Fostering Flexibility: Tips for developing flexible thinking skills

November 6, 2024

Fostering Flexibility: Tips for developing flexible thinking skills

Do you ever have to interact with someone who is so rigid and all or nothing in their thinking, you avoid having to interact with them at all? Or maybe you have received the feedback from someone else that things aren’t all black and white and you need to work on seeing the gray. Rigid thinking, combined with emotional reactivity, can escalate conflicts, hinder problem-solving and stall creativity.

Why is Flexible Thinking Important?

Whether dealing with conflict in the workplace or in our personal lives, it’s crucial to develop the skill of Flexible Thinking. Flexible thinking acknowledges that there is more than one solution to a problem and that people are not “all-bad” or “all-good.” The opposite of All or Nothing Thinking, Flexible Thinking is one of the 4 Big Skills™ taught in all of the High Conflict Institute’s New Ways® training courses. Flexible thinking is also exercised in the Analyzing Options phase of the CARS Method® for problem-solving.

This skill allows all of us to consider different perspectives, adapt to change, and find creative solutions to problems. In high conflict situations, flexible thinking can be a game-changer, helping people to reduce conflict, overcome obstacles, and achieve their goals. It’s a skill that can be learned and practiced, leading to greater success in both personal and professional life.

Tips from the Experts

During the New Ways for Work® Coaching course I lead, we talk about coaching people in workplaces to improve their flexible thinking skills. I asked HCI’s high conflict experts to share their favorite techniques for encouraging flexible thinking to share in an article and here’s what they said:

CalmB4Think: Two-step approach

HCI Co-Founder and CEO, Megan Hunter teaches the CalmB4Think technique in Conflict Influencer™, a class for any individual who wants to learn skills for dealing with high conflict situations. CalmB4Think involves a two-step process: calming the reactive brain and engaging the thinking brain. Megan explains that starting with an EAR statementä acknowledges the other person’s emotions, helps to de-escalate the situation and creates a more receptive environment.

Once the emotional intensity has reduced, we can shift the focus to problem-solving by providing choices, information, analyzing options, or making proposals. Here are some examples of what to say for step two:

Choice/Question: “We can go with option 1 or option 2. Which sounds more appealing and workable to you?”
Information: “Here’s some information that a lot of people don’t know…”
Analyzing Options: “Let’s talk about your options. Here’s what we have available to us….”
Proposals: “What do you propose?” “What are your thoughts?” “Would you like to hear my proposal?”

CalmB4Think de-escalates conflict by building trust and gets you to next steps instead of staying stuck in conversations without resolution.

The Power of Alternatives

When individuals or parties to a dispute are stuck in all-or-nothing positions or thinking, HCI Co-Founder Bill Eddy likes to offer at least three alternatives that other people have used in similar circumstances. Then he asks if any if these alternatives give the people new ideas they might try.

Bill explains that this serves two purposes. First, they may actually use one of the alternatives in their thinking or new proposals. Second, it models for them that it is common to consider many ways to solve a problem, not just one all-or-nothing solution.

Rating Scales: Finding the Gray between Black & White

In her work with people with High Conflict Personalities, L. Georgi DiStefano, co-author of It’s All Your Fault At Work, notices the tendency of HCPs to respond to everything as if it were a five-alarm fire. All or nothing thinking, together with unmanaged emotions, can lead to extreme behaviors like storming out of a meeting or writing an email copying 5 levels of senior leaders in the organization.

When coaching HCPs or their supervisors on building flexible thinking skills, Georgi helps them think through what types of workplace conflicts warrant a “five-alarm fire” response, and what that response might look like. Then she has the person identify what a four-alarm, three-alarm, two-alarm, etc. response might look like and what types of situations would warrant those responses.

Another version of rating scales is found in the New Ways for Work® Workbook, also co-authored by Georgi. Coachees are encouraged to consider whether they would like to see a 20%, 30% or 50% improvement in their situation, and what that might look like. This helps develop skills for seeing improvement in flexible terms rather than all or nothing terms.

