The Sucking Air Solution™: Achieve Success by Being Quiet

When children are little, their parents can’t wait for them to start talking. Then these cute little kids grow up and become people who work. These people are very busy telling, sharing, advising, exhorting and chatting. In fact, once they’ve learned how to talk, it seems as if they can’t stop! In business, this can be a big problem. The strategy and skill that would make people exceptional in their interpersonal interactions is the one that is least used and I call it The Sucking Air Solution™.

This essential but little used strategy is the answer to many of the hurdles encountered in the workplace. Whether you run the company, report to the boss, work alongside of coworkers, or deal directly with the customer, you have the potential to be much more effective than you are. And unlike those phrases that sound like you are reciting lines from a badly written play, this solution can be used anywhere, with anyone, and at anytime.  You can make it your own immediately and that means you can experience success right away.  

It sounds attractive: quick success, more effective outcomes, improved interactions. Like most things in human interaction concerning adults, the biggest challenge is your already well-ingrained habits. It’s hard to stop doing what you are doing and employing a new strategy and behavior. 

Talking Is a Problem
Most people are more interested in what they have to say than what others are saying. We offer solutions and advice often without a thorough understanding of the context, often resulting in an inadequate remedy. Words spoken in anger or haste can not be taken back and often result in an undesirable outcome. Yet we can’t stop ourselves. Why? Because we need to be right. And we can’t just BE right; our being right must be acknowledged. In order for THAT to happen, we have to be right out loud.  

Yeah But ---
Driving without looking where you are going is chaotic and unsafe. Speaking without choosing your words, interrupting, responding in anger, or rushing to get your words in can provide the same disastrous result.  Still, we plow through interpersonal interactions not just speaking, but actually formulating responses while the other person is talking. We focus on how we will make our point with such focus we don’t pick up on many of the cues and clues provided. We think logic will persuade and the clarity with which we see the world just needs to be exported to others. We are so eager to be right that this need competes with paying attention. Being right is best! It’s critical. And whoever is most right gets to be in control.  Altering this behavior is a real challenge.

A Boss Knows What to Do
If you are the Boss, it means you know things your employees don’t. You have the answers, the experience, the responsibility, and the title. When employees come to you with problems, the most efficient thing to do seems to be to tell them that to do. If you have hired people with working brains however, you aren’t leveraging their talent or fostering development by providing solutions. The employee who screws up a project, the professional who can’t seem to take initiative or the staff member who appears to have a chip on his shoulder all need something more effective than an answer from you. If you want to really help your employees and your organization, think about developing them into employees who take initiative. Then they would stop coming to you and you could get on with doing the things ONLY you can do. 

Employees Have Good Ideas
Employees are hired for their skills, experience, potential and talent. You have so much to offer; fresh ideas, innovative suggestions and a desire to make an impact. If you are being passed over for assignments, ignored in meetings, or your ideas are not getting the air time and attention they should, the problem may not be with your ideas or with the people you are talking to, but with your timing. If you want to be heard and play a bigger part of creating solutions at work there is a possible solution.  There are big career payoffs to biting your tongue and biding your time.

Colleagues Can Help Out
We think we see the world pretty clearly and want to share our perspective with colleagues and friends. It is affirming to find like-minded coworkers. If people see things differently, we can illuminate their view. We all see the world through a unique perspective that is truly and only our own. If you ever thought you were helping out but simply made a mess of things, gotten an angry reaction when you expected the wink of an ally, or ruined a valued relationship when you intended to build a stronger one, the answer could be closer than you think.

Customers Can Educate You
Clients and customers keep us in business. If they have information and expectations that don’t fit what we are providing, our job is to straighten them out, right?  Not exactly! If your goal is to strengthen a client relationship, smooth ruffled feathers, buoy disappointment, divert anger into collaborative problem solving and keep those customers coming, you need to do something that brings them closer rather than severing valued ties.

How it Works
When you Suck Air and inhale, it’s practically impossible to speak. Those who try to speak and Suck Air at the same time end up sounding like a braying donkey and running out of both breath and words. Call it the professional version of counting to 10, The Sucking Air Solution™ is the best remedy for talking. It stops it immediately. You can even repeat it several times in a row if you think you'll be tempted to speak rather than be silent. Listening is the great alternative

Silence is Golden
There are many benefits to using the Sucking Air Solution™ and implementing it effectively. Not talking aids in creating rapport, obtaining information, reducing conflict, and creating alignment. This situational solution can help you do all of that and more! The goal is not perfection but improvement. Both a strategy and a skill, integrating the Sucking Air Solution™ can take a lifetime to master, but it can be applied immediately and that means you can see the results right away.

You already know what you think. When you stop speaking, people don’t know exactly what is on your mind - and that may not be such a bad thing. 

 © Daniels & Associates. All Rights Reserved.

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In the News

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