Chapter 9 (part of). Messages as conversations

Conversations are the building-blocks of communication. They’re everywhere. They’re how we transmit information and feelings. They’re also how we make sense of the world and the people in it. They’re how we make and keep friends. It’s easy for us to take them for granted, but is there a better means to carry messages? Let’s take a look at them. Maybe if we understand conversations a little better, we can put them to more effective use as a means of conducting our business messages.


It Takes Two Baby

The world of theatre is full of soliloquies. An actor or actress stands on the stage, alone, and talks to themselves. This is rather weird, because we don’t encounter it in real life. Sure, there are those people who say they talk to themselves habitually because they see themselves as the only worthy conversationalist they know. Then there are those who say that they are the only people they can trust to be discreet and confidential. Yet apart from these social dysfunctional types most people accept that for a conversation you need at least two consenting human beings.

So what is a conversation? Is there a need to define something we’re all so accustomed to? Maybe not define, but it’s a good idea to take a closer look. Conversations are not to be taken for granted. They’re quite complex and they’re really interesting.

Let’s start negatively, what is not a conversation. A conversation is not a meaningless string of words or sounds. It should be based on an exchange of verbal signifiers (words to you and me), which carry meaning. Conversations are opportunities for information exchange. This can be practical: “How I do stuff” or “Check out the watering-hole in the next valley”. The information might be subjective: “You know I don’t like that watering-hole much. The people who drink there suck etc.”

Conversations are also a means of making sense of the world around us and establishing meaningful social relations.

A very very brief history of conversations.

We have been having conversations since we first started to talk as humanoids. It’s only relatively recently we’ve started calling them conversations though. Until the time of the Renaissance “conversation” meant a whole lot of different things. It could mean a manner of living, or behaviour. It could mean a transformational process. Late Medieval Latin described digestion as the “conversation stomachii”. “Conversatio” could mean living with someone, and that did not necessarily mean that you talked to them It could also refer to the act of conversion to a faith or creed, so Saul’s change of direction when Damascus-bound was termed “Conversatio Sancti Pauli.” And if there is any more tangible evidence that your messages have worked, it is the knowledge that you’ve made some new converts. Yet it was in the sixteenth century that the word entered the English language to imply a familiar and relatively friendly discourse. Two centuries later, during the height of the Grand Tour, when English Gentlemen with more money than sense travelled to Italy, they brought back the fashion for conversaziones. These were inevitably places for the best forms of social and intellectual exchanges.
An element of snobbery has long hung over the conversation. In a vain attempt to distinguish it from the humble, even vulgar chat. There are still those who claim conversation is an art form, and one which, like all “true art” is in danger of dying out.

But the fact is nobody ever tells us how to converse. We start doing it as little children.

So what is a conversation?

In the late ‘60s sociologists like Harvey Sachs started to devote their attention to conversations. They started to analyse them. They weren’t interested in the content of what people were talking about. What seized their attention was how they talked. How long did they talk for? Did they “hand over the microphone” in an orderly fashion, or were they interrupted by someone else seizing the conversational initiative? How long did it take for someone to but in? Were conversations orderly things or were they more like free-for-alls? Were there rules, as in sport, and were they obeyed? What they found is commonsensical. A conversation is based around a sometimes complex system of turn taking. A and B decide to have a chat. A talks, maybe at length about a subject dear to him, but then, maybe because he’s exhausted his stock of trivia, he stops talking. He’s giving B an opportunity to respond. B has been handed the microphone. It’s fair. It is an opportunity for B to agree with A, to tell him that he is wrong, or maybe to change the topic of conversation.

Conversations can be of the simple question and response type.
A. How are you?
B. I’m fine.

These can be drawn out a bit but not indefinitely.
B could say “Fine thanks. And how about you?” and A could respond that he too is fine and that everything is fine in Glockamaura. Alternatively A might seize the opportunity to complain about what an awful life he has, how his wife doesn’t understand him, how his kids don’t respect him, how his boss is a moron etc.
Another type of conversation works on embedded questions and answers, each one dependant on a response but not independent.

A. Have you spoken with Peter yet?
B. Is he here?
A. Haven’t you see him then?
B. No, not yet. Why?
A. Well he’s in the bar, telling everyone who’ll listen what a lousy firm he works for.
B. Oh dear. I haven’t been in there.

D’ya get ma drift bro?

So conversations are made up of words strung together to give meaning. They have structure. As we’ll see also have rules. These include the ways we interpret conversational content. We’ve all heard of the hilarity of literalism, where people on comedy shows do things in a literal way. The daddy of social linguistics, William Labov, has pointed out that adults tend to be better at interpreting conversations than children. Hardly surprising, they (should) know more. I remember once seeing a kid who was told to put his soda on his head i.e. to drink it up. He followed the command to the letter, putting the glass on his head from where it flowed down.

