LAVA: A Blueprint to Better Conversations

Alex Cullimore: “That’s a huge portion of coaching training is letting go of the idea that you have an answer. You might think you know, but really, getting into your bones with the idea that you don’t have the other person’s answer is a giant stepping stone.”

[INTRO]                                                   

Alex Cullimore: Welcome to Uncover the Human where every conversation revolves around enhancing all the connections in our lives.

Cristina Amigoni: Whether that's with our families, coworkers, or even ourselves.

Alex Cullimore: When we can be our authentic selves, magic happens.

Cristina Amigoni: This is Cristina Amigoni.

Alex Cullimore: This is Alex Cullimore. 

Both: Let's dive in.

“Authenticity means freedom.”

“Authenticity means going with your gut.”

“Authenticity is bringing 100% of yourself not just the parts you think people want to see, but all of you.”

“Being authentic means that you have integrity to yourself.”

“It's the way our intuition is whispering something deep-rooted and true.”

“Authenticity is when you truly know yourself. You remember and connect to who you were before others told you who you should be.”

“It's transparency, relatability. No frills. No makeup. Just being.”

[EPISODE]

Alex Cullimore: Welcome back to this episode of Uncover the Human. Today, it's Cristina and I, and we are here to discuss one of our favorite modules, or, I don't know, one of our favorite topics, modules, courses, pieces of our course.

Cristina Amigoni: Acronym.

Alex Cullimore: It's not a full module. It's a piece of a thing. Yes. It's a piece of a piece.

Cristina Amigoni: One of the first acronyms, actually.

Alex Cullimore: Yes. This has been a very popular one. We've probably referred to it a few times even on this podcast, to be honest and we definitely refer to it plenty with everybody who goes through our leadership program. That has always been one of the more popular takeaways. I think it's just easy to grab onto and it's one of those that we came up with a couple of good exercises that help people, I think, viscerally connects to what it means. So, we're excited to talk about it, excited to share it with you.

Cristina Amigoni: It is. It's interesting because as you'll hear it, it's not brain surgery. It's nothing complicated. It's not finding a way to go live on Venus. There are definitely familiar concepts, but there's something about the acronym and how it's been received that has stuck with people quite a lot.

Alex Cullimore: Yes. It's always surprisingly popular. So, let's talk about what the acronym is and kind of the intended use of it. The acronym as it is, and as it continues to spread, which is a good word for this acronym is LAVA. So, L-A-V-A that is standing for listening, acknowledging, validating, and asking open-ended questions. It is kind of a distillation of a lot of the coaching process, a lot of the practices that go into coaching, as well as a good way for having deeper conversations and generally stronger connections with people. It's a way to kind of think about what you might need to do to be able to really connect with somebody and to have people feel listened to.

So, where do you want to start on this? I guess we can start right from the top and talk about what got us all into this and go right into listening.

Cristina Amigoni: It's funny. It's been integrated in everything we do so much that I don't even know how it originated. I don't remember how it all started, but I do remember that we wanted to create something that was simple to remember and kind of step by step process on how to basically create better human connections. It's like, how do we get to the point where humans are connecting better. They're communicating more efficiently and communications actually happening as opposed to just words and information going back and forth and people just not even being on the same page.

It probably also goes back to how we always talk about creating space. So, that's one thing to talk about creating space for others, to process what they're doing, to share what they're going through, to feel heard, to feel listened to, to feel like they exist, and the piece that that's the concept, that's the theory, and that's the goal almost. But then how do you actually get there? And LAVA, I think is one of those things that that's how you actually start creating that space and then creating that trust and then go from there.

Alex Cullimore: Yes, we originally, I guess, started to think about this because we were asked by companies, how do we have better conversations? How do we do one-on-ones better? How do we make sure that we're connecting with our staff? How do we make sure we're hearing the things that we need to hear from our employees? We actually kind of went into, “Hey, well, what are tools we've used and see be effective?” And we thought about coaching and coaching is a very effective way of both eliciting necessary information for people and helping people feel a lot more comfortable so that they engage and create some of that space to share things. It is a great way to help foster things like psychological safety and make people feel heard and empowered and ready to continue and move forward.

So, with that, we started with like, how do we get people to think about this? And we thought about the coaching process and it goes from really LAVA in order. You deeply listen, you understand what's happening, you acknowledge what they're saying, and validate what they're saying, and we'll go through what these are. And then you can ask an open-ended question that digs in deeper and gathers more context, more information, and allows people to feel both listened to and to have a chance to sort out their own mental thoughts on whatever you're talking about.

