The Power of Objectivity: A practical introduction to Non-Violent Communication.

The most effective framework for transcending judgement and creating constructive conversations.

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If we want to lead authentically, we must learn to transcend judgment and criticism. We must embrace objectivity in our communication. Non-violent Communication is the most effective framework to achieve this. I often like to call it “constructive communication,” as people are generally more receptive to these words, and this is precisely what it accomplishes.

Some of the pushback I often get from clients when it comes to Relational Leadership sounds something like this: “Well, if I am being totally honest with my, then how do I tell my business partner that he is being passive-aggressive? How do I tell my husband that he is being mean?I mean, that is my truth.”

On our journey to embracing radical authenticity, it is important to recognize that while all of our thoughts and feelings are valid, they are not necessarily constructive. To wield our authenticity masterfully, we need to become extremely conscious of the difference between judgments and observations.

A judgment is aligned with our perception or assessment of something. An observation, on the other hand, is tied to objective analysis. This distinction is the foundation of objectivity.

Examples:

• Judgment: You’re always late.

• Observation: The last three times we've planned to meet, you’ve been late.

• Judgment: This office is not a safe place to work.

• Observation: I know at least four people who have said they feel unsafe in this office.

• Judgment: He isn’t prioritizing me and doesn’t care.

• Observation: He hasn’t responded to my last three text messages.

Marshall Rosenberg, the author of "Nonviolent Communication," would comfort his audience by saying, “If you don’t have any judgments, you’re dead.” He was essentially reminding us that it's natural to have judgments, but they are usually not the most useful things to share when trying to build safety, trust, and connection.

In one of my recent podcast episodes of "What’s the Big Idea?" Thom Bond, the Founder of the NY NVC Center, told me about his philosophy called “Needs-based consciousness.” It's the basic idea that everyone is doing what they are doing to fulfill their needs, including us. Through this lens, we can find a lot of compassion for people who are doing things we don’t agree with because we see behind their actions to understand the deeper needs they are trying to fulfill. It has a humanizing effect that allows us to get closer to people, even those we disagree with.

Back to judgments and observations. Whenever we have a judgment about someone or something, we can be nearly certain that it is tied to an unmet need of ours.

• Judgment: You’re always late.

• Need: I need you to be on time.

• Judgment: This office is not a safe place to work.

• Need: I need to feel safe at work.

• Judgment: He isn’t prioritizing me and doesn’t care.

• Need: I need to feel loved and prioritized.

The best way to avoid judgments and criticism can be found in taking responsibility and speaking from our own perspective. When we learn to do this, we find that our full experience (minus judgment) is usually welcome in conversation.

To do this, non-violent communication invites us to use a simple framework; just remember OFNR.

• Observation — Share specific facts/data, avoid evaluation/judgment.

• Feeling — Share how you’re feeling.

• Need — Share your unmet need.

• Request — Ask for a specific action that will address your need.

If you were to put it into a sentence, it would look something like this: “Hey Sam, you have been late the last three times we tried to hang out, and I am feeling really frustrated. I need you to be on time so I can trust you, and I am asking you to please make this a priority and be on time for our next meetup.”

Recently, a high-powered CEO client came to me, sharing an issue he was having with his partner: “She just isn’t prioritizing me. She has so much going on, and I am not feeling the same support that I am giving her.” He had shared this with his wife, and rightfully, she did not respond well. She took it personally and responded with defensiveness and a counter-attack about how he was not prioritizing her the way she wanted.

I invited my client to consider how he was sharing. “What does it mean that she is not prioritizing you? What aren’t you getting from her that you need?” He paused for a solid 30 seconds before coming up with tangible responses: “She is traveling when she doesn’t need to be and missing important events of mine that I want her to be at.” “Which events?” I asked. “The store opening and our adult summer camp.” I asked how it felt when she didn’t come to these events. He told me he felt “deprioritized.” I reminded him this is actually something called a “faux-feeling.” It is not an actual emotion but a judgment that the other person has not done something, in this case, judging her for not prioritizing him. I asked him to share the real emotion underneath. He didn’t pause this time, “I feel hurt and sad.”

