Coaching Yourself to Leadership: Five Key Strategies for Becoming an Integrated Leader

Skillful Conversations:An Optimum Tool for Communicating

If you can ask powerful questions and then listen deeply to the responses, you will be one step closer to being an assertive communicator. When you talk with someone about a sensitive issue or an area of disagreement, or when members of your team are at odds, try having a skillful conversation. Conducted properly, it will open up space for understanding, for problem solving, and for learning how to move forward together.

Here’s how to shape the conversation. First begin by focusing on the facts on which you both agree. What do you both know to be true? What data can’t be misinterpreted? For example, let’s say Tom and Barbara, peers on the same team, are working on a report that’s due on ...