So, we thought about what does listening really mean? And we went through some of Oscar Trimboli's research, and he talks a lot about how we each have, and we've discussed this one on the podcast for sure, talked about the washing machine of ideas in your head, and you have some 900 words a minute that you can think consciously, not of any necessarily coherence or linear order, but we have about 900 words we can think. We can listen at about 400 words a minute, and then we can speak at around 100, maybe 125 words a minute generally. You can see the drop off between what you're thinking and what you're able to communicate, versus you've got somebody on the other end of a conversation. This is to say nothing of a group conversation where there's even more words going on, but just between two people, you've got two different thought streams happening at 900 words a minute. At best, you can have this kind of midstream conduit of 125 words a minute passing through, and that's just the verbal portion of communications that can only amount to so much.

Deeply listening is a way to try and bridge the gap between the what is being thought and what is being communicated and make sure that that is truly actually communicated in the two-way sense where both what is intended to be said is being said and being received and understood. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. One of my favorite things that Oscar Trimboli actually talks about is how deeply listening is actually helping the speaker process what's in their head. It goes beyond the listener understanding what's going on. It's really about opening that space and creating that condition where, because there's so much going on in everybody's head and there's so much that we bring to any conversations or any interaction, it's allowing that space to unpack. So many times, we'll say something and then after it comes out, I'm like, “No, that's not what I mean. That didn't come out well.” It's because there's so much happening in our head that's influenced by all sorts of things.

So, the deep listener, the active listener then becomes the person that allows for that just chaos to become a little less chaotic, especially when there is something important to say, like we're not talking about, can you add milk to the list when you go to the grocery store type of conversation.

Alex Cullimore: You're deeply listening for that.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. I mean, it would be nice if you deeply listen to that so that you don't forget and you actually write it down and I'm sure that's happened.

Alex Cullimore: It's a different type of deep.

Cristina Amigoni: Exactly. It's a different type of listening. That's listening to understand and remember and be considerate, but when we talk about pretty much any other conversation, especially conversations that are full of emotions. We all come in with our script, we all come in with our version of the story, and so the deep listening is when we can step back and say, like, “This is not my moment. This is not the moment for my script and my story. This is the moment to allow for the space to understand what's going on and go beyond that and allow the speaker to process all the stuff that's happening so that then we can move into a true communication.”

Alex Cullimore: You hit it on it a little bit with the idea of like listening to understand it, remember, and there are pieces of that because if you think about we break listening into kind of three areas. There's the more subjective listening where you're just waiting to give your own input, put your own experience in there, we all do these things. These are not like necessarily terrible to do. It's just not necessarily deep or enhancing the connection. But if you have subjective listening, you're listening for, how does this relate to me? What story am I going to tell? You're listening to wait essentially for your turn to talk. You might get a little piece of the topic and use that as your launching board for what you're going to talk about, but you're not really listening to what they're saying or how they feel about it. Then you can kind of get a little bit deeper. You get to objective listening where you're thinking more about, “Okay, I understand what you're saying and I will respond to your thoughts on it.” It seems like you're thinking maybe this about it and we're just saying, “Hey, I hear what you're saying. I see that this is something that is worrisome to you or something.” Whatever you're reacting to.

Finally, you get into the deep listening where you're really trying to hear everything that is being said, not just verbally, but by the tone and energy of the person saying it. So, you're going into what is the body language? What do they seem like they're excited about? What do they seem like they're dreading? What do they seem like they might notice? And being able to respond to all of that and acknowledge that, “Hey, this seems like what you're saying. Is that what you mean?” And really hear the person on as many levels as possible, and that helps close the gap from the 125 still jarbled words that we tend to say, and jarbled is not even a word. I just threw that, but I messed that one up. That’s garbled.

Cristina Amigoni: Plus the ones that we create on the fly, which I do all the time.

Alex Cullimore: Like jarbled. 

Cristina Amigoni: Jarbled. I thought it was a real world. I don't know why that's not a real word. It should be.

Alex Cullimore: Garbled is the one. It's just either a mispronunciation or it is a, I'm jamming some other word into that.

Cristina Amigoni: I can claim non-native. I think jarbled is better than garbled.

Alex Cullimore: I'm going to make this a thing like GIF or GIF. I'm just going to say that it's totally fine to say it, by the way.

Cristina Amigoni: Totally is. It'll be the new Webster Dictionary word for 2025.

Alex Cullimore: Jarbling. I lost by jarbles.

Cristina Amigoni: Which is exactly what happens is when you lose your jarbles, then you start jarbling.

