“May I be candid with you?”

Why is being clear and direct in saying what needs to be said is so difficult (for many of us) to do?

Recently I’ve noticed my coaching clients mentioning the term “radical candor” in our sessions; these folks work in different sectors from sport to hospitality and the civil service and so it peaked my interest. The expression comes from Kim Scott’s book of the same name and put in the simplest terms radical candor is about challenging someone directly in good faith from a place of caring personally for the other person. In Kim’s model direct challenge without demonstrating care is “obnoxious aggression”; “ruinous empathy” – a focus on being nice and caring whilst avoiding saying what needs to be said and “manipulative insincerity” - acting from general self-interest with no genuine care for the other person - are the other components of it. Evidently we are all likely to unwittingly move between each of these quadrants on any given day.

My clients generally express a desire to be able to be more candid in their communication and so I wonder why is being clear and direct in saying what needs to be said is so difficult (for many of us) to do? Honest communication and authentic relationships are really important to me and yet I often find myself shying away from being up front about naming an issue or being as honest as I could be in my feedback, often I suspect, sliding into “ruinous empathy” by backtracking or downplaying the feedback I’ve given so as to not cause upset. (As an aside - I suspect that my avoidance of challenge comes from my upbringing – my mother was a very feisty lady and being clear and direct when I disagreed with her actions wasn’t well received and would often escalate into very destructive arguments...).

That said there are times when there has been something important to be said to a client or friend and I’ve dug deep, really thought about what the bigger picture is around what it is I’ve got to say, consciously connected with my positive intention and have given it my best shot. Sometimes it’s been really uncomfortable and has caused some upset and I’ve found myself back tracking but other times it has led to a really open conversation and has taken the relationship to another level of trust and mutual understanding.

Often our motivation for not challenging others is that we don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings or because we feel ill-equipped to deal with the emotions that our comments might provoke; depending on what culture you grew up in you might have been told “if you haven’t got something nice to say, don’t say it at all”. My hunch is that the biggest reason for choosing to “be nice” is the avoidance of the personal discomfort we might experience when giving some honest feedback. Often we catastrophize – imagining the worst possible outcome from the conversation, perhaps thinking that we could damage the relationship irrevocably.

But what if it was actually worse not to do some straight talking from the heart when the situation required it?

My perspective is that there’s a cost of not cultivating the ability to respectfully say it as it is. Resentments fester when concerns or differences of opinion aren’t shared, relationships falter as people second guess each other, teams stagnate and people simply move on and those remaining are left wondering why (this is true in organisations or relationships...). This strikes me as a massive missed opportunity and a waste of great potential for growth in relationships, teams and organisations.

I’m reading Kim Scott’s book because it feels like there is some really rich learning in it to bring into my work and it’s a personal growth edge for me for sure. Interestingly in more recent editions she’s changed “radical candor” to “compassionate cador” which resonates much better for me – it feels so important that feedback or challenge comes from a place of kind intention and is as valuable to the person receiving the feedback as the person giving it.

Someone once said to me that when it comes to giving feedback “clear is kind”; I think that we have to accept that we aren’t always going to get it right but there is such an opportunity for growth, for deepening relationships and improving performance that it has to be worth embracing the discomfort and giving it our best shot.

What do you think?

#radicalcandor #compassionatecandor #communication #teambuilding #leadershipcoaching #leadership development