When talk is cheap

Today I’m going to talk about silence — an overlooked but important tool for how we choose to run businesses.

By the end of this article, I hope you’ll have a better understanding of why it matters and where you can use it to helpful effect.

A new plane of honesty.

I was in a session with a board level client and we’d reached an impasse. It felt like whatever words we exchanged were failing to move him or the work forward.

In short: we were stuck.

But instead of reaching for something to say next, I did the opposite.

I decided to wait. And I kept waiting. The silent seconds turned into mute minutes, until out of nowhere the client said something surprising:

“Well it’s quite clear to me that I’m out of my depth. And it’s quite clear to me that my team is out of their depth as well.”

Suddenly we’d reached a new plane of honesty, one that enabled us to explore why he felt that way and what needed to happen next.

Why did silence allow this to happen?

Silence gives us space and time to think. Not rushing in with words allowed this client to evaluate where he was at.

Silence acts as a conduit for emotional energy. There are so many ways to sit in silence. Maybe the way this client experienced the silence was in some way challenging and confronting; something that compelled him to dig a little bit deeper.

Silence can be the sound of work being done. Most places of work have an overt bias towards action, e.g. doing work as opposed to thinking about it. That’s because people tend to recognise and reward action.

Actions tend to manifest through words, so we consider noise and productivity to be one and the same. But in this situation — and many others I’ve faced  — silence was the more productive option.

Silence is space.

It’s a gift to introverts and extroverts alike.

It affords introverts the opportunity to understand and evaluate where their head is at on something, and so find the confidence to share their insights.

For extroverts, silence shepherds more considered contributions.

And silence can help us to untangle tricky situations. It makes room for deeper thinking that might point to a resolution.

How to start using silence.

There are three places in which you might consider experimenting with silence:

1) At the start of meetings.

Mandate five or 10 minutes at the beginning of a meeting for people to sit in silence and gather their thoughts on the agenda. You could set up a question for them to contemplate, or offer a topic for them to reflect upon.

I’ve seen time and time again just how frequently this enhances the quality of the conversation.

2) When a difficult issue arises.

There are two common issues we need to navigate when we’re faced with a difficult situation in the workplace. Firstly, agreeing exactly what the problem is. Secondly, agreeing on a solution to that problem. Problem is, there’s often too much noise to do either well.

Try hitting pause instead. I’m not talking about taking a time out and walking away from the meeting. I mean sitting there together in quiet contemplation. Sitting with an issue often unlocks new ways of dealing with it.

3) In everyday conversation.

In those moments when you feel like jumping into a conversation — perhaps because of a problem or complaint — it takes discipline to sit there for 10, 20, or 30 seconds in silence. But its impact can be significant.

Often it encourages others to reappraise what they’ve just said, or to offer up more information that can be beneficial to your understanding of the situation.

All of this takes some getting used to. Silence is simple, but it isn’t easy. And learning to be silent means unlearning the deeply ingrained need for noise.

But in workplaces that run on words, it’s worth remembering that silence can often produce so much more.

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