Alex Cullimore: That's exactly what I just did. I was on a track, and then I realized I had said that wrong because I said it out loud and heard myself say it. Now, we're down a path of making up words and whether that counts. That's actually a pretty good example of the fact that there is meaning even when the words aren't fully together. We still understand that as long as we're listening, as long as we can listen for the content, see what we're trying to say, put in the context, clues, try to listen enough that the context pieces that might not easily be put together by the speaker are still accessible in the conversation and to the listener.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Then as you said, there are the three types and we fall into the first two all the time, even unintentionally, especially when we're in a hurry, when we're not in that space. We didn't actually prep for that space to be in a deeply listening. It doesn't excuse not doing it. I mean, we could definitely do it on the fly. It's something once you start practicing, it becomes a muscle. Then it becomes just how you show up a lot more often than not. That's when communication happens. That's when empathy, I mean, the non-subjective and non-objective, but the deep listening is when empathy can really show up. Because before that, we don't really know what's going on. We can't understand what's happening on the other side because we're too deep into our own stories.

Alex Cullimore: That's a very easy one to fall into. Somebody might be telling us something and we feel like we know what that kind of experience. We've had a similar experience. We may want to interject with like, “Here's what I would do. Here's the things that I think about that. Here's what went wrong when I was in a similar situation.” And the truth is, the context is always at least a little different and usually a lot different. Even if the surface feels very similar, what the answer may be, who the other players in the arena are for this certain scenario that somebody's bringing up, those all impact, and they know that context better than we ever will. That's not a problem. They can know that context, and we can still help them if we allow them to express that context and not put our own into it.

Cristina Amigoni: Indeed. Well, should we give examples of the three types of listening?

Alex Cullimore: Sure. Subjective listening where you're kind of just responding.

Cristina Amigoni: All right. We can use our usual example or just come up with a new one?

Alex Cullimore: Those are the easy ones that I have on top of my head from too many times. So, I might say something like, “Ah man, I'm really worried about that job interview.” 

Cristina Amigoni: “Oh, you'll be fine. I do great in job interviews.” So, 

Alex Cullimore: That's where the subject changes. Now, it's no longer about me or my job interviews. The subject has changed to the listener. Now, you're subjective listening because now you're talking about your experience with job interviews. “Oh, I do great with this.” That doesn't help the person who was worried about job reviews, particularly that just iterates that maybe even add so just a little dash of shame on top of like, “Well, look, other people are fine with this.”

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Well, I think the thing to remember is that when we do use subjective listening, which we do, and it happens a lot, a lot more often than we probably are aware of, or we would like to. It's not ill intended. We're not just showing up and say like, “Today, I am going to make sure to not listen to anyone and make sure nobody's heard and just go out and destroy lives. That's my goal for the day and destroy connections.” It's really more about we're not in that mindset and so we haven't really switched our mindset yet, but also, a lot of times it's discomfort. We don't know especially when there's difficult emotions like worry, fear, grief, anger, all of that. Sometimes it can be very often hard to want to take that on, to want to go there.

So, the toxic positivity of like, “Oh, you'll be fine. I do great in job interviews.” It's a way to like, “I don't want to have this conversation.” I don't, I don't have the skills, I don't have the tools, I am not mentally, emotionally prepared to go down the path of unpacking your worry.

Alex Cullimore: I'll have to say, there's obviously times where we don't have that time, we don't have the energy, we don't have the ability to respond to somebody else's. But if we can be more cognizant of that, it's easier for us to then clarify that with somebody and be like, “I get that this is an issue. I'm really sorry. I don't have the space. I don't have the capacity to respond to this right now,” or whatever the appropriate way of saying that is to help just identify that, “I get that, I feel you, I understand you want to share this and I'm currently overloaded and don't have the space.” So, it's okay to you. It's not like we should always have the deep listening. We can't, we can't always be in this.

Cristina Amigoni: It's not always the right moment for many reasons. Right, so objective listening.

Alex Cullimore: Again, somebody says something like, “Oh, I'm really worried about that job interview.”

Cristina Amigoni: “Oh, you'll be great. You always ace your job interviews.”

Alex Cullimore: It is technically addressing the job interview. The subject stays on the person who said it originally, but it doesn't necessarily address any of the feelings about it and it's still kind of rolling on and rolling over the topic rather than engaging with it. It doesn't change the object and the focus. It does technically respond to all of the verbal content and it doesn't necessarily move the conversation forward or open up the connection.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, exactly. Yes, it's closer, but we're skipping over the worried part and focusing on the easy part, which is the interview itself.

Alex Cullimore: Which is still different than subjective, where we're skipping over all of that entirely and just relaying our experience with job interviews.

Cristina Amigoni: Exactly. Well, we just are basically saying, like, “Don't talk to me right now. Talk to the hand.”

Alex Cullimore: Yes. This is what I want to say about that.

Cristina Amigoni: Exactly. And I want to change the subject.

