We Need to Talk: Why Communication Sucks at Work with Collette Revere | Ep. 19

We dig into why workplace communication often fails, how family patterns shape our style, and what people can do to improve communication without waiting for perfect conditions. Colette Revere, founder of Open360™, shares a simple, repeatable method for future-focused feedback and explains why repair always beats perfection.

✅ Roots of workplace miscommunication in family norms
✅ “Little truth” vs. “Big Truth” to reduce power struggles
✅ Future-focused feedback with consent and support
✅ Stopping HR escalations through early coaching
✅ Practical scripts for starting tough talks

🎀 Breast Cancer Awareness Month
We remember and recognize those affected by breast cancer. Please consider donating to the Susan G. Komen Foundation. Every dollar helps in the search for a cure. - https://secure.info-komen.org/site/TR?px=27336749&fr_id=10831&pg=personal

🔗 Connect with Colette
Find Collette on LinkedIn and at myopen360.com for psychologically healthy feedback systems.

Chapters

• 0:00 Why Workplace Talk Breaks Down
• 2:00 Meet Colette And Open360
• 3:10 Families Shape How We Speak
• 6:50 Soft Skills And Leadership Gaps
• 10:40 Self‑Awareness And Patterns
• 14:20 Truths, Power, And Perspective
• 18:30 Miscommunication Is Normal
• 22:15 Handling Conflict Before HR
• 26:05 Why We Avoid Tough Talks
• 30:00 Future‑Focused Feedback Tactics
• 34:20 Asking Permission To Give Feedback
• 38:00 Tools Don’t Replace Courage

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:00

Let's be honest, some people's communication at work stops. You send three paragraph emails when one sentence would suffice, you avoid that tough conversation hoping it would just disappear, or you'll say, I'm fine, when you're clearly not, and then HR gets involved, all because two grown adults could not communicate. Today, we're talking about why communication in the workplace is so dysfunctional. Why is it so hard for people to talk to each other like adults? And most importantly, what can we do about it? Joining me today is someone who knows this topic inside and out. Colette Revere, the founder of Open360, a psychology-backed change management consultancy that helps organizations improve performance by aligning people, systems, and communication. At Open360, they blend individual development with organizational strategy so teams don't just move forward, they actually go stronger together. So buckle up because today we're not sugarcoating anything. We're breaking down the truth. We're being honest, we're being transparent about why your communication sucks and also how to finally fix it. So tune in and we'll see you on the episode. Hey, and welcome back to the Transparent Nature Podcast, where we bring real conversations to help you navigate your career and workplace challenges. It's your host, Prince Tate, and I want to thank you for listening as well as supporting the Transparent Nature Podcast. So I'm really excited for the guest we have today. Her name is Colette Revere, and she's here with us, and we're about to dive into why communication at work, why does it suck? Why is it such a mess? So, Colette, welcome to the show. How are you?

SPEAKER_00: 2:14

Thank you so much. I'm doing great, and I'm really glad to be here.

SPEAKER_01: 2:19

Man, thank you so much. You know, this is a conversation that we need to have communication, because whether you're at work or even outside of work, there always seems to be a gap regarding communication, right? And so this is why we need to have this conversation today. Um, and especially from an HR perspective with my background, yeah. Uh this is where the gap is. We always see that, you know what, this issue or this employee relation matter could have been avoided if we would have effectively had a conversation. Let's get to the point of it, right? Why do people struggle so much to have effective conversations at work? Why does it seem that people don't want to communicate, especially when it when there's conflict in the workplace?

SPEAKER_00: 3:14

Yes. It's like a giant game of chicken, and nobody wants to admit that they don't know how to do it, but no one knows how to do it well. To be honest, our families were our first classrooms when it comes to communication. And I haven't met a single person who gives that a 10 out of 10 experience, you know? And so growing up, we uh you learn things from our families and internalize things that we don't even realize. And so a lot of people growing up are just trying to be better than their mom or just like their dad or whatever. Uh the comparison is in the family. And then you go into a workplace and you're interacting with all these different people who have totally different internalized ideas and norms. And of course, we don't know how to communicate with them. We haven't even done the self-discovery of like understanding how our lens is even shaped to know how to then um accept what somebody else is bringing in versus changing our own perspective around things. So I think um it sounds big and hard to do, and it's actually just takes practice and a little bit of knowledge and self-awareness to get started. But I think leaders in particular struggle with this because they haven't been trained in organizations often to do this communication, and yet they're responsible for really doing some heavy duty communication with their teams and employees.

