How to Survive Election Season
"I believe that if we stop talking at one another and start talking with one another, we can get a lot done." – Barack Obama
Thanks to everyone who joined me last week for my A More Perfect Union: How To Talk About Politics in a Divided World webinar! For those of you who registered, we'll be sending you a video recording this week. And if you didn't have the chance to join, don't worry, I'll host another one in the coming months.
Over our lifetimes, we will spend on average 90,000 hours at work. That is over 1/3 of your life. Now think of who we meet at work. We meet and interact with people every day who are different from us. Different races, religions, backgrounds, genders, sexual orientations, and, political points of view. Work is where we are most likely to interact with people who are different from us. And that's okay! People are different and they have different opinions and different needs. Cultures are created out of differences.
I talk about civility all the time. Before I started Inclusion Nation, I worked for years with the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism. I worked on civility. And in that time, I came to understand what civility is and what it is not.
Civility is not agreement. It is not politeness. It is not going on to get along.
Civility is something far broader than that. It is abiding by the social norms that underpin our cohabiting existence. It is the foundation that runs our world. Civility is the same root as civilization.
So goes the nation, so goes the workplace.
This is why it's so important that we learn to engage in civil conversations across our differences. And it's when we talk to them, when we listen to them, when we engage with them, that we can find something else. Shared needs. Shared interests. Shared humanity. Shared civilization. Watch my video below to learn what I mean when I talk about having civil conversations.
People ask me how we heal the country. I don’t know how you heal a country. But I do know how you have conversation. It's not an either/or, folks. It's a both/and. You want to change this world for good? Let's go.
Start with my "how to" for having civil conversations below. It's ten tools I’d like you to start with today that you can use for the rest of your lives. I always suggest starting small. Choose 2-3 and begin there. I hope you remember them. I hope you use them. I hope you share them with others.
Do the work
This week, I commit to reviewing and learning the ten tools above, selecting a few to work on at a time, and always staying committed to working towards building a more civil workplace for all of us.
If you want to keep going
How to Talk About Politics in a Divided World
Across the globe, words have become so charged that debates and discussion quickly veer into anger and accusations. We see it again and again, in our workplaces, our homes, our schools, our lives. And yet, we cannot move forward on inclusion and belonging unless we can successfully share our own perspectives while recognizing the perspectives of others. But having those conversations without the right preparation can lead to anger, frustration, and the belief that tackling difference is not worth all the conflict it brings. That’s where A More Perfect Union enters.
In A More Perfect Union, we start with the possibility, or why these differences matter in our world. Then we move into the reality, using charged phrases and fragmented identites to understand how we became polarized in our silos. Next, we address the solution – civility – the fundamental basis of our shared civilization. Finally, we end with the ten steps we can all take starting now to rebuild a civilization centered on dignity, empathy, respect, and a more perfect union for us all.