Alex Cullimore: So then, deep listening, the deeper portion of this. If I come out again with something like, “Ah man, I'm really worried about that job interview.”

Cristina Amigoni: And here's where the deep listening is like, “Oh wow, that makes a lot of sense. This is an important step for you. Tell me more about it.”

Alex Cullimore: There's getting into understanding like, “Hey, acknowledging the feelings, which we'll talk about acknowledging and validating.” Acknowledging some of that and validating that that makes sense. This is something that's happening for you and asking for a little bit more information, not changing the subject at all, opening that space, hearing that there is worry and the statement, not just because verbally we say, “Hey, I'm worried about that,” but because we can feel that that person is on edge about it.

Cristina Amigoni: That's when you can unpack and be there and have those conversations. Now, again, having the space, the physical space and just the space to do that is very important because it is, especially when there is something to process. If you want somebody to be heard, well, you have to be there for them. So, anything from removing distractions, closing down notifications, putting your phone away, whatever medium that is. But if it's non-video or not in person and you're just on the phone, one of the things that I do, like I start walking around the house. I get away from anything that could distract me.

So, if it's nice outside, I'll go outside and start walking around. If it's not nice outside, I'll walk inside to get away from the possible attachment to laptop or phone or something else. And then even just breathing, taking deep breath, drinking water that slows down the brain and we can stop our own chaos in our head. We can stop our own stories and wanting to interject and thinking that we know what the answer is. So, that's the other piece. We have to leave the space for the silences. Leave the space for realizing, like, I don't know what the answer is going to be when I ask a question. I don't know what comes next. It's not my experience and it's not my script.

Alex Cullimore: That's one thing that comes directly from coaching, but is applicable for anybody trying to like enhance connections with people is that you don't have the answer for the other person. You may feel like you know what you would do in the situation. You may feel like that you totally get what they're going through. You may even have pieces that could be helpful to them. That doesn't mean that they're in a space to absorb that. That doesn't mean that that's actually what they're going through. And that's one huge portion of coaching training is letting go of the idea that you have an answer. You might think, “Oh, I've been in this experience before. Oh, you're having a fight with a co-worker. I've had a fight with a co-worker. Here's what I would do.” You might try and lead them towards something that is not nefarious.

We think we do this to help. We think we're adding something that is helpful, but really getting into your bones with the idea that you don't have the other person's answer is a giant stepping stone where you will open up so much more space when you start to really get curious about like. So, what's your experience with this? Not, what's my experience with something similar? What's your experience with this? And trusting that we don't know. When going through coach training, that was one thing where so many times, anytime I thought I had the answer, I was wrong, by a decent margin, sometimes just really off. And getting comfortable with like, it's okay not to know, you can still help somebody. It's not about your experience because your experience is yours, their experience is theirs. It's okay for those to be separate and you can still help people.

Cristina Amigoni: So, let's move to acknowledging. The first A.

Alex Cullimore: The A, yes, the first A, acknowledging. So, acknowledging coming down to literally paraphrasing and mirroring what you've heard. It's a way of stating what that person seems to be saying, which really helps confirm both that that person has been listened to or finds the gaps, finds the places where they weren't clear about what they said. I mean, how many times have we said something and somebody goes off and does either something a little bit different or has a totally different interpretation, or they respond to something where like, “Oh, I'm sorry, you're right. That's not actually what I meant.” So, really getting into the, “Oh, I hear what you're saying. So, what I'm hearing is blank. “Oh, it seems like you're thinking this,” and not presuming that we are correct in that, but doing our best to just reiterate what we have heard, which confirms that communication has happened and makes the person know that whatever they're saying is heard.

It's also a great way of diffusing generally circular conversations where two people start going back and forth saying the same things to each other and at each other without changing. If you could acknowledge like, “Okay, I see what you're saying. I see that you want to do project X this way because you're worried about the timeline on this.” I understand that, but I don't think that's possible because of these things or like I understand what you're saying, and here's my concern with that. That allows it to be heard and we don't feel like we have to repeat ourselves because we're not understood.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, exactly. It's a huge piece and acknowledging is, it's difficult sometimes because we want to skip to asking the questions, we want to skip to the next step, but it's a huge piece to then reiterate that listening piece. It's not just about being silent and not saying anything and leaving the space and being curious, but it's also acknowledging the fact that you're paying attention, you are hearing what's been said, and you are present and curious and are trying to remove. We all have our scripts, but you're really working to remove that script in our head.

Alex Cullimore: Or at least remove that script has the right answers and we can acknowledge our own script as long as we can also acknowledge somebody else who doesn't try our best to understand that.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, exactly. You're acknowledging that that happened, that the person felt that way. It's not about how we would feel, it's not about what we would do, it's that actually happened. Yes, it did.