SPEAKER_02: 4:57

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00: 4:57

And they don't know how. And of course, they're not gonna raise their hand and be like, hey, like HR, I think I need some communication training. Nobody's gonna do that because you know what I call that?

SPEAKER_01: 5:07

I call that soft skills.

SPEAKER_00: 5:09

Yes, right.

SPEAKER_01: 5:10

That's a part of the soft skills that people often look overlook, right? That's right. I did a couple couple episodes ago, I did an episode on skilling you softly, right? And it really talks about, you know, what are some of those soft skills that we need. Again, we we often see it in organizations where they promote the people who are good at technical skills, right? Uh, if if you know how to run a machine and you learn the machine, now they feel like, okay, now you can lead people who are working on the machine, right? Right. And we forget, hey, when we talk about leadership, right? Uh great leaders are those who can influence uh people who work under them or with them to do or to reach a goal. Okay. And so if you do not have soft skills, and one of those things we call is emotional intelligence as well, yeah. How can you lead effectively?

SPEAKER_02: 6:13

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01: 6:14

How can you communicate effectively when you don't even understand, like you said, how you communicate? What is your communication style? How do you and and this is so interesting because you said that it starts at home, right? It starts at home. And so then you have to look at, okay, how did you grow up? Did you have a mother? Did you have a father?

SPEAKER_02: 6:38

That's right.

SPEAKER_01: 6:39

Did they communicate effectively? Did they even show love to one another, right? And so we go into all of this, and I know I'm still in your shine, but we go into all of this, right?

SPEAKER_02: 6:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 6:51

And then we show up at work and we we don't know where we stand.

SPEAKER_00: 6:57

No, right?

SPEAKER_01: 6:58

So you said it starts with self-what reflection, self-awareness, self-awareness, knowing where you are. Talk a little bit more about that.

SPEAKER_00: 7:06

Yeah, it's uh I recently over the last couple of years have really refined a training around that that I think is really good. It's incredible to see. I mean, you can just see the impact of just a single session that people are going through where we have them evaluate their history. What were the messages you learned about communication growing up? And to your point, what did you learn about conflict and how you deal with conflict? What did you learn about how appropriate it is to express a need? Because you to when you grow up in a home where you're not able to express what you need, and you are a leader now in an organization, often you don't allow other people to do the things you don't allow yourself to do. So as a leader who's not comfortable expressing needs, they're not gonna be great with their people expressing needs as well. So it's just really evaluating that piece and also looking for patterns. So across relationships, what seems to come up that maybe confuses you, like you don't get why people have this response about you, or but it but it comes up over and over again, like those are the places that we can see, oh, I may need to do some rethinking about this. Um, but in terms of how to do it, what's beautiful about it is it's really a perspective shift, and it doesn't take long to get it. Once you have this aha moment where you're looking at your history and you're looking at what you're doing now, and things are making sense about why you respond the way that you do, then the behavior change is really natural. It's not as much of a struggle as people think it will be.

SPEAKER_01: 8:59

Wow. That that is so deep. I think about my how I grew up. I had a father, I had a mother, and this is a really vulnerable moment, right? Um, my mother and father, they divorced when I was in elementary. And my father, you talked about military. My father, he did 25 years in the military.

SPEAKER_00: 9:24

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01: 9:25

And so on top of that, he was a pastor. And so you think about respect, right? Yeah, how do you respect, like when you're in the military, you cannot talk back, right? And so I grew up, like, I can't talk back to people, right? And I mean, there's a sense of respect, but then there's also a sense of like when do you actually speak up? Right? And so sometimes, and again, this is a very vulnerable moment. Sometimes I even have challenges with that, right? Like I may be thinking, no, the sky is blue, but you're telling me because you're a VP of whatever, the sky is gray. And I'm like, no, the sky is blue.

