements might feel very differently: For example, "I can see we have a different viewpoint etc." can sound very judgmental to someone else, like a telling off for having a different view. Together we figured out that using an expression like "That's really interesting, do you think we can talk about this some more" felt better to them - provided they could feel a genuine interest and no judgment in the tone.

Reflecting on the session led me down the path - or maybe down a rabbit hole? - of thinking about how do I communicate? After all, the words we use matter. But even more, the intention and the tone of the kōrero make all the difference in how your message is received. I try hard to be an active listener, but that requires practice, too.

Several other cultural aspects became clearer to me during these conversations:

Alexiusca, CC BY-SA 4.0,via Wikimedia Commons

1) My cultural context is of an individual, I take responsibility for my actions and for things that are within my (limited) sphere of influence. One of my Māori colleagues will frequently us an expression "we as Māori" that is quite foreign to me: I feel uncomfortable to speak for all Germans, all working mums, all immigrants or similar. However, while writing this, I realised that I do speak on behalf of teachers and their learners at my work, i.e., "as teachers, we are used to a professional growth cycle / we are used to working collaboratively" etc. - so maybe we are closer here than I had thought. Engari, the point I was trying to make was that I-statements seem less well suited in cultural contexts where people have a genuine concern about and care for the collective rather than the individual - cultural contexts matter.

2) The amount of time that has passed can be meaningless: A Māori colleague explained to me that while Te Tiriti o Waitangi was signed 184 years ago, in collective Māori memory, it might as well have happened yesterday.

Experiences and interactions in my past also influence how I receive messages today: While I generally see myself as a very open positive person, there are some people that I find harder to engage with than others. I think I might naturally act with suspicion, more likely to pick apart, I might even be down right distrustful of any communication I receive from these sources. While some of these events are in the past, they continue to linger and cause hurt. [Some of the specific instances I think of were actually based in communication issues, in the way messages were sent and received: The sender was lacking the understanding how I had received that message, and has not acknowledged the effect this had (and continues to have) on me.]

It would seem logical to me that the recipient in such a situation would be skeptical, might expect a repeat of the unpleasant experience, will see to protect themselves from that. As facilitators we need to be mindful of that, we cannot dismiss a viewpoint that is connected to emotions from an event in the past just because it was some time ago.

3) The difference between recent immigrants and Pākehā New Zealanders might be smaller than I had thought: A Pākehā colleague and I talked about the similarities between our situations. In both instances, we don't have the same relationship with the whenua that Māori have, neither of us do really whakapapa back to a maunga and an awa in Aotearoa, but our heart might connect to those places, or we might have grown up in the shadow of a particular maunga.

To finish up my reflections:

Reflection. Some rights reserved by Anderson Mancini

What aspect of the last two sessions stood out most?

Words matter, and even more so our intention and our tone. Our cultural lenses can influence how we send and receive a message, as can recent and past experiences.

Does any of what you learnt have an immediate impact on your practice, and if so, what is this impact?

I am trying be even more mindful of how I send my messages (written and verbal). I have also become more aware of my own reaction and interpretation of messages I receive.

How might your learning impact your practice in future?

This is an ongoing process that will probably never stop; however, I wonder if I will ever find an opportunity to share some of my realisations with others who are not aware yet of these communication difficulties when sending and receiving messages? Not in a 'told-you-so' way, but in a 💡moment - and wouldn't it be heart warming if this ever led to an apology from an oblivious sender to a hurt recipient?