PDF Summary:4 Essential Keys to Effective Communication, by Bento C. Leal III

Two of the most common communication faux pas are the failure to effectively listen and the failure to adequately express yourself to others. These issues result in misunderstandings, hurt feelings, and the inability to resolve problems.

In 4 Essential Keys to Effective Communication, Bento C. Leal argues that these communication errors are the most damaging to relationships. However, he claims you can avoid these mistakes and their negative outcomes by learning how to integrate empathy into every step of the communication process. In this guide, we’ll explore three important abilities that will allow you to do this: approaching conversations with empathy, listening with empathy, and expressing yourself with empathy. In our commentary, we’ll discuss other recommendations for communicating effectively from books like Nonviolent Communication (Marshall B. Rosenberg) and The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (Stephen Covey).

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Next, you must pay close attention to the other person’s choice of words, tone of voice, and body language so you can gain the most complete understanding of their perspective. Leal explains that these signals reveal their true thoughts and feelings.

For example, if someone says that they’re “infatuated” with their new partner, it doesn’t just mean that they “like” them—it means that they’re experiencing a short-term obsession and have probably been thinking about them nonstop. Similarly, if someone says that they’re “infatuated” with their new partner in a nervous tone of voice while knitting their eyebrows, this indicates that they’re probably concerned about their infatuation.

Communicating When You or Another Person Struggles With Nonverbal Cues

Leal explains that it’s crucial to focus on someone’s subtle verbal and nonverbal cues, like tone of voice and body language, to gain a complete understanding of what they’re trying to express. However, this advice can be limiting if you or the other person struggles to read and use subtle verbal cues or nonverbal cues, a common occurrence for people with certain disorders like autism.

People who struggle with interpreting nonverbal expression might fail to understand the meaning of cues like sarcasm or distress and consequently miss the deeper meaning of what someone is trying to express. They might also struggle to read body language. Alternatively, an autistic individual might not understand the appropriate uses of body language or tone. This often manifests as expressing themselves in a monotone voice or a tone that doesn’t accurately express how they feel—for example, they might use an elated tone to describe something they’re struggling with. This might cause others to misunderstand them.

Experts make a few recommendations that can improve communication between autistic people struggling with verbal and nonverbal communication and neurotypical people:

• If someone struggles with nonverbal communication, try to use communication methods like text or email that don’t require them to watch for and interpret nonverbal cues.

• If you struggle to understand nonverbal cues, tell the other person directly that for you to understand them, they must express everything they’re feeling directly. If you’re the neurotypical person in this situation, try to be as clear as possible about your feelings and emotions in return.

• Ask what’s going on if you don’t understand—this goes for both parties. For instance, if you don’t understand the other person’s body language, ask them, “Are you angry?” “Are you sad?” and so on.

• If your facial expressions don’t always align with your feelings, inform the other person. For example, if you tend to have an angry resting face, inform the other person so they don’t assume that you’re upset when you’re not.

Practice #3: State Your Understanding

Once you’ve gained a complete and accurate understanding of the other person, express and clarify that understanding by vocalizing it, Leal states. To do this, rephrase and summarize the other person’s words and feelings and share your interpretation with them. It’s important to mimic their tone and body language while doing this—for example, if they seem upset, use a serious tone while responding. This will ensure that you’re being sensitive to the emotions they’re experiencing.

To illustrate this, consider the previous example of your friend expressing concern over their infatuation in a new relationship. With a concerned tone, you can say something like, “It sounds like you’re feeling a bit concerned about how this intense new relationship is affecting you.”

The Four Stages of Stating Your Understanding

In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey reiterates that the cornerstone of empathetic listening is stating your understanding of the other person’s perspective by sharing your interpretation of it and matching their emotions. However, Covey adds that there are four stages of expressing understanding that people go through before they’re able to do so empathetically. Understanding these four stages can help you identify whether you’ve mastered this skill or need to continue working on your ability.

The first stage of stating your understanding is “mimicking”—repeating exactly what the other person just said. This can come off as insulting because it doesn’t show that you’ve truly absorbed and reflected on the statement—just listened to and repeated it.

The second stage is rephrasing what the other person said. This is a step up from stage one because you’ve interpreted rather than repeated, but this is a logic-dominated response that doesn’t factor in the emotional aspect of the other person’s statement.

The third stage is stating your understanding of how the other person is feeling. This is problematic because you’re focusing on emotions and ignoring logic, or in other words, why the person’s feeling that way.