Alex Cullimore: So, acknowledging is a lot about some of the content, and that can be both a little bit of the emotional content as well as a lot of these verbal content, and it's about confirming the understanding. That brings us to validating, because validating is very much about the emotional content. So, when you're validating.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Validating is not condoning. It's not necessarily agreeing with. Sometimes I don't think it's even about understanding how it feels because we are different people and I can try to understand all day long and be like, “Nope, still don't get it.” But it is about validating that somebody's emotions are valid. It doesn't matter whether we agree with them. That's how we would feel. If we can understand them, they are completely valid. We cannot tell someone who shares their emotions to say like, “No, you don't have the right to feel that way.” I'm like, “They kind of do. Their emotions are very appropriate because they're their emotions.”

Alex Cullimore: Having the right or not, the emotions there. So, it's a very much a side issue. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, there's nothing to do with right or wrong or appropriate or not. The emotion is there, it was felt. It caused something, it caused a response, it caused a reaction, it caused a trauma, it caused moving in a different direction. That's it. The emotion exists.

Alex Cullimore: That makes an acknowledging and validating really powerful. It is just acknowledging that that does exist, validating, that it makes sense that it feels that way, saying that, “Yes, I see what you're saying and it makes sense that you're angry about that. It makes sense that that is upsetting. It makes sense that I was very disappointing, whatever it is.” Whether we would feel that way or not. I mean, anybody with kids will know that they may have a meltdown over something that you're like, this is not a big deal at all, but you can't tell them this is not a big deal at all. It is a big deal. They are feeling it. They are feeling that as a big deal. 

Cristina Amigoni: It doesn't go very well. Doesn't make the big deal any smaller. 

Alex Cullimore: I don't know why I brought that as kids. Also, don't appreciate that.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, exactly. It usually makes the big deal much bigger even when you've made be moved on and now you're like, “Oh, now I'm back in it and it's way bigger than before.” Because I don't only feel the way I do but now I feel bad about feeling the way I do, which is the double arrow, which is just devastating sometimes.

Alex Cullimore: Acknowledging and validating is a really good way to remove meta-feelings that we talked, or at least remove the stain of better feelings feeling like, “Oh, my God, I'm really angry about this, but I shouldn't feel angry about this. I can't still feel angry about this.” We all get trapped in that. Sometimes other people will tell us we shouldn't feel angry about things. Validating is the antidote to that. Understandably. No, it's okay. I understand it, but it makes sense to be upset about this. And in both acknowledging and validating, and you mentioned this briefly, but just to highlight it because I think people get hung up on this sometimes. Neither of these is endorsing or agreeing with.

If so, like that the example of an argument kind of going back and forth, you can acknowledge what the other person is saying without agreeing with it, without endorsing it. You can acknowledge that somebody is frustrated without agreeing with it, without saying that that's okay. It's okay to simultaneously understand that people are angry and say, “It's not okay to yell at everybody about it.” Those are okay. It's okay to validate. It makes sense to be angry. Also, you're now infringing on everybody else's space and blowing that up over everybody. It's not the same as saying everybody gets to say everything all the time and everything is allowable. You still have to have just general courtesy from people. It's allowing for the space that feelings are there and that whatever they're trying to say, acknowledging it so that it is known that it is understood, even if there is still disagreement on the topic.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, exactly. It's definitely not a way to say you have to go against your own values. This is still not about you. It's about the other person. You can still have your own values. Sometimes that's a way to understand. I'm like, “Okay, there's a misalignment here. Is it temporary or is it permanent?” If it's permanent, well, now you know.

Alex Cullimore: That's better to know those things than just to continue to bump along.

Cristina Amigoni: All right, So, now we got –

Alex Cullimore: Oh, and the one last portion on both acknowledging and validating. Don't follow them with a but. I think even in my example there, it totally makes sense that you feel that way, but – well, now, all of that acknowledgment is right out the window.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes.

Alex Cullimore: I get what you're saying. But –

Cristina Amigoni: You shouldn't feel that way. That's done. Yes.

Alex Cullimore: Yes. Also, a quick side note. It is helpful sometimes to bring that into more general terms, not I understand what you're saying, but it makes sense that you feel that way. Because sometimes if you say, “Oh, I understand that,” if they're maybe complaining about somebody else or they just had a bad experience with somebody else, then it just kind of brings it into a bubble. It's not like it's bad to relate to somebody that way, but it doesn't necessarily mean that they're right to feel that way. They're like, “Well, I know you and it's okay that you're upset in this tiny circle, but in general, keep that to yourself.” So, trying to keep those general can sometimes help.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, definitely. You can still acknowledge and validate and be there for somebody without necessarily, yes, bringing your own opinion. Also, the I brings it back to you. Now, it's about me. I understand it. If it is a heated conversation, whether it's about dishes in the sink, or something much deeper, you could get into the – now, it becomes the argument about like, “Well, you don't because you're not me.” So now, you have completely disregarded what needs to be talked about and what needs to be resolved. It's not about who's right and wrong.

