From Conflict to Comfort: Navigating Difficult Conversations with Anne-Maartje Oud

Brian Tomlinson: Hello and welcome to a brand new episode of the Aspire to Inspire podcast. My name is Brian Tomlinson and I am the head of Content at Staffbase, and today I have with me Anne-Maartje Oud, behavioral and communications expert and the owner of The Behaviour Company. Anne, welcome to the show. How are you today?

Anne-Maartje Oud: Thank you so much, Brian. I’m great. The weather is great. And you can call me Anne, because Anne-Maartje Oud, that is way too difficult.

Brian Tomlinson: Yeah. Even for me living in Germany, it’s hard to get it out. Right. So, I appreciate that. Thanks so much. So let’s get started jumping right into it. What made you get into behavioral science and into communication? Like, what was it that triggered you to go into that profession? I’m so super curious.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Oh, thank you so much. It’s such a pleasure to talk to you today. Well, what started it is that I did the Academy of Arts. So performance art, as they would say. And that is focused on expression through verbal and physical behavior. So that was already the behavior part. But then I was asked to help some people to get knowledge about stage presence. And I thought, doesn’t everybody know this is common knowledge? But they didn’t know it. And I was very fortunate to teach some people in businesses. And then I thought, okay, this is the path I want to go to. I don’t want to be the director. I don’t want to be the actor or the teacher in that field. But I really want to educate and help people within businesses to improve their behavior.

So 20 years ago — more than 20 years ago, actually — I started The Behaviour Company. And since then, well, I’m very fortunate to teach all over the world and to educate people on the behavior part. So that’s, in short, the story.

Brian Tomlinson: The short one. No but that sounds super cool. I mean, what made you get into the arts? And I’m curious, like, to the performing arts.

Anne-Maartje Oud: It was a teacher there, at my high school, and she was kind of, you know, not regular classes, but you could take some classes to, I don’t know, to have fun after school. I guess that was the purpose. And she gave us workshops like improvisation theater and all those kind of things related to theater. And I never even thought about that as a possibility for a job or for studies. I was more thinking in the lines of, you know, becoming a teacher in the Dutch language or in the English language. But when she showed me that that was a profession as well, and I auditioned for the Academy of Arts and I got in. Yay.

Brian Tomlinson: That’s amazing. Yeah. So you took that shift and went into the business world. Working with leaders, and executives some, I’m guessing mostly. What do you think are some of these key pillars for effective communication? What is it that leaders really need to do, just the basics, to really have good, effective communication that inspires people, inspires their companies to go towards that vision that they have?

Anne-Maartje Oud: Well, it’s a broad question because what you see when people firstly, it’s great if they understand that their behavior is an issue, that behavior has an effect on others. So that would be the first start. The basis is to understand that it’s not just about knowledge or goal-orientated businesses, but that we are in the people business. We’re working with people. So the fact that they, I think if they understand that behavior is a factor, then they can build from that. So who am I as a leader? What are my preferences? What is my style and does it align with the people I’m leading, or does it align with the business approach we have? And if they are willing to reflect on themselves and to really understand what the pros and cons are of their own behavior, like is it effective, what they’re doing? Then I think, that could be a great start to go to that good and effective communication that I hope leaders are striving for, because sadly, and I understand it in a way because everybody you know, everybody’s busy and everybody has a focus on goals. And it’s difficult to focus on other things than business goals sometimes. But what a lot of people should understand, I think, is that you can help those business goals by improving your communication.

Brian Tomlinson: I think that’s definitely true. That’s something that we certainly believe in, is that communication really helps to drive everything in the company. So just clarity, culture, everything that a leader really needs to show that empathetic side of themselves. I know you say that a lot of times though, many leaders unfortunately don’t have that self-awareness to know that they need to change their behavior. Maybe they think their behavior is okay if you come across situations like that. And how would you best approach a leader who needs to change in the right direction?

