Here is a list of different types of disagreements and strategies to overcome them. I hope it will prove to be useful when next time you meet a disagreement.

1- Factual disagreement is caused by the lack of knowledge or wrong knowledge. With the presentation of facts, it is easily resolved.    

2- Referential disagreement is the one where disagreement emerges because of the different angles from which one approaches a fact. Both the parties agree with the fact but their different points of reference create the difference. To sort out such disagreements we need to acknowledge the fact and it’s different points of reference. If any one party is not ready to even acknowledge this, it is difficult to resolve.

3- Some disagreements occur because one party is seeing the whole picture and other is considering a part of it. Here the matter is not resolved until the party that sees a part of the truth realizes and accepts the comprehensive approach.
 
4- Disagreement which is caused by misunderstanding or misinterpretation of words or statements is easy to resolve but difficult to spot. This type of disagreement can be generated by both reader and writer. Either writer has not stated clearly or reader has not understood completely, but, in both conditions, it gives rise to dispute. To settle this kind of dispute we need to locate clearly which term or phrase is ambiguous and define it.

5- There are some differences which occur because of the difference in individual experiences. My experience of a relation might be very different from others’. The human reason is guided by rationality but it is mostly influenced by its own experiences. If I conceptualize a relation by my personal experience of it, it may result in different conception than yours. So, this kind of disagreement is not easy to resolve because there is no great evidence of a truth for us than our own experience. Here experience is not outer influences only but includes our inner experiences as well. The same phenomenon can be realized in different manners by different people. No arguments can resolve this kind of disagreement except either another realization which proves our experience otherwise or acknowledging and understanding the fact that it is one’s experience which has given birth to some particular conception.

6- Attitudinal disagreement is the one which appears by your attitude about a subject. One can indulge in an argument with a positive or negative attitude. One can initiate an argument with the purpose of more clarification and understanding of the truth. Healthy attitude leads to healthy discussion. But if one is already prejudiced negatively, anything even positively stated about it will appear as disagreeable only. With this negative approach no fruitful discussion ensues. This type of disagreement has deep roots in the attitude itself and without reaching to those depths there is no point in indulging oneself to sort out the matter of discussion.

7- Sentimental or emotional disagreement is about the way you feel regarding something. All arguments are useless if there is emotional disagreement. The most one can do is to approach the reason of particular emotion and talk about it.

8- Then there is disagreement which is deliberately created with intentions such as creating a fuss or bothering others or winning over etc. It has psychological reasons inherent in the person who shows disagreement. In this type, the discussion about subject itself is in vain. The strategy should be to attend the psychological cause which gave rise to hostile disposition if it is worth attended to.

1. Be kind. No matter what you say or how you say it, at bottom your communication will always reveal your true thoughts and attitudes. As such, you always have two choices. You can communicate from a standpoint of love or from one of fear. When your communication is laced with sarcasm, blame, threat, anger, anxiety, worry, and control, you are essentially communicating fear. When your communication is laced with respect, appreciation, acceptance, joy, delight, wonder, and acceptance, you are essentially communicating love. If you don’t quite understand the difference, there is an easy way to communicate love not fear: always be kind.

“Words are but pictures of our thoughts.” (John Dryden 1631 – 1700)

2. Be aware of your effect on others. We often use language to criticize and attack others. Some people are masters of doing this in disguise; others do it openly. For many, communication is a battle that they have to win and words are their chief weapons of war. Harsh words can cut people deep and leave their scars for days if not years. That’s why the mark of the true communicator is to know what effect their words have on others and to adjust them accordingly.

“Some words are like rays of sunshine, others like barbed arrows, or the bite of a serpent. And if hard words cut so deep, how much pleasure can kind ones give?” (Sir John Lubbock 1834 – 1913)

3. Emphasize the positive. Really masterful communication doesn’t just depend on getting your message across or even clarifying what someone else is trying to say to you. It goes much deeper. Great communicators leave people feeling better than they did. They said something of value to the other person. Or they appreciated what the other person was saying to them. This happens when the communication isn’t just about the words; it’s about the people.

“There is a subterranean emotional economy that passes amongst all of us. In every interaction, we can make people feel better or worse.” (Daniel Coleman)

4. Don’t assume you’ve been understood. The history of relationships is littered with the history of misunderstood communications. A word gone awry here, a meaning missed there: they all add up to distorting your message and being mis-received.

The story is told of the teacher who handed out a set of worksheets to the pupil at the front of her class with the words, “Please pass these around”. She then turned her attention to the next topic. A few minutes later, she looked up to see the pupil at the back of the room sitting with all the worksheets wondering what to do with them.

As Stephen Covey reminds us, “First, seek to be understood; then understand.”

5. Know when to shut up. If you’ve ever attended a workplace meeting, you’ll know how hard it is to say nothing. Many people attend business meetings with the sole intention of talking, even if it isn’t relevant, even if the point has already been made. Talking is a way to impress. As a result, many meetings waste time and are unproductive. The best communicators are those who are secure enough to admit when they have little to say or little to add. They know when to shut up.

