How to come up with good responses quickly
Nope your comebacks were great. Just more on the tit for tat side. You d do that with somebody who d crossed the line too many times.
Mate we all overreact sometimes. I m in my 50s and I still do it ☹️ Modifying the fight or flight response is really difficult it is hard wired in us. At least I know how I should roll. But embedding it is probably a 2 years struggle.
Bel I hope you don't mind me saying. You might have to work on collaborative frames even harder because of the nature of your profession. You re debating and dealing with adverserial people every day
Thank you, Anon for elaborating on the frame concept and with further references. I feel like I went in for a deep dive here, so thank you for helping me connect the dots. I really appreciate it!🙌
I also realise that I did in fact derailed the thread a bit with me presenting a concrete scenario which would fit better in the other thread you made, so I am sorry for that. If I come up with other experiences for short power moves, I will put them there. Even so, thank you Anon, Bel and Transitioned for still providing feedback on that particular scenario🙏. I learned a lot. Especially how to decompose a scenario to better analyse it: what frame is used, what type of power move is used, possible damage, etc.
One thing that was mentioned which I do think is relevant to the initial question:
Quote from Anon on June 24, 2022, 10:12 pmCan you think of other strategies and approaches on how to get better at quick response in high pressure situations?
is what Bel wrote about having an open mind and be aware of how fast an interaction can switch in seconds. I think this state of mind can help to be more mentally prepared ("it can happen anytime and given from anyone") to give fast and good responses. I believe this is more of an attitude, than an approach, but it made sense to me.
It really depends. For an actual answer, detailed scenario is needed as Lucio suggested in multiple posts and also in the forum guide.
If the asker/challenger is truly value-adding to you, then most of the time you will be comfortable enough to also provide a high-value reply back. Even if you cannot come-up-with a timely reply, it will be fine because value-adding people is often patient enough: they often hold positive believes, rather than negative beliefs like you are dull just because you are slow in response.
In case the challenger is a verbally value-taking dog, the first rule of the thumb is that you don't bite a dog because you are a human. If you bite a dog, everyone (include yourself) will categorize you as a dog. Instead, you can be amused by this laughable dog. Be grateful to this circus animal trying hard to amuse everyone.
Try not to be too emotional or too heavy; if you try harder than the dog, then, you become the circus animal.
In case they are challenging you physically, well, since we are in the 21 century civilized world, we do run away from a dog without sanity, even though we are theoretically capable of bite a dog to death.
This is a slightly amended format I came up with.
It combines the lower-level approaches of "gain time" + "stock answer" format while seeking to generalize a response with no specific high-level technique in mind:
- Stay calm and collected, which works 99% of the times
- Gain time, collect yourself, and display level-headedness with an observational statement, and either add matching body language (for example, corrugating eyebrows as if to say "what the fuck was that"), or only use body language (ie.: "shake your head in disapproval")
For example:- It's interesting you say that
- That was a strange thing to say/do...
- I feel that... (that wasn't very friendly of you)
- (shake head in disapproval)
- Agree with part of their frame when possible, which is the negotiating approach. Of course, if there's absolutely nothing you can agree with, for example with an out of the blue power move or heavy and false accusation, skip it
- I can agree with X
- I can partially agree with what you say
- Bridge: this is what makes your next frame smoother
- You make some strong statements here... (however... ) I'm afraid to say that...
- You seem to think that... (but...) In truth...
- Disagree: explain why whatever they said didn't make sense
- Set your new frame
- The reason why...
- What truly happened is...
- The crux of the matter is still that...
Thoughts... ?
Happy to read any feedback, possible amendments or ideas on this.
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Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on July 3, 2022, 10:15 am
- Stay calm and collected
- Gain time, collect yourself, and display level-headedness with an observational statement
- Agree with part of their frame when possible
- Bridge
- Disagree
- Set your new frame
It's a great framework, thank you very much Lucio. I think it deserves to be a sticky note so we can easily find it and come back to it. I re-structured it for my own learning above.
I meant: I collapsed it for my own learning.
It’s great Lucio!
I see a tendency toward longer sentences to address power moves, which I assume is functional to allow bystanders to “read” the interaction better, and to avoid coming across as blunt or curt and out of place.
It also seems to be great at avoiding giving the other person the idea that one is confrontational against the person, because it focuses on the issue. Very advanced.
Thank you John and Bel, very useful feedback!
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Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on July 3, 2022, 10:15 amThis is a slightly amended format I came up with.
It combines the lower-level approaches of "gain time" + "stock answer" format while seeking to generalize a response with no specific high-level technique in mind:
- Stay calm and collected, which works 99% of the times
- Gain time, collect yourself, and display level-headedness with an observational statement, and either add matching body language (for example, corrugating eyebrows as if to say "what the fuck was that"), or only use body language (ie.: "shake your head in disapproval")
For example:
- It's interesting you say that
- That was a strange thing to say/do...
- I feel that... (that wasn't very friendly of you)
- (shake head in disapproval)
- Agree with part of their frame when possible, which is the negotiating approach. Of course, if there's absolutely nothing you can agree with, for example with an out of the blue power move or heavy and false accusation, skip it
- I can agree with X
- I can partially agree with what you say
- Bridge: this is what makes your next frame smoother
- You make some strong statements here... (however... ) I'm afraid to say that...
- You seem to think that... (but...) In truth...
- Disagree: explain why whatever they said didn't make sense
- Set your new frame
- The reason why...
- What truly happened is...
- The crux of the matter is still that...
Thoughts... ?
Happy to read any feedback, possible amendments or ideas on this.
Very valuable for people who like to have a high level overview of the processes − I like it a lot.
Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on July 3, 2022, 10:15 amThis is a slightly amended format I came up with.
It combines the lower-level approaches of "gain time" + "stock answer" format while seeking to generalize a response with no specific high-level technique in mind:
- Stay calm and collected, which works 99% of the times
- Gain time, collect yourself, and display level-headedness with an observational statement, and either add matching body language (for example, corrugating eyebrows as if to say "what the fuck was that"), or only use body language (ie.: "shake your head in disapproval")
For example:
- It's interesting you say that
- That was a strange thing to say/do...
- I feel that... (that wasn't very friendly of you)
- (shake head in disapproval)
- Agree with part of their frame when possible, which is the negotiating approach. Of course, if there's absolutely nothing you can agree with, for example with an out of the blue power move or heavy and false accusation, skip it
- I can agree with X
- I can partially agree with what you say
- Bridge: this is what makes your next frame smoother
- You make some strong statements here... (however... ) I'm afraid to say that...
- You seem to think that... (but...) In truth...
- Disagree: explain why whatever they said didn't make sense
- Set your new frame
- The reason why...
- What truly happened is...
- The crux of the matter is still that...
Thoughts... ?
Happy to read any feedback, possible amendments or ideas on this.
Great tips, especially for a job interview or professional meeting where people often throw hard questions on you. Companies even intentionally use "stress interview" to see how you would response under pressure.
When facing an aggressively pressuring interviewer, one common advice is that you cannot just shrug the questions off. You must logically treat the interviewers' questions very seriously. Buying time, logic debates, and setting new frames are very important.
An alternative view I've read is that, medium is more important than messages. Dealing with the pressuring emotions is more important than coming-up-with a rationally perfect message. One should not let the aggressive questions derail the whole interview: one should not accept their competitive and aggressive frame by putting energy into defending and explaining. One should focuses on his own theme, strength, and the overall collaborative frame, while taking those emotionally pressuring questions as light as possible.