I invited him to try and share his feelings with his partner, instead of the judgment. We practiced how he’d say it using OFNR: “Hey, I just wanted to let you know that when you told me you were going to miss the store opening and adult summer camp, I felt hurt and sad. These events are really important to me, and I want to share them with you to feel connected. In the future, I’d really appreciate it if you could come to important events when you have non-essential travel going on.”

You see, in this approach, he is not making his partner wrong; he is simply sharing the impact that her actions have had on him and what he would like moving forward. He went to his partner that night, shared his feelings, and this time around, they had a completely different conversation. She was able to receive his request and changed her travel plans to make it back for one of his upcoming events she had previously planned to miss.

On top of that, his partner shared that she totally understood his request and also wanted him to let her know which events were important to him, in advance, because she wasn’t always clear. Now they are setting themselves up for more success in the future.

When we share our feelings with people, we become “empathizable.” We make it easier for people to have compassion for how we’re feeling. From this place, it is much easier for them to open up to introspection and consider their behavior and how it has created those feelings.

We don’t know if people are going to be receptive to our feelings or able to meet our requests. We can know what we’re feeling, what we need, and what we want from people. Through this lens, radical transparency and honesty are always within reach.

Making room for judgment with “Evolved NVC”. 

As Marshall Rosenberg would say to comfort his audience, “if you don’t have any judgments, you’re dead.” 

It is natural to have judgments about the world and other people. NVC is beautiful at pointing out how those judgments are often counterproductive for cultivating connection and safety.

I have spent a lot of time training teams and couples on implementing NVC and have also seen how NVC can fall short by not making room for judgment. 

For many of us, we have been unconsciously sharing our subjective judgments and presenting them as facts for most of our lives.

I.e. “You ARE such a taker.” “You ARE always late.” 

A part of us feels like we need to share our judgments to be understood by our conversation partner. We feel that withholding judgment will prevent us from creating the essential “shared understanding” we all crave.

The internal dialogue often sounds like…

“If I just share my feelings, they aren’t going to get it.”

“This feels inauthentic or robotic.”

If someone feels resistance to practicing traditional NVC (which is my preference), I will invite them to practice what I call Evolved NVC. The main difference is that Evolved NVC makes room for judgment, so long as those judgements are properly contextualized as judgment and not presented as facts. 

OFNR becomes OFJNR. The J is for judgment. 

Those statements above become…

“My judgment is that you are such a taker.” “My story is that you are always late.”

From there, you can invite your conversation partner into their objective needs and requests, like the OFJNR protocol suggests.

When someone contextualizes their judgment in this way, it becomes easier to not take it personally. We’re more capable of seeing through any criticism and getting to the essence of what they need to be understood and move forward. 

If someone isn’t differentiating their subjective judgment from objective facts, I advise my clients to call the behavior out directly. 

“Hey, you are sharing your subjective judgment (“repeat their words here”) as objective fact and it is making it very difficult for me to hear you and stay present in this conversation. If you need to share your judgment, can you please differentiate that this is your perspective, and not objective fact.” 

If you invite the person to differentiate their judgment from objective facts and they are unwilling to do this, I typically recommend that my clients disengage from these conversations with compassion and purpose.

“I really want to hear you out and I’m not going to be able to do that if you’re unwilling to own your judgments. I’d like to pause until a later time when you’re available for that type of conversation.”

If they are unwilling to own their part, they’re very unlikely to hear you out, consider your perspective and likely unavailable for true repair or collaboration.

Welcoming judgments and transforming our context

Another powerful aspect of welcoming in judgment, is that we’ll have an opportunity to inspect and integrate it consciously. 

Contrary to our intuitive sense, most of the reactivity (tension, anxiety, resistance) we experience in relationship is caused by our context (beliefs/perspective) and not content (what people say or do).

Our judgment is emblematic of this context and when we make space for it consciously, we can run it through “The Work”, take its power away, reconnect with reality and take responsibility for sharing what we need to move things forward.