Interpersonal conversation,

Improve communication. Interpersonal conversation is key to finding and correcting the potential contributors to an incident. People need to talk openly about the various environment, behavior, and person factors related to a near hit, injury, or damage to property. But this will not happen if tire focus of an "investigation" is to find a single reason for the "failure." People want notiiing to do with a failure. 

You can see how this simple inexpensive incentive/reward program was both pleasant and constructive. It got people talking about the behavior-based coaching process in positive terms and it rewarded the most difficult aspect of a behavioral coaching process— interpersonal feedback. It is relatively easy to complete a critical behavioral checklist (CBC) compared with relaying the CBC results to an observee in a positive and constructive interpersonal conversation. The potential reward for completing this last and most important aspect of behavioral coaching added an element of fxm to the whole process. It made it easier to transition from behavioral observation to interpersonal feedback. 

Safety coaching is a critically important intervention approach, but keep in mind the many other ways you can contribute to the health and safety of a work culture, hi other words, safety coaching is one type of intervention for the "1" stage of the DO IT process. Any variety of activator and consequence strategies explained in Chapters 10 and 11, respectively, can be used as a behavior-based intervention. These steps require people to go beyond their normal routine to help another person. The next chapter shows how we can support and, thereby, improve safety with everyday interpersonal conversations and informal coaching. 

Interpersonal conversation defines the culture in which we work. It can create conflict and buUd barriers to safety improvement or it can cultivate the kind cfwork culture needed to make a major breakthrough in injury prevention. Interpersonal conversation also affects our intrapersorud conversations or self-talk, which in turn influences our willingness to get involved in safety-improvement efforts. This chapter explains the reciprocal impact cf inter- and intrapersonal conversation and offers guidelines for aligning both toward the achievement cfa Total Safety Culture. 

Coaching was presented as a rather formal step-by-step process whereby a critical behavior checklist (CBC) is developed and used to observe and analyze the safe vs. at-risk behaviors occurring in a particular work procedure. Then, as illustrated in Figure 13.1, the CBC is used to present directive and/or motivational feedback in a one-to-one interpersonal conversation. Also, percent safe scores are derived from a variety of CBCs and presented on a group feedback chart. Comments written on the CBCs are discussed in group meetings to analyze areas of concern and to find ways to make safe behavior more likely to occur. 

This chapter is also about interpersonal conversation and coaching, but the emphasis is on brief informal communication to support safe behavior and help it become more fluent. How we talk with others (interpersonal communication) influences their attitude and ongoing behavior, and how we talk to ourselves (intrapersonal communication) influences our own behavior and attitude. Therefore, this chapter also addresses self-talk—the mental scripts we carry around in our heads before, during, and after our behaviors. 

You know your interpersonal conversation is especially productive when someone makes a commitment to improve in a certain way. This reflects success in moving conversation from the past to tiie future and then to a specific action plan. A verbal commitment also tells you that something is happening on an intrapersonal level within that other person. The person is becoming self-motivated, increasing tire probability the target behavior will improve (Cialdini, 1993). 

Corrective feedback that can be interpreted as an "adult-child" confrontation will probably not work. The supervisor in Figure 13.5 means well, but the worker does not see it that way. When a directive conversation is interpreted as controlling or demeaning, it is essentially ineffective, so play it safe. Try to be more nondirective when using interpersonal conversation to affect behavior change. 

Every conversation you have with someone is biased by prejudice or prejudgment filters— in yourself and within the other person. You cannot get around it. From personal experience, people develop opinions and attitudes and these, in turn, influence subsequent experience. With regard to interpersonal conversation, we have subjective prejudgment filters that influence what words we hear, how we interpret those words, and what we say in response to those words. In Chapter 5,1 referred to this bias as premature cognitive commitment (Langer, 1989). Every conversation influences how we process and interpret the next conversation. 

Pay close attention to the body language and tone in conversations. I am sure you have heard many times that the method of delivery can hold as much or more information as the words themselves. Listen for passion, commitment, or caring. If nothing else, you could learn whether the messenger imderstands and believes the message and, perhaps, you will learn a new way to deliver a message yourself. The bottom line is our intrapersonal conversations can either facilitate or hinder what we learn from interpersonal conversation. 