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yeah, sometimes I come across people who are in a position where they almost do not get feedback anymore because they’re the CEO and nobody dares to approach them in a way. So it’s hard for them to reflect on their own behavior. Like, how am I doing? Because everybody’s saying, yes, it’s great. It’s fantastic, which is not always the case, of course, but sadly, there’s a hierarchy sometimes that prevents people from speaking up and giving feedback. So, I would say it’s important for leaders to understand, am I open for feedback? Do I ask for feedback? Do I get feedback? But also to reflect on themselves, to see what they could improve on. If they want to improve, I think it starts with what kind of effect do you have on others? Or actually it starts with focusing on yourself. Who are you and do you know your pitfalls and qualities? But also, are you willing to look at the effect you have on others and really observe the behavior?

Because what you see if — and I worked with some of those people who were in a position where nobody gave them feedback anymore and when you start helping them because they’re doing great, you know, this is not a bad performance that they’re putting on us. But there’s this nuance that they can use to help themselves, to even improve more by observing others by really focusing on the details of the, for instance, nonverbal communication of others so that they will see what the effect is and that they can build on that, for instance, working with their colleagues, but also in negotiations like, “oh, what can I tweak?” So to say.

Brian Tomlinson: Yeah, I’m always looking for that little thing, that little 1% where they can get better. Right.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yeah. Maybe sometimes it’s 0.001. But I think sometimes it can be even — I’m sometimes very, I don’t know if shocked is the right word, but very surprised that in some positions there are basic elements in communication that they do not show. So for instance, eye contact. I think that everybody knows now how important this is. There’s a lot of knowledge out there, but you still have to translate this into your behavior. You have to show it in your body. And not just eye contact, but also other things. I was working with a leader, and he completely failed to focus on eye contact. So he was always talking, you know, writing things down while looking at his phone. And we would say, this is basic knowledge, basic communication. So it’s not always the detailed details, but the basic knowledge as well.

Brian Tomlinson: What would make up like the top three things, outside of eye contact? We touched on that already, but what else would you say would be really the basics that leaders need to work on to have this effective communication?

Anne-Maartje Oud: I would say apart from the eye contact, I think if we if we take it a step further, it would be validation — the skill to validate others, to understand that they are in a different position, that they sometimes need to vent, that even if you don’t have a lot of time, you still need to make time to understand what’s going on in your business and to really validate the perspective of this other person. And when I work, for instance, with teams, there’s this common complaint like, I’m not, they don’t notice me, they don’t notice how hard we’re working or they don’t understand — and they being the leaders, in many forms. But that is something that if you say three things, first eye contact, the second one would be, validation. And I think the third one, if I have to choose. Right? That would be observation, to see, to really observe. And to observe yourself, as well as the other person. Like, what am I doing? How am I today? What is my emotion, and how does it reflect on my behavior? All those kinds of things. Yeah. And if we change eye contact, then make it nonverbal communication. So we observe and we validate.

Brian Tomlinson: Cool. I actually really like that because I know you recently held a talk with a very provocative title. It was called, “The Road to Hell is Paved with Bad Conversations.”

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yes.

Brian Tomlinson: Definitely something that was very eye-catching, but in that I know you talked about building comfort. And, when I think of that, that connects very much to this validation topic in my eyes. So maybe we can switch a little bit, first, maybe let us know what exactly the road to hell looks like with bad conversations. What do you mean by that? But then really dig into this validation topic and having comfort between both parties. Could you talk a little bit more about that for me?

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yes. Of course. Well, it is a provocative title. I’m fully aware of that. But in essence, and we laugh about it, but in essence, there is a truth to it, depending on how you want to phrase hell. But what I come across in organizations is heartache, is sorrow because of the lack of validation or the lack of conversation or the lack of communication. And what we see is if that starts to change within businesses, there’s more comfort happening, there’s more trust with teams amongst each other or towards the leaders. And it sounds very trivial. We have to have effective communication. We have to create comfort as leaders. But actually doing it is difficult. And if you do it the wrong way, it affects many people. And that’s why I would consider it hell in the provocative title. But it’s devastating sometimes that people, you know, when they confide in me and they share what has been going on. You can see a lot of debris, I would even say from the bad conversations that people have had. And when you refer to creating comfort, what I see is that when you have to have a difficult conversation, it is more effective to focus on both parties. So if I’m, for instance, if I’m a leader and I have to have a difficult conversation, you sometimes see that they’re very stressed or they’re not bothered at all. That’s also possible. But they have to understand, there’s an element of my comfort and that is affecting the other person as well.

