{"id":709,"date":"2021-09-15T11:13:10","date_gmt":"2021-09-15T09:13:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/?p=709"},"modified":"2021-10-12T10:40:39","modified_gmt":"2021-10-12T08:40:39","slug":"assuming-positive-intent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/assuming-positive-intent\/","title":{"rendered":"Assuming Positive Intent"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It all started with a tweet by Tobias Mayer<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDon\u2019t make assumptions\u201d says one school of wisdom, \u201cAssume positive intent\u201d says another. I choose the first. You?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m a card bearing member of the second tribe (at least I thought I was) so I answered:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The second one. Makes me kinder.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Going into difficult conversations assuming positive intent has rarely left me disappointed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Or as Gitte Klitgaard<\/a> so beautifully put it:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I find that I get what I expect. So if I expect good, I get good.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

My experience is exactly the same. Whenever I don\u2019t manage to assume \npositive intent and give in to blaming thoughts it leads to more \ndisappointment. My beliefs always always leak into what I say and how I \nsay it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s why I ask someone else to facilitate \/ mediate in my place when I cannot honestly assume positive intent for each party<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The \u201cdon\u2019t assume anything\u201d school of thought has never helped me to \nprep angry people for constructive conversations. When someone thinks \nothers to be malicious, countering their theories by saying \u201cYou don\u2019t \nknow that. Don\u2019t just assume that\u201d only helps for about 2 seconds:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They rake a hand through their hair and say \u201cYeah, I guess you\u2019re right. I don\u2019t know that for sure.\u201d Pause for effect. \u201cBut I swear, they\u2019re just doing that to fuck with us!\u201d Aaaand, back to Square One.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What did help multiple times is giving a couple of scenarios in which the enraging behaviour is a result of good helpful intentions of the other party and doesn\u2019t manifest their evil and \/ or stupid nature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Giving examples of how something might have had positive intent opens\n the door to really talk. I\u2019ve established a possible alternate reality \n🙂<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s really going on is something we can try to find out during the facilitated conversation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After I laid out these thoughts, Tobias remarked:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Talking \u201cof how this might have had positive intent\u201d is very different to making the assumption, isn\u2019t it?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Huh? Hm, I guess that\u2019s true. Apparently I fall inbetween the two schools of thought and my mindset when preparing to facilitate is:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I assume that positive intent is possible (while not actually assuming any particular motive)<\/strong> <\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

And I can come up with at least two positive intent scenarios for any given situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Learned something about myself there. It\u2019s a mindset that has served me well so far. What\u2019s your mindset for facilitating tense conversations? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

PS: Did you know there's a Retromat eBook Bundle? Ready-made retrospective plans for beginners and all activities from Retromat for experienced facilitators. Check out the Retromat books<\/a><\/strong><\/h3><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It all started with a tweet by Tobias Mayer: \u201cDon\u2019t make assumptions\u201d says one school of wisdom, \u201cAssume positive intent\u201d says another. I choose the first. You? I\u2019m a card bearing member of the second tribe (at least I thought I was) so I answered: The second one. Makes me kinder. Going into difficult conversations … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Assuming Positive Intent”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/709"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=709"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/709\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":711,"href":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/709\/revisions\/711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/retromat.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}