Do you want to change how others perceive you Change the conversations people are having about you. Through proactive listening, you can become aware of negative interpersonal conversations about you and then you can interject new statements about yourself into conversations, especially with people who have numerous contacts with others. 

The strategies covered here for getting the most from interpersonal conversation are reviewed in Figure 13.9. Each technique is relevant for getting more safety-related involvement from others. Applying these strategies effectively can improve one s self-talk or intrapersonal conversation. This leads to increased self-esteem and perceptions of empowerment—person states which enhance an individual s willingness to actively care for the safety and health of others. Evidence for this is detailed in Section 5 of this Handbook. 

Figure 13.9 Follow these strategies to get the most from interpersonal conversation.

Remember that planting certain words in self-talk and conversations with others can improve your self-image and confidence as a facilitator of beneficial change. Tell others of your increased commitment to facilitate more effective safety conversations. Then, tell yourself the strategies you will use to improve interpersonal conversation and commend yourself when you do. In this way, intra- and interpersonal conversations work together to help achieve a Total Safety Culture. 

By giving quality interpersonal support, we give people a script they can use to reward their own behavior. In other words, our quality recognition improves the other person s interpersonal conversation. Positive self-talk is crucial for long-term maintenance of safe behavior. In odier words, when we allow our recognition to stand alone and soak in, we give people words they can use later for self-motivation. 

The bottom line is to realize yom genuine acceptance of quality recognition will activate the reciprocity norm, and the more this norm is activated from positive interpersonal conversation, the greater the frequency of interpersonal recognition. So accept recognition well and embrace the reciprocity norm. The result will be more interpersonal involvement consistent with the vision of a Total Safety Culture. 

Each type of actively caring behavior can be direct or indirect, with direct behavior requiring effective communication strategies. For instance, leaving a note to explain an actively caring act does not involve interpersonal conversation. Similarly, you can report an individual s safe or at-risk behavior to a supervisor and eliminate the need for one-to-one communication skills. 

Daily events can elevate or depress our moods. Some events are controllable, some are not. Clearly, the nature of our interactions with others can have a dramatic impact on the mood of everyone involved. As depicted in Figure 14.12, even a telephone conversation can lift a person s spirits and increase his or her propensity to actively care. Perhaps, remembering the research on mood and its effect will motivate us to adjust om interpersonal conversations with coworkers (see Chapter 13). We should also interact in a way that could influence a person s beliefs or expectations in certain directions, as explained next. 

It is important to imderstand that fulfilling a pessimistic prophecy can depreciate our perceptions of personal control, self-efficacy, and even self-esteem. Realizing this should motivate us to do whatever we can to make interpersonal conversations positive and... 

Figure 15,15 Interpersonal conversation affects the actively caring person states.

Conversely, patients may also display certain interpersonal styles that fluctuate with the course of their illness. For example, Janowsky et al. ( 40) demonstrated that manic patients have a characteristic interactional style that clearly distinguishes them from schizoaffective and schizophrenic patients. Using their Manic Interpersonal Interaction Scale (MIIS) to assess changes in personality style, the authors found manic patients more likely to do the following ... 

Enhancing interpersonal skills such as the ability to initiate a conversation... 

I Interpersonal. Social language seeks to know another person or being together with others. 2, Immediate. Social language is primarily the language of face-to-face sharing. Even written or electronic social messages strive to capture the tone of friendly conversation. 

Communication barriers often also called noise or static can complicate the communication process. While unavoidable, both the sender and receiver must work to minimize them. Interpersonal communication barriers can arise within the realm of either the sender or receiver. If an individual holds a bias against the topic under discussion, anything said in the conversation can affect perception. 

One key, established sociological concept is that like attracts like. In social psychology, similarity refers to how closely attitudes, values, interests, and personality match between people. Research has consistently shown that similarities in opinions, interpersonal styles, level of communication skill, demographics, and values have all been shown in experiments to increase interpersonal attraction. Conversely, people tend to make negative assumptions about those who disagree with them on fundamental issues, and hence dislike them. 

There are two fundamental forms of communication verbal and nonverbal. Verbal communication includes interpersonal or electronically transmitted conversations and chats, lectures, audiovisual mass media such as television and radio, and similar forms of oral speech. Verbal communication also includes written communication books, letters, magazines, signs, Web sites, and e-mails. Nonverbal... 

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