SPEAKER_00: 10:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 10:11

Right? And and and so then I start to think, like, okay, I start getting nervous because I know I need to respect the hierarchy.

SPEAKER_00: 10:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 10:23

But then on my the other side of me, it's like uh angel over here and the devil over here, right? And then I'm like, no, you need to speak up.

SPEAKER_02: 10:31

Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_01: 10:31

Yeah, I'm like, ah, but if I speak, then I start running through, okay, what what what are the effects if I do this, if I don't do this? And then I think about, okay, you know what, is it even worth it?

SPEAKER_00: 10:44

No. Well, because internally you have to go through so much to even get to the place of doing it that you do, you talk yourself out of it. I so appreciate your vulnerability with that. And it's I love that you have a transparent HR podcast now. So it's such a from feeling like, oh, I can't speak up, oh, it's a harder thing for me to do. And now you, that is your mission in some ways, is to be transparent and to speak up and to help other people do that as well. I'm with you. I grew up in a home with abuse. This is kind of how my journey started to becoming a therapist and then doing family systems work and then moving it into the workplace of, you know, the you even the hard lessons, even the lessons that are not the ones that you really want to carry on through adulthood, are good information about how other people might be responding, how they might be perceiving things, because um you just don't know the environment that people have been shaped in. And I think for when you're talking about the sky is blue versus the sky is gray, that's so tricky. And one of the things we talk about in our training at Open360 is um the big T truth and the little T truth. So we're assuming well, the little T truth is your personal truth, and everybody has one. And there are some people who will just say the sky is gray just because I'm in charge and I get to say what it is, but many times there are people who just totally see things different than us, and we're on two different sides of a thing, and we're just like legitimately each seeing things very, very differently. I think, especially in our world today, that is incredibly relatable. And then there's this bigger truth that holds space for everybody's truth. Like, in order for you to be right, I don't have to be wrong. We can both 100% believe what we believe, and your belief doesn't negate mine at all. And and that is the space that when people learn to navigate, okay, I respect that this is your truth, even though I totally don't that's totally not my truth, and okay, this is my truth, and I respect that. When you can start communicating from that place, that's where real, real progress begins.

SPEAKER_01: 13:30

Wow. Man, that this is a lot of good information. And you know, let's kind of pull from your background. So from a psychology standpoint, and we probably already talked about it, but from a psychology standpoint, when we see communication breakdowns, what does that really tell us?

SPEAKER_00: 13:49

Well, that's a good question. It's it tells us we're human. I mean, there is no way. This is this is what I tell people, you only ever have control of 50% of the conversation. Like I'm good at this, and I still have really bad conversations. It doesn't, there is no pinnacle. There's no there's no moment in your life will you where you will be above this problem of miscommunication ever. It will always be a risk in every conversation that you go into, and that's what's so scary for people, I think. And that's why when we uh teach people, we focus on this is gonna happen. Perfection is not an option. So let's look at what good looks like. And what good looks like is being able to go back and repair when things go wrong, because they will.

SPEAKER_01: 14:47

Wow. So, you know, I I say that earlier. A lot of times in the workplace, as HR professionals, we often see that um there's a common gap in terms of employee relations and what the actual issue is.

SPEAKER_02: 15:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 15:03

Right? Uh sometimes team members may come and say, hey, I'm having an issue with another team member, and my manager won't do anything about it. And one of the things one of the questions I ask is, well, um, okay, let's talk about this. Have you talked with that person to let them know that you do not like them calling you big back? I'm just gonna put that in there. Yeah. Right?

SPEAKER_00: 15:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 15:31

And I'm using that example because it's a real example.

SPEAKER_00: 15:34

Oh my gosh. I'm never amazed.

SPEAKER_01: 15:39

And so again, like, have you talked to that person, say, hey, I mean, what if they're just playing with you and and thought that that's just how you communicate?

SPEAKER_00: 15:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 15:50

And like, oh, then they get really small and they go, um, no, I haven't talked to them. And so let's do this first. Let's have a conversation with them, and and then I'll ask them, do you want to practice the conversation?