“If A equals success, then the formula is: A = X + Y + Z, where X is work, Y is play and Z is keep your mouth shut.” (Albert Einstein 1879 – 1955)

6. Don’t interrupt. If you’ve ever eavesdropped on a conversation between two people, you’ll probably have noticed that, instead of there being a progression of ideas building one on top of the other, most people talk over one another. It resembles a contest more than a dialogue. It is rare to see people listening with openness and non-judgment until the other person has stopped speaking. And even rarer to hear people asking for clarification and help with understanding. But holding back while you listen to others is the mark of the real communications expert.

“There is no such thing as conversation. It is an illusion. There are intersecting monologues, that’s all.” (Rebecca West)

7. Don’t gossip. Gossip is a particularly pernicious form of communication. It is idle, often indulged in merely to pass the time, and serves no real purpose other than to make ourselves feel better at the expense of others. If you work with others who like to gossip, simply learn the trick of disengagement: don’t reply, don’t be drawn in, and never do it yourself.

“Great minds think and talk about ideas. Average minds think and talk about situations. Little minds think and talk about other people.”

Working on improving your communications is a broad-brush activity. You have to change your thoughts, your feelings, and your physical connections. That way you can break down the barriers that get in your way and start building relationships that really work. Communicate with others like rays of sunshine, not poisoned arrows.

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Eric Garner is one of the foremost leaders in management and personal development with a personal guarantee to make you a better manager, trainer, and learner. His company, ManageTrainLearn, runs corporate training programmes in the UK and since 2002 has published a website at www.managetrainlearn.com that provides a wide range of exclusive digital learning products.

While enough has been said and written on how it is important and crucial to manage performance in an organization, not much emphasis has been laid on the importance of communicating it to the members of the organization at all levels.

This leads to a lot of confusion, uncertainty, and most of all, shock and surprise when in the middle of the year/end of the year, the employees are measured, reviewed, and  evaluated by a process which they are not even prima facie aware of.

Many a times, such a performance management exercise, which is truly objective and equal to all gets perceived to be biased, and partial; the only culprit in this whole event is the absence of a well laid down communication strategy – within the organization to all internal stakeholders.

That strategy which will, well in time, at the beginning of the period or year under review, state in writing to each and every employee the measures and attributes by which his/her contribution will be done.

Lack of such communication will also have an adverse impact of the performing members of the team. Whilst they give in their best, which would have exceeded their division and business objectives, they would see that their not so performing peers also seem to hold the same stature and growth in a patriarchal management. This can be highly dangerous to the overall health and long term growth of the company. Unless people see a visible difference between where performers will stand – higher – and where non performers will stand – lower or out of the organization – the very performers will desert the organization.

Communication, in the right time and in a very transparent manner (with all the measures quantified, sans any scope for bias), will be a decisive differentiator that would enable all concerned to view the process as legitimate and objective. And once this happens, tremendous amount of discipline comes by in the way everyone views the short term and long term goals. And they also know how and where they will grow within, with the kind of work they do in the period under review.

This highlights the critical nature of the performance communication process, and the time and energy the HR team, the SBU heads, and the CEO ought to spend in making this exercise possibly the best communication amongst the employees. If there is one single exercise that would contribute directly to the top line and the bottom line of the organization, it is PERFORMANCE COMMUNICATION.

The best way to do this will be to create a sort of ‘war room’ that takes care of the whole communication process – planning, vetting, implementing at all levels top down, ascertaining feedback on whether everyone had understood their goals right through. And post the actual performance process, a check on whether what happened is as per the communiqué to each of the employee.

So let all of us, in our organizations do our bit for PERFORMANCE COMMUNICATION.

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Muralidharan is an HR practitioner and a recruitment professional. A strong believer in spreading cheer and positivity, Murali currently works out of Chennai and is a voracious reader and a prolific writer.

The answer to this predicament is in developing a stable persona which is true to itself. If you had felt that he was not doing his job, you should have said so in a normal way right at the first instance. If you kept silent, it means you gave tacit approval. After that if he began to take this as normal and took you for granted, why should he not? It never would have occurred to him that he was in the wrong. He most probably thought everything was just fine and that he was doing a good job because nobody was ever complaining.

This subject has been on my mind lately because my wife has the tendency to take the same attitude. She never shows her true feelings. She keeps silent and lets others do whatever they want at home and at work. Then one day (approximately after six months) she will burst out in anger not only complaining, but being abusive as well. I have been trying to drum this into her that she should not allow a wound to fester. Tackle it immediately. Never let an unsavoury situation to get off the ground. A stitch in time saves nine. So much heart break and ill will can be avoided by complaining softly before egos get involved. This can be called being tactful.

Some blame for such a situation can be laid on our upbringing and education. We are taught to be ‚Äònice’, polite and kind. We are taught that good manners are better than being truthful and straightforward. So, there is a gap between what we want to do and what we do; with a lot of suppressed irritation or guilt.

We humans, tend to gravitate between extremes, highly influenced by the weather, TV, neighbours and all that we hear and see. Our behaviour tends to be very inconsistent indeed. This is the entire focus of the teachings of The Mother and Sri Aurobindo. First integrate your personality into a cohesive whole and then you will know exactly what to do, what attitude and action to take.