Sunday, September 30, 2007

Disagree Agreeably

I am currently taking a Dale Carnegie Training Course. Last Wednesday, I learned a very beneficial lesson in my life, how to disagree agreeably. I notice myself turning people's ideas down constantly. How do you know if you are disagreeing with someone's opinion? Well, if you EVER use the words 'but', 'however', or 'nevertheless' in your sentences, then you are opposing one's idea. For example, Phil said "Hey Kamil, I like that new song on the radio by Matchbox 20," and I respond "I do too Phil, BUT......" Notice how everything I say is worthwhile until I use the word, BUT, then I end up disagreeing with everything Phil has just said.
So, while in training I learned to never use the word but : here is a small table of how disagreements should and should not be delivered :
Step 1) CUSHION : After the person speaks you cushion their opinion by saying "I hear you saying...", "I understand...", or "I appreciate your view..."
Step 2) USE : The words "and", "also", "in addition", or just a after your CUSHION.
Step 3) EXAMPLE : Use an example to let the person know where you're coming from with your opinion.
Step 4) YOUR OPINION : Deliver your open-ended opinion, after you have used all of the three steps.

Prior to 'Step 1' you should think about what you're going to say. Always ask yourself before speaking, "What do I think?" "Why do I think that?" "What evidence do I have?"

Once you become good at this process, I am guessing that you will be more open-minded to many ideas, since you will be thinking about what the other person is saying.

1 comment:

Mike Lavia said...

This is great, and I remember reading this in the Carnegie book, "How to win friends and influence people."

If you disagree with someone, sometimes the best thing to do is pause for at least 4-5 seconds. What this does is make the other person uncomfortable and begin speaking again. In most cases, they will start to disagree with that they had said, in which you begin agreeing with them. At this point, you are not telling them you're wrong, but letting them think of the idea on their own, an idea in which you completely agree on.

A great sales tool by the way!