And what you see, and I think we’ve all had that situation where sometimes somebody says, your manager says, hey, can you come over because I need to have a chat with you or you find an invite in your calendar, we have to have a chat. The stress level of people is very high immediately, and if you don’t pick up on that as a leader and you’re really focused on just content, hey, I have a message for you. And you don’t pick up on stress or you don’t pick up on non-verbals so you don’t pick up on all those other things. Yeah, that’s really a recipe for, well, maybe disaster. We could even have a disaster.

Brian Tomlinson: Yeah. How do you make the time? How do you find that right time though? Like if you are getting ready for this difficult conversation, you notice that, let’s say, for example, an employee is under stress. How do you find that right time? The conversation is important, but it might not be the right time. Like how do you manage that then?

Anne-Maartje Oud: Well, I would say it starts with the preparation. If you have a message you want to get across, then what you see a lot of people prepare is the content, so what do they want to get across. But they rarely prepare, for instance, what you’re saying is focusing on the procedure. Is this the right time? Should I have the conversation right now, or am I that stressed myself because of my next meeting? Maybe I should postpone it to tomorrow or this person is in the middle of a project. Maybe I should postpone it until the end of the day. So making the time is also preparing the right way. So that would be the content. That would be the procedure, but it would also be the interaction, like, how am I going to get this specific message across for this specific person or for this specific team? Do I write an email, which might be sufficient sometimes if you don’t have a lot of time. I’m a big fan of face-to-face communication, or if it has to be online, of course, but it means you prepare what is effective for the interaction. And if you do not have the time and you are very, you know, stressed or fidgety all the time, or looking at your watch the whole time because you do not have the time, it will not be an effective communication or a conversation. So I would always say focus as a leader, really focus on what would be the right time, what would be the right place and what would be the right content and interaction.

Brian Tomlinson: Great. I like that a lot. You mentioned also that you like face-to-face. Right. And I think we know also from speaking to our mutual friend Joe Navarro as well, that these non-verbal communication plays a massive role. However, I think today there’s so much that’s done virtually. Yeah. Right. For example, I can say for myself 99% of my communication is virtual, right? So are there any tips and tricks that you have for how to see this non-verbal communication and how we can better create more comfortable conversations in a virtual world.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yeah. Perfect question. Because I think it’s even more important to pick up on those signals in a virtual world. So, for instance, when you’re looking at the camera like this, it’s very important. But what you see sometimes is that people, you know, look away or they look that way or that way or they are distracted and then they cannot pick up on the signals. So one of the ideas would be to, for instance, hide your self view. So you can just look at the person in front of you like, you know, you and I are doing right now. And if you’re in a team meeting where there are multiple people, it’s really distracting sometimes because what you see, there’s a lot of movement going on. And we have to understand that our brain picks up on movement. It’s the orientation reflex. So it’s constantly kind of scanning for what’s going on. If I move my hands like this, you will pick up on it unconsciously or maybe you’re so focused on non-verbals that it’s already very consciously. That means that even in a conversation with somebody speaking and other people are moving, we will pick up on those signals instead of only looking at the person who’s speaking. So we have to be aware that one, that it is exhausting, but also that it can give us signals. So if somebody is, you know, doing this all the time or, you know, touching the commissures here, we have to understand that there might be signals. Oh, is that discomfort going on? With online meetings it’s even more important to look at nonverbals because you have to pick up on the details even more. In a room, you can see people quicker, how they’re interacting with each other. And here it’s just you and I in our own setting.

Brian Tomlinson: No, I gotcha, and I know that, Joe spoke about that as well. Especially also like, don’t stay completely still like this. That’s also one tip. So if you’re watching like, don’t stay still in your Zoom calls. Great. But, maybe let’s also dig deeper into this topic of conflict and of difficult conversations.

