History tells us that people who have little in common often don’t get along. But what we rarely think about are the social constructs that create this division. They are deeply ingrained in the way we live and work and confronting them head with discovery though dialogue on is the only way to incite real change.
Before we get into how dialogue can bring us together, it’s important to know the science behind what pulls us apart in the first place. The psychological theory is called social identity theory 1. It says that we all draw part of our self-esteem from the groups of people we belong to – whether that’s a big group such as a nationality and race or a small one like a weekly book club. Once we identify with a group, we find ourselves naturally comparing ourselves with other outside groups with conflicts occurring when there are clashes over the identities.
This identity is what makes us human. But it’s also what tears us apart. And since we all belong more than one group at a time, this sense of identity is understandably complex. You might identify as an ambitious worker, a union member, and a remote part-time employee all at the same time. These aspects are layered on top of our culture, nationality, religion, family and values.
To help you navigate differences through dialogue, we’ve put together four steps to help your organization overcome conflict and start to create conversations that spark unity rather than division.
Step #1: Bring people together
It may sound simple, one of the most important strategies for setting up meaningful conversations is ensuring people can come together in a productive way.2 In recent studies, people have been brought together to see how they relate (or don’t) to people who are different from them. Across 713 independent samples from 515 studies, a supportive environment was the key to people from different groups bonding. The ability to learn from each other was shown to significantly enhance relationships overall.3 A great example of this is “My country talks”. Launched in Germany, this study featured over 20,000 Germans talking openly about their country’s history and current policies. A similar format has taken place in many other countries, bringing together people who don’t normally socialize to learn more about each other and explore different perspectives.
Step #2: Embrace complexity
Dialogues can be helpful or divisive depending on how they are set up.4 Try beginning your conversations by stating upfront that it’s not about being right – it’s about listening to explore and understand. This helps set expectations that will make opposing viewpoints as a good thing rather than a nuisance. In a study from Dr. Coleman, this was shown to be highly effective. They filmed thousands of people having conversations with opposing views on divisive issues. They found that conversations were more likely to be negative if they were framed up at the beginnings as a pro and con debate rather than as a nuanced and complicated conversation. His team has also found that facilitating these conversations by encouraging inquiry, exploration and accuracy in understanding made the conversations a lot more productive.
Step #3: Gain a new perspective
We have all heard the phrase “put yourself in their shoes”.5 But we often don’t think about how much that relates to perspective taking and empathy. At its core, this phrase is really all about seeking understanding rather than rushing to judgment. In an analysis of 304 independent samples, research showed that taking the perspective of someone different to you or feeling empathy for that person made people more amenable and supportive. Try to incorporate both perspective taking and empathy into dialogues about difference. This can be done by framing the conversation properly, asking participants to really listen to what other people are saying and focus on seeing the world through different perspectives.
Step #4: Don’t just apologize. Act.
If a mistake has been made by individual, team, or organization, it’s important to make real amends rather than just apologizing. Apologies can go wrong in a number of ways.6
- The sincerity of the apology is often up for debate – is it a sincere acknowledgment of the responsibility or more of a reputation-saving ploy?
- Apologies can be perceived as empty gestures that doesn’t go far enough to rectify the injustice
- Apologies may be seen as a strategy for shifting the burden onto those who have been affected
It’s important to pair apologies with an attempt to genuinely amend the situation. For example, Giner-Sorolla, Castano, Espinosa, and Brown (2008) found that people were less insulted when an apology was accompanied by an attempt to actually repair the situation. When it comes to making amends, actions really do speak louder than words.
As you can see, countless studies show that that key to successful collaboration and communication comes from confronting differences with honesty and openness. Hiding behind excuses or creating animosity hasn’t gotten us far historically, and it’s not going to get us where we need to go in the future either. Modern organizations would do well to learn from some of these studies between groups and use the evidence-based approaches to bring us all closer together.
References
- Tajfel and Turner, 1986
- Dovidio, Love, Schellhaas and Hewstone, 2017
- Pettigrew & Tropp, 2006
- Dr Peter Coleman of the Difficult Conversations Lab at Columbia University
- Longmire and Harrison, 2017
- Čehajić-Clancy & Brown, 2016; 2019
