Lenny Rachitsky: prediction

Transcript context

…You can think about it some more, right? I'm not going to put you on the spot right now, but just to say for all of us, the reason they're difficult, to your point, they're difficult. But we're putting meaning on things all the time, every day, all the time, and I think it's important, it's actually helpful in motivating you to have difficult conversations, but also in helping them go well. If you can get to the bottom of what you're putting on top of it, what you're weighting it with, because I can understand that again, you are not alone. I don't want to make people upset. Totally. And also, I would just say on the other hand, when you're enlightening someone or you're working out a situation with someone and it's difficult, if you don't give them the opportunity to hear what you have to say, if you don't bring this up, then you're never going to have the opportunity to help them see something differently or help them improve or help you improve the relationship or whatever it is you're trying to do. And so, I can understand it's a natural thing. I don't want to make them upset. No one wants to make anybody upset, but through that upset on the other side of that, can often be a whole new possibility and a whole new revelation, and actually a lot of joy and freedom. I think that we forget about all the other possibilities that come out of difficult conversations and we just land on these really uncomfortable parts about like, "oh, it's going to be a lot of extra work" or like, "They're going to get uncomfortable or even maybe cry." And I think it's just really helpful to tap into what you make it mean and then also what other possibilities it could mean. I love that. And it's one thing to hear that and say that, it's another to actually feel that deeply and feel like I shouldn't be as worried as I am. I think part of it is doing these enough times where you're like, "Okay, it's actually not so hard. " And the other is having some of this support. To make this even more real, let's give some examples of what we say when we say difficult conversations. There's like, "You're not getting a promotion that you thought you would, we're going to let you go." What other examples or common difficult conversations that you run across? Those are two very common ones. And then of course, the most common one is just difficult performance feedback. Or [inaudible 00:08:56] what we say, quote unquote, "constructive performance feedback," which we never made positive. It only is the sort of things that you're not doing well. I think there are two flavors of that. One is, "You're screwing up" and the other is, "Developmentally, I'd like to see you add something or change something."…

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