The final stage, stating your understanding empathetically, incorporates stages two and three—you interpret what the other person is saying while addressing their emotions. Leal would add that in doing so, you should also adjust your tone of voice to match the other person’s.

Ability #3: Express Yourself With Empathy

Once you’ve listened to the other person, you must be able to respond to what they’ve said and express yourself effectively. Leal argues that doing so requires you to express yourself with empathy—the last ability of effective communication. Expressing yourself with empathy means clearly and accurately vocalizing your emotions and thoughts in a way that makes the other person willing to listen.

Leal explains that failing to express yourself with empathy often leads to misunderstandings or offenses that can damage relationships. This issue is especially prevalent when people are upset or discussing sensitive topics. When emotions are running high, people tend to speak before thinking and can say offensive, confusing, or inaccurate things.

For example, if you’re angry at your partner for continuing to ignore their chores, your strong emotions might lead you to yell at them and accuse them of being lazy. This might cause your partner to resent you and ultimately damage your relationship.

Life-Alienating Communication—the Opposite of Empathetic Expression

In Nonviolent Communication, Marshall B. Rosenberg also emphasizes the importance of expressing ourselves with empathy and compassion. And like Leal, Rosenberg explains that if we fail to do so, we’re likely to engage in harmful forms of communication. Rosenberg calls these harmful forms of communication “life-alienating communication," and he explains that they’re the opposite of empathetic expression. In other words, they produce the effects that Leal’s recommendations seek to avoid—they push others away, make them not want to listen to us, and ultimately damage relationships.

Rosenberg explains that if we don’t take the time to formulate an accurate and empathetic response before speaking, especially when emotions are running high, we’re likely to engage in one of the following forms of life-alienating communication:

• Moralistic judgments. This is when we blame, criticize, diagnose, label, or insult others based on our own judgment of right and wrong.

• Comparisons. Any time we make a comparison between ourselves and others, we’re essentially weighing who’s “better” and who’s “worse.”

• Denial of responsibility. This is when we blame outside factors (situations, people, and so on) for our thoughts and feelings instead of taking responsibility.

• Making demands. When we demand something of someone else, we imply that there will be consequences if they don’t comply. Threats never result in productive outcomes.

Leal recommends three main practices to avoid these issues and express yourself with empathy:

Practice #1: Get Organized

Before you speak, Leal recommends taking a moment to sort out what you’re thinking, how you’re feeling, and what you want to get from the conversation. When we speak before clarifying these factors, our strong emotions might make us confused about what we really want and cause us to act dramatically, possibly saying things that are hurtful or that we don’t really mean. Acting in this way will make the other person unreceptive to what we’re saying and will likely produce an unsatisfactory end to the conversation. In contrast, planning helps us to express exactly what we need the other person to hear in a way that’s easy for them to understand and that triggers productive conversation.

For example, if your partner upsets you, your strong emotions might flood you with the urge for revenge when rationally, you want to solve the problem and achieve peace. If you don’t take a second to plan your response, these emotions might cause you to accuse or yell at your partner rather than speaking to them with empathy, triggering a major fight. If you’d taken a second to plan your response before speaking, you could have avoided this.

Separate Observations From Evaluations and Feelings From Judgments

In Nonviolent Communication, Rosenberg agrees that it’s crucial to stop and organize your thoughts and feelings before speaking. However, he breaks this process into two steps and provides additional advice that might make Leal’s easier to follow.

Rosenberg’s first step for organizing your thoughts is to observe your feelings without using them to make evaluations of the other person. For example, “I feel frustrated” is an observation of your feelings. Meanwhile, “you’re an annoying person” is an evaluation of the person who caused your feelings, but it’s not an objective fact. It’s important to separate these thoughts and avoid making (and communicating) evaluations because they lead to moralistic judgments—a form of life-alienating communication discussed in our earlier commentary. Further, this step will help you clearly distinguish between your feelings, your thoughts, and reality.

Rosenberg’s second step for organizing your thoughts is to accurately identify your emotions and their causes—in particular, to clearly distinguish emotions from thoughts. While the word “feel” should be used to describe your emotions, many people use “feel” to describe what they’re thinking. For example, you don’t “feel like this is a bad idea”—you “feel uncomfortable because you think this is a bad idea.” Once you’ve identified what you’re truly feeling (as opposed to just thinking), try to understand why you’re feeling that way. For example, maybe you feel uncomfortable with the idea because you’re afraid that it’s going to get you in trouble.