SPEAKER_00: 16:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 16:07

Because I can't be the gap for you. No, you have to speak up, right? So again, as we talk about um, you know, miscommunication and it's resulting into employee relation concerns, how can we as employees and leaders avoid having to escalate an issue that we can really address ourselves?

SPEAKER_00: 16:32

Yeah. I think it starts with scaling up because I think it really starts with this acknowledgement that it doesn't matter whether you're a leader or employee, people are kind of equally bad at this, and it's okay. This is just like, why wouldn't we be? We haven't learned to do things differently. So I think it starts with just the acknowledgement and the ability to say, it's okay if we don't know how to do this well. That's the place we're gonna start to learn to do this well. And unfortunately, what I see, and I'm curious what you see, is that um people are too afraid to say they don't know, so they never learn and grow because they're not willing to admit that they don't know. And and and their companies are just kind of their companies are aware that it's a skill gap, but it's one of those things because it's a soft skill. They feel like, well, we don't need to invest in that right now. We're gonna kick that can down the road a little bit. And so I think for leaders and employees who want to learn to do better, I think it's about asking your leader, asking your organization, can I get help with this? Can you bring in some support and teach us really how to do this?

SPEAKER_01: 17:50

Wow. But let me ask you this. Why do you why do you think people avoid tough conversations?

SPEAKER_00: 17:59

Oh, that's a good question.

SPEAKER_01: 18:01

Because oftentimes we we see that you know, people are okay with like sharing good news.

SPEAKER_02: 18:07

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 18:08

Yeah. They can't wait to share good news. But when it when it comes to having crucial or tough conversations, they're really avoidant, right? So what is, I mean, what does that really do with trust and even team dynamics?

SPEAKER_00: 18:23

I have my perspective on this. And I don't know, this is just based on my experience, but I think that people often avoid conflict in those conversations because they're afraid something is going to be revealed about them that they don't want to be revealed. So, what I mean by that is I think we all go through this world. I'm I am gonna say all, even though that's a stretch to say like everybody in the world, but uh feeling not good enough.

SPEAKER_01: 18:57

Wow.

SPEAKER_00: 18:58

And so we especially in our professional life go through our days like hoping people don't see the places that we feel insecure, hoping people don't notice the ways that we're not showing up, and we're just kind of creating the narrative about who we are or we're trying to. And when you go into a conflict situation where you're bringing up somebody else's thing that they're afraid to see or be called out on because it's hard for everyone, then you risk somebody flipping it around and coming back at you and going, Well, you did this and you do that. And it's like opening this whole can of worms that feels completely risky, and you just like to your point earlier, you have to manufacture so much energy to do it that you just talk yourself out of it and tell yourself that it's easier and that the problem will just resolve itself if you don't address it.

SPEAKER_01: 20:01

I love that you brought that up because that's another real life example. You know, I had a leader, she um she was trying to really coach and talk to an employee about something that they were doing. And in turn, the employee then said, Well, you do it too. I know, yeah, and when I heard that, I was like, Oh my god, this is about to go down. And so, look, even HR professional, you know, I I have fun in my brain. That's right. I may not share everything, it may not come out, but in my brain, I'm like, wow. I'm like, she just told you. And then and then guess what? I actually believe the employee.

SPEAKER_00: 20:46

Yeah, seriously.

SPEAKER_01: 20:49

Right. So uh these are real life examples. Yes. Well, let me ask you, let me ask you this. How would you coach somebody? Or what tips would you give somebody who's really not wanting to have that conversation? Yeah, like what steps would you give them to say, okay, this is how you should effectively do it?

