Respectful communication is based on the premise that understanding others is as important as being understood by them.
Respectful communication builds trust, dispels stereotypes and enables people to be open to perspectives that are different from their own. This is an important approach to master when living in a diverse community.
Respectful communication is not about judging, weighing or making decisions quickly, but about understanding and learning. Respectful communication allows people to share their perspectives and experiences with one another even about difficult issues. It can facilitate both personal and collaborative action.
Respectful communication helps us engage in a sound decision-making process that involves all parties and explores all options, rather than addressing issues through the use of power or coercion. The trust, mutual understanding and relationships that are built by respectful communication allow community members to make better decisions in meetings and enjoy a higher quality of life.
Respectful communication helps us do many things important for maintaining a healthy community: to resolve conflicts and bridge divides; to build understanding about complex issues; to foster innovative solutions to problems and take action; and to reach agreement on policy decisions.
Community members utilize respectful communication in order to tackle issues and conflicts in new ways. Ways that enable us to share power effectively with each other, instead of ways that tend to leave people feeling overpowered and frustrated. Ways that welcome and validate all perspectives on an issue rather than hearing, once again, only from the most vocal and powerful parties.
The following steps can contribute to effective respectful communication in meetings:
Prep work
Get to know the issue, the stakeholders that are affected most, and other participants. When you are the presenter, prepare community members for discussing the issue by providing background materials.
Introductions
Facilitators introduce themselves and the agenda before proceeding. Participants should feel welcomed and appreciated, and should feel somewhat prepared for what’s ahead of them.
Establish/present ground rules
Also called “agreements,” ground rules are an important part of meetings. Ground rules such as “listen carefully and with respect,” “one person speaks at a time,” “speak for yourself, using I statements,” and “seek to understand rather than persuade” create a safe space for people with very different views and experiences. Adhering to ground rules that foster civility, honesty and respect is what makes respectful communication so different from adversarial debate and back-and-forth discussion.
Sharing personal stories and perspectives
Hearing from everyone at the table is a key principle in respectful communication. We may begin by hearing each other’s personal stories and perspectives on a potentially contentious issue. We may ask first “how has this issue played out in your life?” rather than “what do you think should be done about this issue?” or “What’s your take on this issue?” This builds trust in the group, establishes a sense of equality, and enables people to begin seeing the issue from perspectives other than their own. This is especially important when participants have different levels of technical knowledge or professional experience with the issue, or when some participants are not comfortable talking openly about contentious issues.
Exploring a range of views
When a wide variety of viewpoints on an issue are represented in the group, it is important to make sure the group explores a balanced range of those views. The facilitator’s role is to ensure that participants have the chance to explore and critique all of the primary viewpoints on an issue—even those unpopular with the entire group. This step prepares the community for answering the question “What should we do about this?”
Analysis and reasoned argument
We want meetings to be characterized by focused listening, deliberation, and thoughtful decision-making. Meetings aren’t just discussions to promote better understanding. They are the way we make the decisions that allow us to act together. People are challenged to consider the costs and consequences of various options and to ‘work through’ the potentially volatile emotions that are part of making decisions. The previous steps lay the groundwork for this important step.
Deciding on action steps or recommendations
If meetings do not move to action of one kind or another, participants are likely to leave feeling unsatisfied and frustrated. It is vital that community members understand how the process they just participated in will proceed. Participants may take any number of actions. They may commit themselves to establishing respectful communication groups to further explore an issue. They may establish new personal commitments to change how they handle an issue such as classism in their daily lives. Any member may make a new policy recommendation. Or members may start planning how to implement the solutions they came up with.
All of the steps above help to ensure that community members are able to create the collective wisdom that is essential for the development of sound, achievable decisions and policies, as well as the common ground and buy-in that is essential for effective, sustainable action to take place.