A Non-SAVI Response to Yes-Buts

One of our readers just brought to our attention a great example of a non-SAVI response to Yes-Butting. (Thanks, Candace!)

Source:
"The Worst Words to Say at Work: 9 common words and phrases that will make you sound noncommittal, undependable, and untrustworthy"
by Linnda Durre, Forbes.com

7. "Yes, but . . ."
This is another excuse. You might give your team members suggestions or solutions, and they come back to you with "Yes, but . . ." as a response. They don't really want answers, help, or solutions. You need to call the "Yes, but . . ." people out on their avoidance tactic by saying something like "You know, Jackie, every time I offer you a suggestion you say, 'Yes, but . . . ,' which makes me think you don't really want to solve this problem. That's not going to work. If you want to play the victim, go right ahead, but I'm not going to allow you to keep this up." After a response like that, you can be assured that the next words you hear will not be "Yes, but . . ."!
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A few things to notice about this approach:

1. The emphasis is all on the people, not on the way they are communicating. Instead of addressing Yes-Buts, the author focuses on "'Yes-But' people." She shifts our attention from external behavior, which we can all objectively observe (the person is using Yes-Buts) to internal motivation (e.g., the person is trying to avoid the problem by making excuses), which we can only guess at. If we accept the claim "They don't really want answers, help, or solutions," we're presuming to know what's going on inside the head of anyone who says "Yes-But" — quite a bold claim! (Many of you will recognize this as a "mind-read," an assumption about other people's thoughts and feelings stated as if it were a fact.)

2. Since the Yes-But people are (presumably) the problem, the solution seems to be to shut them down, to teach them a lesson so they'll stop doing what they're doing. There's no sense of any larger context (e.g., what factors may be contributing to a lot of Yes-Butting) or larger goals (e.g., to help these people communicate in a more constructive way) — much less of any useful information the Yes-Butters might have. (Consider: "Yes, we want to meet the deadline, but the product hasn't passed the safety inspection yet." or "Yes, this is an exciting idea, but it violates our contract.")    

3. Let's look at the details of the proposed strategy. What type of behavior would the author use to respond to a Yes-But?

a. "You know, Jackie, every time I offer you a suggestion you say, 'Yes, but . . . ,'
--This statement has elements of fact in it (the person has Yes-Butted more than once), but the generalized "you do this *every* time" makes it more of an attack. And while it's possible you could say it in a non-hostile tone, it would be hard to do it with no edge at all. Therefore, we're pretty confident calling this an attack.

b. "...which makes me think you don't really want to solve this problem."
--Here's another mind-read. Because it's an accusatory one, we'd call this an attack as well.

c. "That's not going to work."
--In another context, this could be a discount (criticizing another person's ideas or intentions, rather than criticizing them personally), but here it comes across as blameful, if not threatening. (The implication being, your attempts to avoid solving this problem won't work.) Thus, another attack.

d. "If you want to play the victim, go right ahead, but I'm not going to allow you to keep this up."
--Hmm, what could this be? Ironically, it takes the form of a Yes-But, the very behavior the author is railing against, but again the hostility pushes it into attack -- with a bit of sarcasm thrown in for good measure.

So there we have it -- one clear strategy for responding to a Yes-But: Attack the person who's Yes-Butting. The author is right that the next words you hear probably won't be "Yes, but." Attacks turn a conflict away from the subject matter being discussed, making it more personal. If the original Yes-Butter gives any response at all, it is likely to be self-defense or a counter-attack.

Happily, there are other, more promising options for dealing with Yes-Buts. We'll turn to them in our next posting.

Two Brief Notes on Butting

1. Stealth-Butting
Some of the worst Yes-But offenders are people who are convinced they never use them at all. Somewhere along the line they learned that “Yes, but” was a bad thing to say, so they eliminated the phrase from their vocabulary. However, their Yes-Buts never truly went away. They just went underground, to reemerge as what we call stealth-Buts. Stealth-Buts don’t contain the word but or even, in most cases, the word yes. The people using them generally have no idea that they’re secretly Yes-Butting. In fact, they often believe they’re communicating in a highly constructive and supportive way. But no matter how sophisticated the phrasing, this type of communication has the same problematic effects as a traditional Yes-But. Here are just a few examples:

Yes variations
I understand where you’re coming from…
I see your point…
That may be true…
I know that seems like the obvious solution…
You could say that…
While that’s one way to look at things…
You’re absolutely right…
Sure…

But variations
…however…
…nevertheless…
…on the other hand…
…still…
…only then…
…have you considered…
…it’s just that…
…and yet…

Even Yes-And can be a Yes-But in disguise — for instance, “Yes, I like your approach, and what we need now is something completely different.” If you’re arguing against what someone just said, simply changing but to and isn’t going to fool anybody.

2. The “But” Reflex
Nobody is a perfect communicator. We’ve all developed at least a few bad habits in the way we express ourselves. Often those habits are so automatic that we don’t even notice them. This became very clear in one team of top executives that we trained. We came in to observe one of their strategic meetings, and quickly noticed that whenever a particular person (call him Jim) spoke, he seemed to get resistance from others in the group.

We decided to start tracking Jim’s behavior. It turned out that he was one of the most vocal participants in the meeting, and every single time he made a comment, he started with the word “But.” This was true even when he was asking an otherwise open and neutral question (“[But] where do you think we can get this information?”) or building on what someone else had said (“[But] let’s see if we can get other departments on board with the idea.”). When we talked to Jim later, he said he had no idea he was doing that. It was only by gaining this awareness — making his unconscious habit conscious — that he could start to do something different.