SPEAKER_00: 21:12

Right. Okay. So the self-awareness piece is like critical, but also takes a little bit of time and different kind of effort. I have this one hack that I think can be applied no matter how skillful you are or not, this is something that you can do to make it easier and better. And so what we tell people to do is give future focused feedback. Because if you're talking to somebody who actually cares about their performance at all, and you tell them what they did wrong two weeks ago, two months ago, two days ago, that's gonna hurt because they're actually they care, you know, and they're trying. And what are they gonna do about it? It's like telling somebody the final score of a game and expecting that to change the outcome. Like it's it's done. And so you can often give the same information and a future with a future focus, and that comes with hope. And that also comes with your ability to support it. So instead of saying, you know, that presentation you did two weeks ago, the technology was off, like you already know that. You could say, in the future, I think it can be really helpful if we did the meeting from this room because there's more tech to do that from, and I'm happy to take you and show you like how to work all that stuff before the meeting if you're interested. Same outcome, same thing. You're communicating the same information, but one is demoralizing because it's done and you can't change it, and the other comes with hope because it's not done, and you can change it. And guess what? The person who even gave you the feedback can help you be, can help you to do better. And so this future-focused feedback piece is incredibly powerful. Um, and it's something that can be applied right away, truly.

SPEAKER_01: 23:09

I love that having that future-focused mindset. So let me ask this because I know like there's some people listening. So, how do you start the conversation? Because oftentimes uh people may start the conversation saying, Well, I noticed that you um did X, Y, and Z.

SPEAKER_00: 23:30

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01: 23:31

And then they may go into the future focus. So, how do we really have this conversation?

SPEAKER_00: 23:36

Yeah. Or even worse, this is like my least favorite of how do you think you did when when you know somebody has feedback for you that's coming and you're just like, don't make me do this. Just tell me what you think.

SPEAKER_01: 23:52

Yeah, it's annoying.

SPEAKER_00: 23:53

It's annoying. So I think part of the problem is that feedback, we tend to say constructive feedback. I hate that term. I don't, I think it's we know it's negative feedback. It's part of that gaslighting thing, right? Constructive feedback. Okay, you're gonna tell me something I did wrong. Let's just do this, you know? But I think that's what creates the stress and the ick of feedback, is because, you know, that is the reputation, that is the pattern, this is how we've done it for so long. So part of reducing that response is just having people experience another way where every time you talk to them, it doesn't feel punitive, it doesn't feel like you're being critical. It feels like you're actually helping them be better, which most people want to do. So I think that um to what you're saying, I think it will take a few times to actually get that response uh a little bit tempered um by the more positive interaction. But the you just start and say, Hey, I would love to um share some feedback with you. Is that okay? And I think asking permission is great. The word feedback freaks people out, they're not gonna be happy about it, but they're probably gonna say yes anyway. And then when they say yes, when you invite people to give you permission to do it, then there's a little something that goes on in their head of like, okay, I'm participating in this. This is not something that's just happening to me. I'm involved in this process. So I think that's an important piece. And then just saying, you know, I point out what they did well. I think you did a great job with this, this, and this. I feel like in the future, it could be even better if you did XYZ. And here's how I could help you do that. So all of a sudden you're turning this conversation into one where that's consensual. You've asked for permission. And guess what? If somebody's having a terrible day, they can say no. Can we do that? And then you can say, can we meet tomorrow? Then let's just put something on a schedule for tomorrow. Like having people be able to uh set their own boundaries and show up in the way that they know they only they know they can do, that's incredibly important. And then this other piece where you're not focusing on what went wrong, you're really focusing on what went right and saying how it could be even better. Like that is a much easier conversation to have than what we're doing now.

SPEAKER_01: 26:42

Wow. I love the fact that you said you asked a question. Hey, can I provide some feedback? Because again, like you say it, like like you stated, it opens them up to say, oh, I really have an option. Yes. Right? And then who's not curious about what someone's thinking, right? Yeah. Like for me, if you say, Hey, uh, do you want to give me some uh hey, can I give you some feedback? I say, oh, sure, what you what you got? What you got? Yeah, you know, it's it's like you're telling me a lot of people.

SPEAKER_00: 27:19

You might go, oh no, please don't give me feedback. But you're gonna say yes, usually. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 27:25

Yeah. Or if not, if you say no, you're gonna come back tomorrow and think about it. Like, yeah, okay, um, you you said you had some.

SPEAKER_00: 27:34

Exactly. You won't be able to let it go.

SPEAKER_01: 27:38

I love that. I'm actually gonna put that in my next coaching session uh when I do some some draining. All right.