I think conflict and these hard conversations, you’re just going to have them inside of an organization. You don’t bring thousands and thousands of people together and not have some sort of conflict. That would really be.

Anne-Maartje Oud: That would be an ideal world.

Brian Tomlinson: Yeah. Right.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yes. One day.

Brian Tomlinson: Yeah. So how should you approach conflict resolution, taking into account factors like diversity and inclusion? There’s so many things that leaders have to pick up on nowadays. Right? How can someone make sure that they’re covering all the bases if they have to have a difficult conversation with someone?

Anne-Maartje Oud: I think it starts with being aware again, and this is what I said before. If you’re having a difficult conversation and you’re not preparing this, if you’re winging it, so to say, you might be lucky sometimes that you’re understanding this person or you already know this person very well, you have a level of comfort already. Sometimes it might happen the right way, but if we understand that there’s so many different people and so many different conflicts or conversations going on, it has to do again with being alert. Who is this person in front of me? And what I always say is, know your role, know your goal. Because what is your role in that moment, in that conversation with that specific person? And that means that you have to, at least it’s my opinion if you are a good leader, that you will understand, this is not just about me as a leader conveying something. I need to make sure that I know who the other person is and that I am taking the time or the preparation or at least the effort to understand who this person is, to ask questions to look for what they need, and then we can have a better conversation.

So especially when you talk about diversity or inclusion, you have to be aware of your own bias during the conversation, but also beforehand. Like, what do I think is going to happen? A lot of people prepare in their mind, but they’re probably going to say this or they’re probably going to say that, which is a good thing to do in a way, because of course, you want to prepare yourself, but make sure that you also give allowance for, well, turn yielding and seeing how the other person responds and what they need and be open for that. And that is very important, especially in big organizations, because then sometimes you see these rules happening like, oh, this is how we do it. Stick to the script. I would not always advise you to do that.

Brian Tomlinson: Okay. Yeah, I think that’s great advice. I have one. Maybe it’s also a personal one. What about for introverted leaders? So a lot of times I think you have leaders who may have the strength that they’re very empathetic. But they avoid conflict as much as they can.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yes.

Brian Tomlinson: In such a situation, if you have a leader who’s like that, who’s supportive, who’s empathetic, they do a lot of the right things. But when it’s time for that conflict resolution, it’s really challenging for them. Do you have any tips for how someone could be able to get over that?

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yeah. Thank you. Because you experienced that yourself. If I may be so blunt in asking.

Brian Tomlinson: Yeah, yeah, I’m asking for a friend, you know.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yeah, you’re asking for a friend. Well, if your friends have this situation — first let me try to say something that a lot of people sometimes mix up. Please know that extroverts are having trouble with interacting in conflicts as well. So it’s not, you know, you look at behavior and oh, this person is out there and they just go for it. I work with a lot of people that are — even in the businesses where you think they’re so bold and so self-assured — they will have no problems with difficult conversations. They do. So that would be the first reassurance. I’m very fortunate that I’m very busy, with helping people to either prepare for those difficult conversations or being present at the difficult conversations, but it’s not. It’s also, well, how can we say this? It’s a challenge for a lot of people. So it’s also, you’re not alone, or your friend is not alone. But the thing is, it’s also to understand why you should have to have these conversations because it’s okay sometimes to not have a conversation.

You don’t have to address everything all the time. You know, being a nitpicking person. So also give yourself some allowance if you dread to have some conversations sometimes. But here’s the thing. If you wait too long, and this is what happens all the time with people, either the behavior of the other person that you want to address continues. So the conflict might grow, and that’s not what we want. So the addressing of the feedback becomes harder, but also the hurdle, so to say, to do it gets harder because now it’s not just a tiny thing anymore. Oops. Now I really have to have difficult conversations. So the tip would be to do it as soon as possible in a setting where you feel comfortable, create comfort for yourself and of course, preferably also for this other person. But try to, it’s almost nudging yourself to do it, because when you’re doing it more and more often, you see that if you do it early and if you do it with comfort, and if you do it with compassion and empathy, as you already said you have, which is perfect for those conversations, then you see that it becomes less difficult because it’s it’s almost a muscle, like you have to train this.

