Hi, everyone.
This talk is about communication.
The first thing I'm going to tell you
is that I stutter.
I've stuttered since I was 3 years old,
around this age. I know, I'm adorable.
It's okay. You can tell me. [Laughter]
Stuttering has shaped how I communicate
since I was that person right there.
I began stuttering when I was 3.
I was talking to my parents about it
and they said they weren't that concerned
because many kids stutter at that age and
they grow out of it when they're 5 or 6.
I had cousins who stuttered, my brother,
my parents; they all grew out of theirs
by the time they were around 17.
People thought, it's a thing
that is happening right now,
but it'll go away on its own
and that will be the end of that.
Well, I'm 32, and it's still here.
I guess it's just here to stay.
Those who stutter develop coping tools.
I did... So many things that I did
that were kind of odd
were because of my stuttering.
I would try to conceal it
by saying things... Sorry.
I would try to stay away from situations
where I knew that I'd have to talk
because I was so terrified of stuttering.
I'd change words because when you stutter,
you are keenly aware of the words
that are going to give you some trouble.
Before saying the word, I'd quickly
think about a different word to say
so I wouldn't stutter.
I came to know that stuttering and
the ways I was coping were taking over
both my personal and professional life
so I decided to try to face this fear
by pursuing small opportunities to speak
in front of people.
It know it sounds insane
but I'm the type of person who,
if I'm afraid to swim, I'm going to jump
in the deep end and see what happens.
Hopefully, I won't drown. [Laughter]
When I began pursuing public speaking,
the views that I had had of communication
drastically changed.
Communication is supposed to be
an act of incredible empathy.
The problem is that it definitely isn't.
To talk about communication,
we have to talk about conversations.
The way we approach conversations is bad.
That's you, and you come up with
this thing that you want to tell people.
You have an idea. That's you.
That's the thing you want to tell people
and you get pumped about this idea.
You don't want to brag, but you think that
this thing could have legs.
You're pretty excited about
what you want to share.
You think about the idea,
about the words you want to use,
about how you want others to feel,
about how you want to feel as
you're explaining the idea.
You say it, you're excited, and
you expect them to be "wow,
that was the best idea
that I think I will ever hear in my life",
and they don't act like that.
They're like, "Okay, great.
I have to go to lunch now."
You're confused as to why this person
isn't as excited as you about this idea
that you think is so great.
The problem is you don't care about them.
You don't want to have
a two-way conversation.
You just want them to love
your idea the way that Kanye loves Kanye.
[Laughter]
This self-focused approach
to communication is a breeding ground for
lackluster conversations and it can even
cause problems on teams.
What do you need to do,
and how do you fix the problem?
You need to think about the other person.
You need to be empathetic.
The reason why is because empathy
fuels connection, and if this is true,
then empathetic communication is going to
drive collaboration.
When building teams or products,
one of the most important things
that has to be positive
is the way you collaborate
as a collective.
This presents a problem.
In 2016, the way we collaborate
is almost exclusively via
glowing screens, software, and text;
which is fine, there are benefits
to communicating in this way.
Teams have said that being able to talk
to each other via Slack and Twitter
helps sharing.
It helps people feel connected
and to build common ground.
The problem there is that,
when you are communicating exclusively
via text,
the empathy that you must have
to connect is oftentimes lost.
Technology is extremely helpful
but it can't replace the social aspect
of face-to-face communication.
Here is another truth.
Failures of communication can't just be
automated away.
You have to confront things
face-to-face.
If you take away the technology,
cellphones, computers, software,
then what do you have left?
You have people.
There's a second problem.
People hate talking to each other
because talking is hard,
conversations are difficult, and
collaboration is extremely hard.
That's why collaboration does fail,
it's hard to talk to people sometimes.
Let's figure out why collaboration fails.
The biggest reasons are that people
are afraid of being wrong and
concerned they aren't going to be able
to communicate their thoughts and
opinions in a clear way.
The fear of being wrong
is the fear of being judged.
I can't tell you the times when I've had
an idea and wanted to share it,
but I was so consumed with the thought of
being judged,
that I just remained silent.
Being misunderstood happens almost daily.
You are all highly technical people
and you work with non-technical people.
Having to explain things can often end up
in frustration and irritation,
so it's just easier not to collaborate.
So how do we fix this?
The first thing is
that you have to speak up,
and encourage the people around you
to do the same
because silence kills collaboration.
Hearing what another person has to say
doesn't make your thoughts
and opinions any less valid.
All it does is enhance conversations.
The next thing that you have to do is
to think about the person
that you are talking to.
All of us are on different planes.
intellectually, emotionally. That's okay.
Speaking to people on their level
doesn't compromise your level.
Next thing is to think about the speaker.
When you're having a conversation where
the speaker is struggling while talking,
think back to hearing me speak now.
I know that it can be incredibly difficult
to completely understand what I'm trying
to say, and that you have to be patient.
You have to really pay attention.
When you discuss your ideas
from a place of great empathy,
and you pay attention to
others' ideas
from that same place,
you are going to create something
that is bigger and better than the things
you could have created by yourself.
That takes vulnerability.
It's the vulnerability to embrace silence
or discuss the things that are going to be
an uncomfortable conversation,
and that also takes courage.
It takes the courage to listen to people
when they are struggling to communicate
the things that they're trying to say,
and the courage to embrace them
being vulnerable to you.
To be an empathetic communicator,
you need to be courageous,
you need to be vulnerable and patient.
That's going to be the foundation
of a positive and effective
team collaboration.
Thank you.
[Applause]
RYAN: Would you like to take questions?
SHARON: Sure.
RYAN: Thank you very much
for sharing your story with us.
RYAN: It's a very powerful talk.
We do have time for questions as well
if anybody has any questions that
would like to pose...
AUDIENCE MEMBER: I was really struck when
you made the point about how people
are often afraid to speak up
because they fear either
of being wrong or they fear
being misunderstood.
I really reflected on that.
I started to wonder which one
of those two things I fear most.
I'm still wondering about that,
but when I was reflecting on that further,
I realized that some of the biggest jerks
that I've ever known, we're talking
about real geniuses but quite often jerks,
who do fear being wrong
but that don't care at all
about being misunderstood.
Oftentimes, they deliberately choose
their words to ensure they can't be wrong
because they're ambiguous,
they have many interpretations.
They don't care about being misunderstood
because they leave it up to the audience
to misunderstand them.
Maybe I'm being unfair to those people, or
maybe they have legitimate reasons for
behaving that way, but I'm curious about
what you think about this, in terms of
the kind of personality that stops caring
about whether their audience
misunderstands them or not.
SHARON: I'm sure we call them sociopaths.
[Laughter]
They just don't feel, they don't care,
so they can live their lives in a way that
it doesn't matter if I hurt your feelings
because I don't have feelings anyway.
In terms of the personality for
people who do have feelings,
I think they are a lot more thoughtful,
and think about what they're going to say.
They make sure that the way
they communicate is going to be
both positive and effective, and
it's not going to harm others
because that's also really important, too.
The way we talk about things,
and the way that we say things
has an impact on how things are perceived.
I think that people who care
talk to people in the way that
they have to be spoken to.
Everybody else who's on the ends,
you probably don't want to be talking
to them anyway, because they don't care
about your feelings.
Unless you have to go to work with them.
and then... I don't know.
RYAN: Are there any more questions?
Thank you very much.
SHARON: Thank you.
[Applause]