Alex Cullimore: Yes. Now, the age-old idea that you should be like, if you're in a fight with somebody, you should be fighting the problem, not the person. If you start to bring all those pronouns that are personal into it, whether personal for you or the other person, that can very quickly change the context to where it feels like it's arguing between the people instead of about the problem.

Cristina Amigoni: It becomes an, I versus you, situation where if you are sharing how you feel and you're doing it in a way that it's about I feel this way, but then instead of the – you get the acknowledging and validating, I'm like, “Oh yes, it makes sense that you feel that way and you shouldn't. Now, it becomes about you.” Well, again, it's not about that. So, let's keep it to feelings are valid. If I feel this way, I feel this way. That's it.

Alex Cullimore: One thing I forgot to mention on listening, but we can mention for both of these ss we have a very easy exercise that helps people practice this. If people are interested in doing it, you can find somebody, find a partner. What you do is, is what we call it deep weekending. It practicing deep listening where one person at a time for three to five minutes, we'll share there last weekend, chronologically, just as much as you can remember, just think about like, “Hey, what happened on Friday night? What did I do Saturday morning, afternoon, evening?” Sunday morning, afternoon, evening. tell it in chronological order and the other person can only listen, can only deeply – is there to just try and understand everything they can from that story based on how the person is telling it.

If you're going to put in any questions, just to clarify what they might have done or put in an acknowledgement or validation if you want to try and practice those. That’s the most that you can do in the listening position. Then have that, swap roles, have both people share it, and then reflect for each other, what were the high and low energy points of the weekend? What were you listening to? Like, “Oh, you seem really excited about that. Or that must have been really hard. It seems like that was a rougher part of the weekend.” It takes often a surprising amount of energy if we're not used to doing this to keep that engaged while listening and to make sure we're not putting ourselves into the conversation.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, definitely. That is a great exercise. And it's usually when people start to understand it. Before then it's just theory and examples, but then once they're in it, like, “Oh, I really felt heard. Wow.” And, “Oh, it was really hard to not interject with my own weekend and my ideas and my advice.” That's when you'd really know how it feels, which then it's an imprint now that you know how it feels. Just like Maya Angel says, “It's not about what we say or what we hear, it's about how we feel.”

Alex Cullimore: How we make people feel, and that is what they will remember and reflect a little bit on what it feels like both to listen and to be listened to.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, exactly.

Alex Cullimore: Often this is a little bit different than how we are often listened to. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. All right. So now, we've got, asking open-ended questions. 

Alex Cullimore: Asking open-ended. So first of all, what is an open-ended question? 

Cristina Amigoni: Oh, well, it's one that you can't answer yes or no. Now, if you have kids and they're especially pre-teen, teen, they manage to close open-ended questions too. So, it's not a guarantee that people are actually going to share what's going on. However, it does get a little bit closer to that. So, close-ended question would be something like I'm so used to asking open-ended questions now that I can't even figure out how close that in questions. Did you have a good day?

Alex Cullimore: Yes. Was your day good?

Cristina Amigoni: Exactly. Was your day good? Like, “Yes.” All right. Conversation is over. Now –

Alex Cullimore: Do you need anything else as a common moment in the workplace? You need to answer with yes or no?

Cristina Amigoni: No. I'm all set.

Alex Cullimore: Usually a no.

Cristina Amigoni: Usually a no because there's a shaming. There's a possibility. If I say yes, I may lose my job. If I say yes, I'm feeling. If I say yes, all those stories that go on. Yes. So, open-ended questions allow the opposite of that. How was your day?

Alex Cullimore: It expands. It digs for more context. It allows people to share that context. How was your day is a great example of what your pre-teen can turn into a closed-ended question. “How was your day?” “Fine.”

Cristina Amigoni: “Good.”

Alex Cullimore: “Good.”

Cristina Amigoni: “Terrible.”

Alex Cullimore: “Terrible. Oh, and what happened?”

Cristina Amigoni: “Tell me more about it.” “I don’t want to.”

Alex Cullimore: “It wasn’t great. I don’t want to talk about it.” It's hilarious when we do this for people. We talk about open-ended questions and things like how was your day or getting into, giving them a little seed of something like what was the most exciting part of your day? What was the hardest part of your day? What was your favorite part of this day? Whatever it is, that giving them a little bit of something to kick off of those are great open-ended questions because it allows for much more answer and is looking for much more answer than, which does not say everybody will always respond that way, but it is looking for much more, but they often start with a what, or a how rather than was your day good. Did you have a good time? Those are yes or no.