I mean, this is my job, and sometimes it’s still difficult for me to have difficult conversations. We don’t like to have those conversations, but we have to because if you don’t, well, the conflict might grow. And that could be devastating for your team or as a leader or even your company. So just do it would be the summary.

Brian Tomlinson: Just do it.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Just do it. Yeah. No, I don’t mean to belittle you or anybody in any way, because it is hard. But what is harder is if you don’t do it. Because then, it starts to simmer in your organization and especially and this is also difficult maybe, but when you experience yourself and I would like to know that you also set an example as a leader. So if you don’t address things others might feel, oh, he’s not addressing it. Maybe I shouldn’t say anything myself, because if he doesn’t do it, maybe I shouldn’t do that. But how does that work for you, if I may ask?

Brian Tomlinson: I think in business settings, I don’t really have that challenge, that’s something that I can do. No problem. Right. So I think that if it needs to be done it gets done. But I think you said something that is also very mindful of and that is making sure not to nitpick. So really picking out the things that you really do need to talk about. Versus trying to pick at every little thing. Right. Which ends up coming across at least for if it’s with your employees, that it comes across as like micromanaging to some extent. Right. And, I think sometimes these things kind of play themselves out. And I think it’s just you need to judge the situation. And coming back to what you said, I think that actually goes even broader, like on an organizational level, because you also have difficult conversations that need to be had with an organization. And a lot of times you see companies not addressing these things transparently, proactively with their employee base. And this many times then really has had such a negative effect on the culture of that organization. So I don’t know if you also have some examples. You’ve been doing this for so long now, of how good, transparent, open communication in difficult times has helped, and also how the not so good examples.

Anne-Maartje Oud: The not so good. Well I have to choose an example. Well, what comes to mind was a team that was working together effectively as they thought — that wasn’t the case. So this is intriguing to me because the long story short, I was hired to observe the team — they agreed, of course — and there was a lot of nonverbal communication going on that wasn’t addressed at all. So eye rolling when somebody said something like, oh, that’s there he goes again. Or you know, kind of gossiping a little bit. At least that’s how it looked like people saying something towards each other in a meeting. So I was confused because you felt it. There was almost this atmosphere that the people, “oh we’re, no we’re great together. We’re working fantastically. Fine.” But you could pick up — or I could pick up on the signals. And then I addressed that. Okay. But every time this person speaks, you guys cut him off or oh, she speaks, you guys start to talk with each other. So what is going on? And all of a sudden, it was kind of like a wake up call for all of them. Like, oh, we are showing behavior that is not transparent. And, while it was transparent on the negative part, but not transparent on what they were experiencing with each other. So by kind of opening that up and asking them, hey, so why do I see this behavior? And, and this is hard. And of course, I work with safety to create a good atmosphere that they will open up on it.

But what happened afterwards is that they actually started to talk about what they were feeling, what they were experiencing, but also about a situation that had happened two years ago and that was still — because they never talked about it — that was still there, you know, so there was still this residue of negative situations, but because it never was addressed, it was still simmering there. Long story short, by opening up, by clearing the air, by discussing everything, you all of a sudden everybody was like, “ah!” They were breathing in a different way. They were more happy. And the fun part is — the fun part — I would say the great, effective part was that they started interacting with each other more directly, more interactive, directly going to the person that they needed to call. And that meant that things were faster, that the team was more effective, and that had a great result on the business part of things. So, yeah, that was an interesting case.

Brian Tomlinson: Yeah. I mean, I think that’s definitely something that will always be interesting is this mix of people, and what does it really mean to be like a high performing team, right? Because again, it becomes even more difficult if you have just a leader. And, who has to have self-awareness, but that’s like 10x. Now you’re going into a large group of people who need to have that same self-awareness of themselves. And of the group as well. Maybe let’s shift over to because I know we have, we talked a lot about what people can do. But what about some of the common pitfalls that you find leaders encountering when they have to go into these difficult conversations?