Georgi presents these techniques to clients who have a history of reactive responses but are usually not in the middle of a crisis. The scales help clients learn to keep issues in perspective and then, when in a crisis, to use the techniques outlined in this article. Georgi also uses scales to measure past responses and how the reaction could have been different considering how the client rates the situation after the fact.

Another way to use rating scales is to try rating a situation out of 10 and then consider what you would like to see in terms of improvement. You might say that the current situation is a 2/10 or a 4/10 and you’d like to see it improve to a 6/10 or 8/10. Then you can think, or talk with a coach, supervisor or supportive friend, about what the situation would have to look like order to be reassessed at a higher number and options for what to do differently in order to work towards achieving that.

All-Nothing-Middle

A technique I use with coachees who tend to see things in all or nothing terms is to start by articulating an “all” and a “nothing” interpretation or response to a given situation. For example, if the coachee describes a situation where a co-worker was snippy to them, the “all” interpretation might be that this is another example of how the co-worker has it in for the coachee. The “nothing” interpretation might be that it’s all in the coachee’s head.

Then I ask the coachee to come up with some interpretations that are somewhere in the middle. Once the all and nothing interpretations are articulated, the coachee might suggest that a middle interpretation could be that the person’s pet had just died so they were having a hard day. Then I encourage the person to list some more potential interpretations of why the co-worker was snippy. Practicing stating the “all”, “nothing” and “middle” interpretations repeatedly helps us develop the flexible thinking skill to use in other difficult situations we encounter.

A Structured Approach: The Proposals Method

A must-have tool for anyone who is working on flexible thinking skills has to include the Proposals Method. This technique can be quickly taught to anyone by anyone in any situation where there is a dispute and a need to move forward quickly. It works for one-on-one conversations, for facilitating dialogue between two people, and also for group meetings. Before you start, you have to articulate the topic being discussed in neutral terms. Then each person makes proposals in relation to that topic in these three steps:

Make a Proposal: Clearly state your proposal for who will do what, where and when
Ask & Answer Questions: The recipient of the proposal asks clarifying questions and the proposer provides answers
Respond to the Proposal: The recipient responds Yes, No or I’ll think about it. If they say no, they have to make a counter-proposal.

Each person continues making proposals until there is a plan everyone can live with for how to move forward. The Proposals Method is a powerful tool for several reasons. Rather than making demands that others may find off-putting, it encourages people to exchange suggestions or proposals for what to do and build the plan together. The method encourages considering other people’s perspectives rather than dismissing them immediately. The method also provides for flexible thinking within a structured format which reduces the likelihood of conversations derailing. For a deeper dive on the Proposals Method look for Bill Eddy’s book, So, What’s Your Proposal?

Conclusion

Conflict is a normal and healthy part of life, but when people think in rigid, all or nothing terms, conflict can escalate and become unhealthy. The remedy for all or nothing thinking is Flexible Thinking, one of the 4 Big Skills™ for resolving conflict constructively. This article provides tips and techniques from some High Conflict Institute experts that anyone can use for developing their own flexible thinking skills or supporting someone else in developing their flexible thinking skills.

New Ways for Work® training courses:

Are you looking to develop your leadership or coaching skills for dealing with high conflict behavior in workplaces or organizations? New Ways for Work® Leaders and New Ways for Work® Coaching livestream online courses are offered several times per year.

Cherolyn Knapp, B.Comm, LL.B, Q.Med is a conflict resolution consultant, mediator, trainer, workplace investigator, and lawyer based in Victoria, Canada. She holds a B.Comm (Human Resources) from Toronto Metropolitan University and an LL.B. from the University of Ottawa. Cherolyn began teaching HCI’s techniques in 2020, and she now brings a thorough knowledge of high conflict personality traits and resolution strategies to HCI’s trainings. Cherolyn is the New Ways for Work® instructor for HCI.