This second step will help you clearly explain yourself to the other person. Realizing why you feel the way you do will also help you to avoid forms of life-alienating communication such as denial of responsibility: You’ll know if you’re the reason why you feel the way you do. Finally, this process as a whole will ensure that the conversation reaches a satisfying conclusion for all parties involved.

Practice #2: Express Yourself Clearly and Respectfully

Once you’ve determined what you want to say to the other person, Leal recommends expressing yourself in a way that makes your thoughts, feelings, and needs easy for the other person to understand and respond to.

To do this, explain your points one at a time. Furthermore, focus the conversation on your perspective of the situation by using the “I” pronoun rather than the more critical-sounding “you.” For example, say “I feel…” rather than “you did…”. You’ll avoid making accusations and assumptions that might make the other person uncomfortable and cause them to disengage from the conversation.

Leal argues that the best way to express yourself clearly and respectfully is to follow a set formula (what he calls an “XYZ Statement”). First, explain the issue in question. Then, explain your perception of the issue. Finally, explain how the issue makes you feel. For example, “Yesterday, my boss called out the quality of my work in front of the office, and it made me think they wanted to publicly embarrass me. It made me feel really ashamed and a little angry at them.”

Additional Tips for Respectful Expression

In Nonviolent Communication, Rosenberg also emphasizes the importance of using “I”-centered statements and set formulas to express yourself respectfully. However, he provides a few additional recommendations that might help you form an even stronger I-statement.

First, Rosenberg warns that many people think they’re using I-statements but are still placing blame on external factors rather than taking responsibility for their emotions. For instance, the phrase “I feel angry because you pushed me,” seems like an I-statement, but it still places blame on the other person. Instead, say something like “I feel angry because I don’t like being pushed.”

Second, whereas Leal presents a three-step formula for crafting an I-statement, Rosenberg’s formula is more detailed, including four steps. Further, Rosenberg’s formula involves specifying when and how you need people to address your needs—while Leal recommends clarifying your needs, he doesn’t include these specifics in his formula.

Rosenberg recommends that you:

• Observe: State the observation that you want to address. For example, “Yesterday, you called out the quality of my work in front of the office.”

• Express your feelings: “I’ve been feeling ashamed and a little angry since that happened…”

• Connect feelings to needs: “... because I need to feel respected and valued in the workplace.”

• Make a specific request: “Can we talk about ways for us to discuss my performance while maintaining a respectful environment that meets my needs?”

Practice #3: Continue the Conversation

The final practice of expressing yourself with empathy is allowing the other person to respond and then continuing the discussion until everyone is satisfied. Leal notes that this practice ensures that the conversation comes to a satisfactory end—both parties have fully expressed themselves and fully understand each other. If the discussion is about a problem that needs to be solved, continuing the conversation will ensure that a solution is identified.

To continue the conversation until its natural end, switch back and forth between listening and expressing yourself and follow the practices necessary to perform these abilities. At the end of the conversation, thank the other person for listening.

How to Continue the Conversation in Difficult Situations

The authors of Crucial Conversations agree that allowing the other person to respond, and switching back and forth between listening and expression, is the key to having an effective conversation. However, they note that this process doesn’t always go as planned. For example, you might accidentally say something that offends the other person, causing them to clam up in silence or react with violent communication. In these situations, they recommend taking a few additional steps that Leal doesn’t address.

First, the authors discuss how to continue the conversation in situations where the other person is hesitant to respond. This situation might arise if the other person is afraid to share their opinions for fear that you might judge them, get offended, or get angry. To encourage the other person to speak up, the authors recommend explicitly inviting opposing views, being sincere, playing devil’s advocate, and persisting.

For example, you can explicitly say something like “This is how I see it, but do you think I’m missing anything?” or “Do you disagree?” If they still don’t open up, you could take the devil’s advocate approach by guessing their point of disagreement: “Maybe I’m wrong, but what if…” If the other person still resorts to silence, continue to press for their opposing view.

The authors also make a few recommendations on how to respond to violent communication like yelling or accusing. If this happens, first, break the violent communication cycle by making the conversation safe again. This requires you to establish a mutual purpose (a common goal for having the discussion) and mutual respect (showing the other person that you genuinely care about their perspective). During this process, you might have to apologize or state your understanding of their perspective. Next, invite them to share the facts and story that explain why they’ve become so upset. In doing this, reassure the other person that you won’t react negatively to their honesty.