Can I Talk to You?

'Can I talk to you?' 

The words that can fill a person with dread. 

How often do you hear this from a peer or your boss and think 'Oh God, what have I done?'. 

I don't think I am alone in this feeling and I don't think it's the Catholic guilt that makes me feel this way. I think this is naturally the way we are geared. 

I find more and more, I try to model what I would like for me, to others. This is a great example. If someone says 'Can I talk to you?' straight away I think 'What is it about?' with my subtext and anxious brain going 'OMG, whatever it is, I am sorry I did it, I didn't mean to do it, am I going to get fired?' 

When I need to talk to someone I will give some context in my question 'Can I talk to you as I need some advice on this idea I had' or 'Can I talk to you about a change in playground duties?' or 'Can I talk to you as I value your feedback and I have an idea I want to flesh out'.

But what about when you need to have a difficult conversation?

 Rather than the ominous 'Can I talk to you?' I might instead say  'Can I talk to you to check in on something that happened with ...' 

It means you are addressing the situation rather than the person. This can be shortened to 'Can I check in with you about something that happened?' 

It is a rare occasion that someone is wanting to do a bad job, upset someone, make someone's day miserable or break the rules. 80% of the time it's a misunderstanding, 19% of the time it is a situation that needs some education or coaching as to how to approach it better next time and perhaps 1% of the time it is because a person is being a terrible, horrible, no-good person.

Reassuring people that you are working through a situation makes it less personal and more able to be addressed logically. It moves the problem into a more neutral space where you can analyse what happened, how you can improve and ultimately how you can make better decisions.

I have been trying to not use my old go-to 'Can I talk to you - don't worry you're not in trouble' as the minute you might need to talk to someone about their performance or provide feedback they might identify it as them getting in trouble. Arrggh nuance, you cruel and painful mastermind!

How do you approach people when you need to talk? Personally I can't stand when people are padding out the problem with words like 'look, you are really good and nice and it's not you and you're normally ok at this and I am not sure how to say this' that is when I want to internally scream and find myself saying 'just spit it out'. 

Having to have the 'Can I talk to you' talk can be really challenging. It can be just as hard to say as it is to hear. By providing some context, separating the person from the problem and looking at the conversation as a 'let's solve this together' in a clear way, it can make a once painful conversation a little more palatable.