Conversations can be linked to “good manners”. So children, in many cultures, apart from being told to be seen and not heard, are told that it is rude and impolite to butt in. It’s like farting, picking your nose etc. It just isn’t done. This “genteel” approach is often followed into adulthood. In the world of politics parliamentary debates are structured according to the “ideal” conversation. One person has the floor. They have to be heard out, without interruption. Yet this is culture specific. North Americans are often considered to be less restrained. They will jump in when they have something, anything to say. This can lead to unfortunate and unfavourable stereotyping.

But do we always rely on what is said or do we sometimes have to fill in the blanks? In the 1950s and ‘60s American philosopher Herbert Grice took a hard look at our conversations. His conclusion was that it was full of implications or implicatures. These were implied assumptions we made about the content of a conversation. Taken as a whole these were conversation maxims. Unspoken rules underlying discourse. They help us to cut corners, to not have to spell everything out. Most people accept them and internalise them. Funny thing is no one ever learns them far less teaches them. They are conventions which everyone signs up to out something Grice called the “Co-operative Principle”. They helped people to co-operate and they enhanced mutual comprehension.

According to Grice there are four maxims.

(1) the maxim of quality. A person is expected not to tell downright lies, or offer opinions for which they have no evidence.
(2) The maxim of quantity. A speaker is expected neither to give too much nor too little factual information
(3) The maxim of relation. The speaker is assumed not to say things which are irrelevant.
(4) The maxim of manner. The speaker is always expected to be brief, well-ordered in their speech and never to waffle on endlessly.

We can mention a fifth. The maxim of continuity. This is an extension of the maxim of relation. Basically when two (or more) people are talking about a topic, none of the participants will unilaterally start talking about a different, unrelated topic without flagging the change of tack in some way.

Let’s take an example of the maxim of quantity. Someone says “Nick has two kids”.
Actually Nicky has four kids. The statement is not accurate. But strictly speaking Nick does have two kids - and two more. Yet the statement is an inadequate because it gives too little information. Those hearing it feel that the speaker wants his hearers to believe that Nick has only two children. On finding out the truth, they may feel cheated, especially if the person they asked is a close friend of Nick. This person should have known the truth, and they should have given an adequate representation of it.

And for an example of the maxim of relation let's have a joke. This one was told by the legendary, fez-wearing British comic Tommy Cooper. Two men are standing at a bar with a dog. The first man asks the second. "Excuse me. Does your dog bite?"
"Oh no, not at all" replied the second man. The first man puts his hand down to the dog, which bites him severely.
"Ouch" he shrieks. "I thought you said your dog didn't bite..."
"That's not my dog", answers the second man.



They are observed because they apply themselves quite rigorously in practice. Suppose two people meet coming out of the office after work finishes. One says to the other “Are you coming for a drink Frank?” to which Frank answers “That’s a really nice briefcase you have Brian.” This Frank’s answer to Brian’s question is irrelevant. It flouts the maxim of relation. Yet Brian will probably gather from Frank’s response that he’s not interested in going for a drink and will change the subject.

One aspect of Grice’s maxims is that they are based on assumptions of other people. We as participants in a conversation are always relevant, we never rabbit on etc. …

Silence Please

Let’s return to our two conversationalists A and B. A has spoken perhaps at some length about something. Maybe he’s got tired. Anyway he decides to let B have a go, so he stops talking. In many cultures not only does B now have the right to speak, he also has an obligation to speak. If he says nothing it will certainly not go unobserved. Maybe he is completely bowled over by the intellectual rigour of A’s argument; or maybe he just does not know what to say. Usually though B makes some sort of sound and is rarely completely silent. How does A respond? Sometimes by embarrassment, but rarely is the silence considered golden. So after a few seconds off he goes again.

But the lack of conversational cut-and-thrust may be a cultural and a psychological thing. We may like to talk because it makes us feel safe. When we encounter a complete stranger we want to be able to assess quickly whether he’s a friend or a foe. Does he belong to the same tribe or social caste? Answers to these can be got pretty speedily by attempting conversation. If he does he’s more likely to be a friend, or at least not an enemy, so you can relax. We use conversation to establish relationships, even of the most trivial kind. Yet the members of the Navajo and Apache nations in the American south west view conversational triviality with disdain. They only speak when they’ve got something important to say. And when they come together with people from a culture like ours which views any topic as fair game for conversation, misunderstandings can occur. The encounters between Europeans and Athabaskans in British Columbia have been studies. The Athabaskans have an attitude to trivial discourse similar to their distant relatives further south. What’s more when they are unsure about the appropriateness of establishing contacts, even at the level of the conversational, their response is usually to stay silent. They have to be fairly confident of who they’re talking to and what they’re talking about. The Europeans when they met the Athabaskans, were invariably the first to speak. Then they went on and on, often about little things. The Athabaskans (who understood them perfectly) were a little taken aback. They weren’t sure whether verbal communications with these strangers was appropriate, so they kept silent, even when the Europeans stopped and indicated it was their turn to speak. The Europeans, discomforted by the silence, started talking again. The exchanges were, as a result, somewhat one-sided. The two groups were then asked what they thought of each other based on these encounters. The Europeans couldn’t make up their minds about the Athabaskans. They seemed shy, but also quite haughty and surly. The Athabaskans considered the Europeans to be rude, garrulous and domineering.