SPEAKER_02: 27:45

Right.

SPEAKER_01: 27:45

I'm gonna say, hey, ask the question first, right? And there's psych uh there's a there's psychology behind it. Yeah. Right, right. So thank you. You're helping me and everybody else out here. So I got one last question for you. Yes. If you could give one truth about communication that people do not want to hear, what would it be and why?

SPEAKER_00: 28:09

I think the thing that they do not want to hear, but it also provides so much relief, is that there is no mountain peak here. You you're never going to be perfect at it. There's no plateau. You don't just grow and then all of a sudden, because the thing is you're communicating with other people. So even if you get really good at it and you're communicating with somebody who lacks self-awareness, conversations can really go sideways. And so the bad news is I'm not gonna say it never gets better, but it never gets perfect. Like there, you're always going to have a risk. Right. And you can skill yourself up to be more self-aware, to be more able to navigate those conversations and repair when things get wrong. But it's not like you can learn and develop to a point where you just don't have to deal with messy conversations anymore. They will be happening for the rest of your life.

SPEAKER_01: 29:11

And it's okay to have those difficult conversations.

SPEAKER_00: 29:14

Okay. Everybody does. Nobody's doing better than you, I promise.

SPEAKER_01: 29:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 29:18

You know? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 29:20

Yeah. Well, I love it. I love it so much because these are practical things that we really don't think about as we have conversations, as we uh talk to people and communicate, whether that's communicating through email versus communicating in person, right? And and one thing I see a lot is that people tend to hide behind the communication tools that we have.

SPEAKER_02: 29:46

Yes.

SPEAKER_01: 29:47

Like, you know, using Teams instead of having an in person conversation, texting, right? I one time I had a uh a supervisor, a manager who texts the employee that. That we're terminated.

SPEAKER_02: 30:01

No.

SPEAKER_01: 30:02

And it's like, how impersonal are you?

SPEAKER_02: 30:05

Oh my gosh. Right.

SPEAKER_01: 30:06

And so people tend to naturally hide behind the tools that are supposed to help us communicate. What's your thoughts about that?

SPEAKER_00: 30:16

I totally agree. And I don't think it's, you know, bad intent. I think it's lack of ability. So as adults, when we see other adults who are not doing what they're supposed to do, automatically we just think motivation. They're not motivated to do the right thing. They're not motivated to do it. When in reality, the majority of the time it's an ability issue. But kids, we expect ability issues. They'll raise their hand and say they don't know. Adults won't do that. So I think we have to start with giving people the skills to actually do the job well. Because when people don't have the ability, they overly rely on these structures that we've provided from World War One, basically, that are not working. And so yeah, then we get dysfunction, we don't get the outcomes that we're looking for. It's not great for succession planning or even anything else because the data that we that we're using is not um it's not incredibly valid. So I think that is uh I totally agree with you that ability is really the reason why most managers lean on the tool lean on the tools that organizations have instead of using their their own skill.

SPEAKER_01: 31:37

So I've got a question for you.

SPEAKER_00: 31:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 31:40

What is your workplace pet peeve? What's a pet peeve of yours that just really irked your nerves? I love asking this question.

SPEAKER_00: 31:48

That's a good one. I it so I I I call it institutional gaslighting. And it's when we're like all doing something that we know isn't above board, isn't true. So performance management is one of those things that I talk about as often institutional gaslighting because it's like framed as this thing that we do for employees to help them improve performance, but everybody knows it's the it's the check the box thing, it's the it's the legal document, and it's not actually helping me improve my performance. And so that's what I struggle with is the mixed messages of you tell me one thing, but I we all know that's not what the thing is, and so maybe that's a lack of transparency, to be honest.

SPEAKER_01: 32:43

Well, hey, this is the transparent nature podcast, right? And it doesn't get any more real than this, right?

SPEAKER_02: 32:49

Yeah, yes.

SPEAKER_01: 32:50

But that's a good point that you touched on because uh when we look at performance, uh really how do we build someone's performance? Yeah, it's not a one-year conversation.

SPEAKER_02: 33:03

Uh-uh.

