Managing Sticky Situations at Work

Sticky Situations on the Home Front 193the end of the discussion. In each sticky situation, however, the speakeridentified the problem, which both parties finally resolved, whenweighing the Decision Points.• Invite the Other Person to Talk. Usually the speaker invited theother to talk immediately after specifying the problem. That approachset the tone for curiosity and interest in the other’s point of view.Furthermore, in nearly every case, the speaker invited the other toparticipate in the resolution of the issue. Again, how much the speakerinvited the other to talk depended on the other’s personality. Somepersonalities talk more freely than others.• Join Feelings with Facts. Expressing feelings about what was happeninghumanized the events. Depending on the speaker’s personality, theability to express feeling came with more or less ease. Nonetheless, inall our situations each speaker joined feeling with fact and in doing sotended to grab the other’s attention and move toward problemresolution.• Resolve the Issue. We never saw an SIJR Conversation that endedwithout resolution. The last case in Chapter 11 threatened to do sowhen Nichole requested time before making her decision to participatein the resolution. Her speaker conceded but insisted that she agree tostop the behavior. Had he simply agreed, the problem might havecontinued and/or escalated. Because each speaker invited the other toparticipate in the resolution, the final decision ended up beingsomething both parties could live with.This book demonstrated that the SIJR Model works in all kinds ofoffice situations. We looked at sticky situations between bosses and subordinates,between vendors and customers or clients, and between coworkers.We also looked at situational situations, namely, in interviews,in meetings, as well as in romantic situations, in e-situations, and stickyetiquette situations. Although each of these cases involved differentpeople with different personalities, we applied the model accordingly.The SIJR Model works not only in an office environment but also inthose thorny situations that affect our personal lives. Imagine the followingsticky home situation.STICKY SITUATION #26:YOUR TEENAGE DAUGHTER IS BUSTEDAnita and Thomas Maxwell have a 17-year-old daughter,Katie, who enjoys popularity in school but whose grades hover at