Some cultures consider silence, or lack of conversation, to be the norm during certain activities. Anyone who has ever been fortunate enough to get invited to a dinner party in Finland soon remarks upon a few things. The food is invariably delicious. It is consumed by all in almost deadly silence. No chit-chat, no small-talk. Eating is serious stuff. Your mouth has far more important things to do than make sounds. This can cause deep discomfort for non-Finns not in the groove.


The Sound of Silence

Silence isn’t something that should frighten message deliverers. It’s often a good thing to deliver your message well and then disappear for a while. Many marketers would think this suicidal. You are giving your turf to the competition. But message delivery should be seen as a conversation, a dialog. If one person to a conversation keeps yapping on they’re viewed rightly as a pain in the neck. Remember too conversational implicatures. Your willingness to deliver your message and wait for a response gives your message credibility. It won’t get trashed by constant repetition. It will take on the aura of a quality message – just the thing if you’re selling a quality product. Too often it seems dialogues between business and customers are like the interfaces with the Athabaskans – one-sided affairs. Companies may say they want feedback – all types of feedback – but they don’t know how to get it, or what to do with it if they get it. If it is good copy it may get recycled into customer testimonials. If it’s bad it causes squirms of embarrassment. And if there is no recognisable feedback, well you just keep on talking.


Messages for business

Now what has all this to say about messages? Lots.
Let's go back to Grice's maxims. Number one is the maxim of quality. This is a big problem for message senders, whether in business or politics. Marshall McLuhan said "The medium is the message". The fact is that Mr or Mrs Average's automatic response to messages coming from business is "Oh yeah?". They somehow expect message senders to be on a spin-trip, always putting the best possible spin on any issue. In late 2006 Hungarian prime minister was taped making a very injudicious speech to party insiders. He stated that his government had done nothing for years and that it had lied through its teeth to get re-elected. Thousands of angry Hungarians took to the streets demanding the premier's resignation, but many people couldn't see what the fuss was about. They rationalised their sang-froid by saying "So he lied, but that's what politicians do."

There is a fundamental issue to be tackled here if message senders want to use messages effectively. They have to regain the trust of their listeners or hearers. They can do a lot to make their messages stickier by working on the maxims of manner, maybe of relativity as well, but unless they reestablish a trust channel they might as well be shouting down a disconnected telephone line.

A start can be made by remembering that effective communication depends on seeing the whole process at first as a transaction. You have something you want to give. The success of the transaction depends on the other guy taking it. He may not like it, or even know what to do with it, but it’s important to establish the transfer transaction for your message. Even rejection is better than being ignored – ask any speed-dater. Rejection is something that can be worked with. Eventually your message is taken on board. The more times the message transaction is repeated the more trust is established. Eventually the transaction framework dissolves, leaving a communications channel.




It takes two to tango. It's a truism that messages form an important part of any conversation but they should be tailored to your audience. But maybe that's a part of the problem: All the world's a stage etc. An evening at the theater can be great fun but the best actors and actresses are the ones who can engineer a suspension of belief. Great entertainment but not great for building trust. We might say that the job of the corporate message adviser is how to engineer the audience to suspend its disbelief. Talk about audience implies an immediate distance between message sender and receptor. It is all too easy for this to get filled by distrust.

so let's forget about stage and audience, them and us. Let's try to attain participation. A conversation is a series of messages, but it isn't a one-way process. It's something everyone who's at the party can participate in. If a real and effective conversation is established it is never a dialogue des sourdes or a dialog of the deaf. The other person must be listened to. This gives you their response to your messages. Too often business pays lip-service to customer feedback. Sure, the importance of listening to the customer has been preached eloquently for years: it is part of Management by Walking Around, postulated by Tom Peters among others. But it has to be about more than a clickable link at the bottom of a web page labelled “feedback”. We have to see customers in a new light, maybe not as an audience to be entertained but as a community we have to serve. And who is our community? It’s any company’s stakeholders, not just present ones but even those it is likely to acquire. A business’s community is anyone likely to be affected (hopefully beneficially) by the business’s operations. The conversations with this community have to be on-going, 24/7, 365 days a year. Going back to the earlier meaning of conversation, it involves a cohabitation with this community, actually living and breathing in it. Corporate organisation will have to respond to this environment by appointing a Community Liaison director, but this won’t be just another functional silo with its own discreet budget and rules of engagement. Community Liaison must run throughout the organisation.

The cultural context of conversations is imperative to a proper communications interchange. We’ve looked at cultural conflicts where the gap appears big. But the same cultural conflicts can stymie conversations within a culture, say between rich and poor, old and young and even between male and female. The American socio-linguist Dorothy Tannen demonstrated in her book You Just Don’t Understand that men and women have different ways of participating in a conversation. Failure to recognise this causes tension.