SPEAKER_01: 33:04

It's also not a one-year rating, right? It's something that uh you I like to say you having you're you you gotta have intentional conversations. And as you see things come up, you need to address them, right? And how do you address it? Is it uh a corrective approach or is it more of a one-on-one, hey, let me help and coach you, right? And so these are conversations that we need to have in our workplaces that again, it's more than just a one-year or two-year conversation. I I I I used to tell my leaders, hey, give me feedback as you see it. As you as if you see a gap, if you see something missing, if you see me going in the wrong direction, I need you to let me know immediately.

SPEAKER_02: 33:53

Please.

SPEAKER_01: 33:59

And I'm like, I never heard you say anything about that. So why would you put that on my right hand?

SPEAKER_00: 34:05

Yeah. No, they're they're crazy. Do you know where performance reviews came from? Like the history of where they came from.

SPEAKER_01: 34:13

Tell us about it.

SPEAKER_00: 34:14

Okay. It it's it makes sense when when you know this, is that they actually came from processes that were used in the World War I military system to determine who should rise in the ranks. So that's why we have rating and ranking as part of our performance management, because it was literally taken from this military process and popped into organizations in the 1970s and hasn't changed much since. And in the 70s, it was functional because the pace of change was nothing like it is today. In the 70s, an annual review, like, depending on what your job is, could be functional now today to still be using this system that's hierarchical, that you know, the only person who can control my performance is me. So, why are managers responsible for owning that process and not me who's actually doing the job?

SPEAKER_01: 35:17

That's good.

SPEAKER_00: 35:18

And it's really antiquated. And when we talk about communication at work, I think these old systems are part of the reason why we see so much dysfunction and communication at work because the structures that we have in place aren't working.

SPEAKER_01: 35:34

Right, right. And and you often hear that uh performance reviews is the beginning of succession planning.

SPEAKER_02: 35:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 35:42

And is that really the the right direction? Is that really the right step? Oh, man. We have to really think about those things, right? All right. So, anywho, that this is a great conversation. I probably gotta bring you back to have this conversation because we can talk about performance reviews and and talking about the history and all of that, but I want to take a moment to recognize October. We know October is breast cancer awareness month, and in honor of that, as you can see, I've changed my studio lights today to pink as a reminder to support the fighters, celebrate the survivors, and to honor those that we've lost. So if you'd like to help make a difference, please consider donating to the Susan G. Coleman Foundation. There's a link in the description below where you can click that link and donate to the foundation. Every dollar helps in the research for a cure. All right now. I also want to also recognize uh some people. Um, on my last episode, I shared hey, if you um comment your name or if you comment on uh the episode, I'll give you a shout out, right? So I want to do that real quick. Uh, we have Ace Ads, we have Halo Vision Media, we have Julius Sue Clean, we have Danny Rogers from New York, and we have Greta Sutton. Thank you so much for listening to the episode uh and supporting the podcast. Uh, it's really, really greatly appreciated. Before we get out of here, how can people reach out to you? Uh, how can organizations uh say, hey, I want to utilize you in your services?

SPEAKER_00: 37:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 37:28

How can people find you?

SPEAKER_00: 37:30

Uh, I you can find me on LinkedIn. That's probably one of the easiest ways. I'm really active on there, Colette Revere. And my company's name is Open360. And we have actually a better 360 assessment than uh the traditional 360. Our goal is to really replace some of these old performance processes with psychologically healthy and functional ways of communicating and sharing feedback in the workplace. So you can find information about all the stuff that we offer at uh myopen360.com.

SPEAKER_01: 38:09

And guess what? We'll have the link in the description below. So if you want to connect with Collette, you'll be able to do so uh again within the description. At the end of the day, communication isn't just about what comes out of your mouth, it's about what people receive and perceive. If you want to lead, grow, and build trust, you have to communicate like someone who actually cares about being understood and not just heard. So before you say, HR is in my business again, ask yourself, did you communicate well? Or does my communications suck? Or did you just never say what needed to be said? So I'm Prince Tate. And until next time, keep navigating your career with confidence and clarity. See you then.