Anne-Maartje Oud: Many pitfalls. First, not having the conversation. That would be number one. Also not preparing the right way, just focusing on content and not on procedure and interaction, but also being really focused on themselves. I have a message for you. You have to listen to me. This is important for you to know. And that means that they, as talked before, that they don’t take the other person into consideration. And if you want to, I would almost say, like, if you want to make sure that a message gets to the person, you don’t just deliver it. Here it is. Have fun with it. You have to make sure that it’s, that this message that you can give to this other person and that they can kind of unwrap it and fully understand what it means and respond to it, and understand what it means for them. What are the consequences? What is the message? So it’s important that leaders know that — sometimes, I would say, that they have to know that they have a more important role than they think they have when it comes to difficult conversations. Because it can have effects for years, even if people are fired the wrong way or if somebody gets feedback on a project. I recently worked with a woman. She’s a manager herself, but she got some feedback. And the feedback was given to her poorly and in an unprofessional way. And the effect was that she as a leader became very timid and afraid to step up, to be proactive because she was afraid. “Oh, if I’m going to do something now, you know they will bite my head off.” The thing is, she needed to be helped to have a difficult conversation about that as well. Because even if you experienced a difficult conversation, an ineffective one, it’s also your duty to have a conversation about that conversation and that that doesn’t happen either. So if you are very rude to me. Yeah, usually what people say is, “okay bye” and they’re not going to talk to you anymore or they just gossip about it, but actually saying, “Brian, I really want to listen to what you have to say, but you’re the way you shout at me or the way you’re looking at your phone now doesn’t give me the the confidence that you’re really want to help me grow as a person”, you know, those kinds of things. Or could you be so kind in really focusing on me and expressing what I need to change instead of me telling you that you don’t like my behavior? What is it specifically that I need to change, for instance? So being specific and also talking about the conversation is important.

Brian Tomlinson: Good. really like that a lot. I think that’s something that you can basically immediately implement. I guess my next question is, as we look to start wrapping up, looking at leadership teams, right? So let’s look at C-levels. A lot of times you have situations where you may have mass layoffs or really difficult situations within a larger organization. How can leaders better prepare themselves, like how should they behave to be able to keep that organization as calm as possible to make sure and transport that message to everyone? Because I think it’s one thing when they’re having a 1-to-1 conversation.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yeah, true.

Brian Tomlinson: Where it’s like, okay, it’s just me and you. We’re both comfortable. But what is it like for a CEO when he has to deliver, like, bad news to potentially thousands of people or so? Hundreds of people. What would that look like? How would you prepare someone for a situation like that?

Anne-Maartje Oud: Well, the same principles apply. And this reminds me of a situation where, with BP, the leader, there was this huge oil spill. And, yeah, it was a massive disaster. And his response was very focused on the “I”. “I am so … I can’t sleep anymore. This is so awful for me and I have to do this.” The same principles apply. Yes, you have to deliver difficult content, but you have to understand that it is not about you. It is about, of course, you have to be comfortable to stand in front of a camera or to say something towards your colleagues or your peers in this case. But you have to understand that you have to show empathy, that you have to help. So, for instance, lowering your voice to create calm is a very effective way to really show people that this is a serious message and that it’s difficult news or bad situation for them. So you have to understand that the interaction for you as a CEO needs to show that it is a difficult conversation, and that you’re not just reading it from a paper, or that you are faking empathy, because that is what you see sometimes. And I would say, if you have to deliver the message in a big group, make sure that you address the group as a group. So you, for instance, I work with somebody who had to do this in a big hall so to say, and to me is that you really have to look at everybody and address them and show them in your voice and in your gestures that you’re devastated because what happened is he was really hurt that they had to deliver the message, but because he knew he needed to go in performance mode, with the preparation, he almost, you know, the face got still as Joe talked about, we saw the stress in his face and that came across as less empathetic. So although it sounds a bit weird for some people that you rehearse those kinds of talks, it’s essential because it’s not, oh, I want to look good. No, you know you want to have a message that is or, you know, you have a message that is affecting a lot of people and you want to make sure that you do this with care and that you’re a leader that shows that you care because he really did care. But because of stress, it is difficult to show sometimes because you’re so focused on, oh, I have to get this right. So yeah, the same principle goes — content, prepare. Yes. Procedure prepare it. When are you going to talk about this? And also, what are you going to do with your interaction?