It can sound like the same thing. How was your day and did you have a good day can easily be interchanged in our minds and feel like the same thing, but they have a very different path. How can open up a lot easier than did? Sometimes you just have a good friend that you guys are both comfortable with just sharing information with each other. You'll ask it whatever way you want and they'll give the information either way. They'll give it as an open as a question either way. But when you purposely restructure your questions with people who are closed off, you have a better chance of opening that up.

Cristina Amigoni: Indeed. I am known if I feel safe to, I don't care if you ask the questions. I'll share it even before you ask the questions. So, you can ask me a close-ended question. “How was your week?” “Horrific.” And then take it from there. 

Alex Cullimore: Yes. I’ll let you decide where you want to go with this.

Cristina Amigoni: That's where I know –Exactly. That's where I know. Is there time space and is this the moment to unpack that and then you can go from there, or you just anticipate the question and just reach out and say, “Yes, horrific time. How's your week?”

Alex Cullimore: It's funny when we go through all of LAVA and we talk to people about like this is a relationship deepener and oftentimes this is on like our second day of leadership courses and people will go home that night. They will have conversations with their kids and spouses. They will try some of these things out. A lot of the time we will have people have good experience with their spouses that where a conversation will change, a conversation will feel better, that even we had somebody who had been having the same conversation with his wife for months and it changed and moved because he was listening, acknowledging, and validating, and it went in a different direction than it had before.

So often, our conversations with adults will open up a bit. As far as teenagers go or kids, it's a total mixed bag. Either it helps out a little bit and sometimes they are like, “Wow, my kid actually did open up.” Or it's, “That didn't work at all.” We’re not willing to open this up, which is totally fair. If there isn't the safety, there won't be the safety of this. It's not the time, there won't be the time, and you can't force these things, but this is the most you get to do from your side of the equation.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, exactly. This is the part you can control, is how do you open that up? It can happen with adults too. I mean, it's humans. If they're not ready, they're not ready. That's just how it is.

Alex Cullimore: It's all the time with co-workers. You have history, if there's something you don't know or trust about the person or you just don't, trust not there yet, then it won't be there. That doesn't mean it doesn't change over time. That doesn't mean you’re continually providing the space, it doesn't eventually get through. It just means that that relationship isn't open yet and that's okay. This is still a way to start to pry that door open, hopefully, as long as we genuinely stay curious.

Alex Cullimore: Oh, for sure. Yes, I remember a lot of my jobs, but especially the past one, I spent a lot of time checking in on people and on a is asking like, “Hey, how's it going? Just checking in on you.” “Hey, how's it going? Checking in on you.” “How can I help?” Because there was no trust and the relationship wasn't there, and there was a lot of, well, does she mean it? Does she not mean it? And is she actually going to be there to listen if I do want to share something? It would take 10, 20, 30 times of asking consistently. Then after that, I would start getting the messages that like, “Hey, do you have a minute. I want to talk through something.” But first, it was a lot of, I'm going to ask the questions and get nothing, ask the question, get nothing, ask the question, get nothing, or at least just get a one-word answer. I don't think I asked a question more than a few times if I didn't get anything. The ghosting doesn't work well with me. Well, I get the one-word answer. Yes, everything is fine. Nope, don't need anything. Then eventually it was like, maybe she means it. Maybe she actually wants to hear it. 

Alex Cullimore: Consistency with everything in relationships, that's where we start to move the need a little bit when we show the same way. LAVA can be used then in repeat essentially. You listen, you acknowledge, you validate, you ask an open-ended question, you listen deeply to that answer and acknowledge what they said, and validate the feelings in it, and ask another open-ended question. These are great ways to have and expand one-on-ones, great ways when it's at work for managers to get curious and get to know who's on their team, what they're really experiencing.

I think my favorite example is when Ford changed his leadership, it was in dire straits, things were very, very bad, and they changed the CEO, and the new guy came in and was like, “Okay, so what is the status of all the projects?” And everybody was like, “Good, good, green, all greens all around.” And his comment was, “We are in shockingly good shape for a company that is losing billions of dollars. It's amazing that all the projects are going well.” He asked every week and every time, what are the hours, what are the status? Eventually, somebody had the bravery to be like, “This one's yellow. This is not going well.” He latched onto that and opened up and tried to understand what the problem was, helped solve it. It cascaded to where there was suddenly way more safety. People could talk about these things. Now, we still have Ford cars instead of that, just slowly going by the wayside and disappearing.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. That happens a lot, especially in the workplace. If it's one of those repeated things, like, “How is that going?” “Good, good, good. Everything good?” “Yes.” So then, get specifics. Again, like just like teenagers, you get specific. I'm like, “Oh, so last week we talked about this specific piece of your project. How's that going? Was that resolved? Is it still an issue? Is there an issue that maybe wasn't there?” And that's when, if there is safety and the safety has been created, then that's when the opening up could happen.