Brian Tomlinson: Yeah. Making that preparation key, getting yourself centered like, I think those sound like really, really good advice because one can only imagine how much stress that you’re under in situations like that. So having that is key, that BP example we know quite well we talked about it on our podcast before and empathy I think was also like this big foundational key for that. So that’s what we also found as well. So super.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Yeah. Yeah. And when you have empathy, like you said, if you yourself are a person that has empathy, it’s a great quality because a lot of the — I’m not saying that leaders don’t have empathy, but they don’t show a lot of empathy sometimes because they’re so busy or they’re focused on the goal. And it’s the key element, I would say to effective leadership when it comes to the soft skills, of course, because that is my job to focus on the soft skills of behavior.

Brian Tomlinson: CooI. I mean, so I guess the last question, from my side would be, what are some of the nonverbals. So really, this behavior the leader should look for in his team because, like we talked about earlier, it’s hard to tell. Like, okay, is my team performing well? Is everyone really happy? Are they in a place where they can do their best work? Because of exactly what we mentioned earlier, someone is not being fully truthful with you. Everything’s okay. Everything is perfect. Everything’s all good. What are some of the behavioral keys that we can look for as leaders to be able to better observe and better validate the situation within our teams.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Good question. Because there’s so many. And now I have to choose again. I would say for me, one of the elements is the furrowed glabella. When people are listening to you like this, it’s being recorded. So you see this part. And that might be an indication of either being critical towards what you were saying or critical to other people, like, oh, what “you are” saying? Eye rolling is an indication of … If you pick up on a lot of eye rolling, there’s something going on in the team, that is not really open and that they’re not really open with feedback and all those kinds of things. But I also think that when you look at how quickly people are speaking, how loud people are speaking, that can also be indications of is this a safe area for everyone to speak up, or is this or is there always this one person that shouts out their ideas, is very loud and other people are a bit more timid, saying it like that. So you can look at that as well. The variety of how people address things, and connect with that, how much space does everybody take up, or is everybody, getting space to vent or space to have ideas? Because it’s not, it doesn’t mean that everybody has to have the same amount of time always. But, what I see when people work very effectively in a team, there’s room for everybody to say something. And some people might speak a bit more than others, but if you if you’re quiet the whole time and they don’t check, hey, is there something that you have to add, that could be an indication of, hey, is this team working effectively enough? I would say, but there are many, many more. But then we have to have another hour.

Brian Tomlinson: No, I think, you can totally appreciate that. But then it’s a great opportunity for you to let people know where they can find out more about you and be able to learn more of these behavioral analysis skills.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Sure. Well, I’m always excited when people connect on LinkedIn. So that would be my name on LinkedIn. But they also can send an email to amo@behaviourcompany.eu, behaviour spelled the British way. Yeah, but, you can also find me with information on YouTube or, there’s a video of Wired. So there’s information out there, but if somebody has questions, please feel free to connect. It’s always nice to know what people are up to or what is, you know, happening in their businesses and what are they striving for, what are the troubles when it comes to behavior? And so, it would be great if they connect with me and send me emails or on LinkedIn.

Brian Tomlinson: Super. Yeah. We’ll be sure to link everything in the show notes, all your contact info, etc. and thank you so much Anne for joining us today. And having, hopefully, what was not a difficult conversation.

Anne-Maartje Oud: Not at all.

Brian Tomlinson: And well, for everyone listening and watching, thank you so much for joining yet another episode of the Aspire to Inspire podcast. Please feel free to tell your friends. Tell your coworkers to give this a listen. We’re here to help communicators, and we’ll see you next time.