Alex Cullimore: It's one of those like, you won't do it right every single time, but if you do it consistently, people will feel it. The same thing as like doing it wrong. You'll still occasionally be right. He's still occasionally will deep listen on accident. But the more you do this, the better you can open up some of those conversations. Great for conversations at work. Great for relationships in general. It's a good way to remember, “Hey, this is really and this is why we like calling it LAVA.” It helps get to the core of things. It helps give us the molten-gooey center.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, it does. It is. It's a way of showing up. It's not just, “Oh, I have a one-on-one. Let me get my LAVA tips on, so that I know how to do this.” This is not a tool that you use. It's not a blender that you take out of the closet only when you need to blend something. This is a way of showing up in any conversation.

Alex Cullimore: It also becomes a lot easier if you try out something like deep weekending and you feel like it was actually like, “Wow, I didn't realize how much I was going to try and put in or interrupt, or put my own experience in there.” Or, “I wasn't listening to what they were saying.” Which is perfectly common. We just get used to our patterns of conversation, but if we try something new, it might feel like a lot of work at first. Anything, over time, it just becomes the fault. That's how you listen, that's how you do, and that's what you can respond with, especially when you have the space and the energy to do so.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Especially asking open-ended questions, amazing how the more you practice that, the more you just bring it out and you find all sorts of applications for it. I've noticed that, and I still do, I struggle with just having conversations with people I don't know. Well, I struggle with having shallow conversations. I struggle with a lot of conversations unless they're deep. But I found that with the practice of LAVA and especially the open-ended questions, even just getting in a cab and having a conversation with a cab driver becomes super easy. It starts just like, “Oh, how long have you lived here?” And then after that, it's like, “Oh, the answer is, I just moved here 10 years ago and I'm from blah, blah.” I'm like, “Oh, how does it feel to be here? Which one do you prefer?”

That conversation keeps going. You can be super curious about something just going with open-ended questions because now there's a story that you're creating as opposed to, “How are you today?” “Good. Good.” Okay. Now, you're silent for 45 minutes in the cab.

Alex Cullimore: Yes. Yes. Which is sometimes nice too. Sometimes you don't want to have a conversation with the cab driver.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Sometimes that's what you want.

Alex Cullimore: Sometimes you ask one open-ended question and you don't say anything else for the next 45 minutes.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, that too.

Alex Cullimore: Which isn't bad, it's just these are the ways to open things, especially on relationships that do feel a little bit more closed off or things where we just, we have to collaborate on something where this is why we bring it up at work a lot, because it's just good ways to relate, so we don't feel stressed about it all the time.

Cristina Amigoni: It's also a good way to not have the same conversation over and

over and over and over. It's an indication that the person doesn't feel listened to. If you're the same, having the same conversation.

Alex Cullimore: On repeat.

Cristina Amigoni: On repeat, and you know exactly how it's going to go, then you can pull a script out and be silent and record it for the next time.

Alex Cullimore: So, think about the times – when you're conversing with people, think about times you might be able to throw in an open-ended question, or think about times what it feels like when people are maybe not returning that or returning that. The people that are getting curious, or the people that aren't, what does that feel like? What are the differences? How do you quantify relationships for yourself? It's easy to start to observe this and start to decide, “Hey, where do we want to land for ourselves in this spectrum? How do we want to show up? What feels better? Who can I do that with?” It's just a new thought on evaluating it if it's not something you've considered before.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. So good luck.

Alex Cullimore: Go forth and enjoy. Spread the love.

Cristina Amigoni: Spread the love.

[OUTRO]

Alex Cullimore: Thank you so much for tuning into this episode of Uncover the Human. Special thanks to Rachel Sherwood who helped produce our theme and of course our production assistants, Carlee and Niki for whom we could not do this or could not publish this. We get to do basically the fun parts. Thank you to We Edit Podcasts for editing our podcasts. 

Cristina Amigoni: You can find us at podcast@wearesiamo.com. You can find us on LinkedIn. You can find us at Uncover the Human on social media. So, follow us. We Are Siamo is W-E A-R-E S-I-A-M-O.com.

Alex Cullimore: Please feel free to reach out with questions, topics you'd like addressed. If you'd like to be on the show, reach out. We're around. Thank you everybody for listening.

[END]