Clean Language Tools Get Better Results And Better Communication
Whether you’re a coach, manager or leader, clean language tools get better results when you’re communicating your ideas. These simple techniques will increase your engagement and impact on those around you. When we learn to listen so attentively that our awareness of the words, vocal tone and expressions used by others is as precise as possible, we are forging stronger connections in coaching, management and everyday communication.
The business world, the economy, and the human race is in a state of transition right now. Communication has never been more important. We’re learning how to communicate remotely and we need more creativity, flexibility and coherent team work. There has never been a better time to clean up our language and clarify our communication, and I’m not talking about expletives here!
“Clean Language” is a conversational therapy technique developed by a David Grove, a psychotherapist. The technique involves asking neutral, non-directional, questions to avoid influencing the response or responder. It’s a very useful technique in coaching. In business, it’s invaluable. Quite simply, clean language tools brings better results.
Mondegreens, Mishears and Madness
Now here’s an admission. When I was a child I was a big fan of Paul Young’s ‘No Parlez’ album. If you know the singer you might remember a song named “Every Time You Go Away.” There’s a line in the song that says “Every time you go away, you take a piece of me with you.” One day my family caught me singing along to this particular track, and collapsed in giggles when I loudly chanted “Every time you go away, you take a piece of MEAT with you.” That joke lasted for several years!
Specifically, this is referred to as a Mondegreen or an Orynym – when we mishear common phrases or song lyrics that sound similar to the original version. Let’s face it, you may have your own slightly embarrassing example. What’s more interesting, is how commonly it occurs in general conversation.
Have You Ever Stopped To Consider How Conversations Work?
I imagine your answer to this questions goes something like this. “I talk, you listen. Next you talk and I listen, or vice versa. Actually, this is rarely how conversations work.
In fact, we are constantly deafened by the sound barrier of our own projections, assumptions, beliefs and preoccupations. That is to say, we naturally predict what our friends, family and colleagues are going to say and, often, that’s also what we hear. As a result, often only part of the message passes through the barrier.
When we use clean language, and NLP Coaching language, we aim to break down the wall. We practice being fully present in the moment so that we can listen with ALL of our senses and hear the other person’s message with a greater level of clarity.
What Is Clean Language?
Clean Language is a way of communicating that helps reduce bias and influence in order to help bring clarity to a situation. By using the clean language framework we can garner high quality information whilst minimising assumptions. What’s more, these questions expose diversity in thinking, approaches and attitudes and create more cohesive teams.
There are 12 basic Clean Language questions. To use them, we combine them with the words of the speaker. Consequently, the questions are entirely flexible. Used well, these questions can bring change to a person’s mindset, through reframing, offering more opportunities to an individual, team or company. As an aside, NLP Language techniques encompass and align fully with Clean Language. In this article, I’m not taking you through all the techniques, however, I give you an example of how you can start to integrate clean language tools to get better results. I teach Clean Language as part of my NLP Master Practitioner training programme.
This same ‘Clean Language’ approach to questioning can be used in a multitude of situations. Specifically, when you’re gathering information, interviewing a new team member, working with a coaching client to establishing best practice for a corporate project. It’s even useful when you’re communicating with your kids!
Let's Try A Little Exercise - Managing Assumptions & Different Realities
Look at the image to the left and take a few moments to take it in. Now pick up a pen and write down three statements that describe the image for you. Imagine for a moment you’re on the phone and describing the image to the person on the line who can’t see the picture.
Now score each of those statements from one to ten, defining how certain you are the statements are true. One indicating a lack of certainty the statement is true and ten indicating total certainty the statement you’ve written is true.
Next ask yourself the following questions:
1) What would have to be true about this picture for my statement to be untrue?
2) What would have to be true about this picture for my statement to be true?
Then re-score your original statements to identify how certain you are they are true or untrue. Has the score changed or remained the same?
Self-Awareness Prepares Us to Manage Bias And Assumptions
The exercise above shows us how easy it is to make inaccurate assumptions about a photograph. Imagine how much easier it is to make assumptions in real life. So, now that we know we’re always making assumptions and have a certain perspective bias, we can diminish that voice as we practice using clean language.
Everyone on the planet has a different reality and a different perspective based on where they were born, the culture they grew up in, the climate they live in (yes, really!), their education, their working environment and the friends and family they choose to surround themselves with now. Even the news channel we choose to watch has an unconscious influence on our thinking.
What’s wonderful about this process is that every time you engage fully with clean language tools, you literally train your brain to diminish assumption, bias and judgement. In fact, it’s truly liberating! Try it, it’s nice to think nothing about the content of what someone says and get excited about the words they use, the vocal tone they assign to any specific words or phrases and discover how they link concepts together.
It’s like solving a giant jigsaw puzzle on a rainy day – deeply satisfying!
An Example Of How Clean Language Tools Get Better Results - A Coaching Scenario
Coach: How are you getting on at work?
Client: Okay, but it always feels as if there is another problem to solve and sometimes I feel like it’s useless to imagine everything will ever be resolved.
Coach: What kind of problems are those problems? The same problems, old problems, new problems or something else?
Client: Just a continuous stream of problems, sometimes old, sometimes new. If feels like a huge barrier.
Coach: What type of barrier is the one you just mentioned?
Client: Too big to get through.
Coach: And when if feels as if it’s too big to get through, where are you exactly? What would happen if you changed position?
Client: Well it was right in front of me. Now I’ve stepped back it’s further away.
Coach: And now it’s further away, how does it look and feel?
Client: Actually, it looks smaller and there might even be a gap to pass through.
Coach: Great! How does that feel? And where would you have to view it from to know, with certainty, you can pass through the barrier?
Client: It feels better. If I stand far back or if I float higher and view it from above then I can see that it’s manageable.
Coach: So, now that you can see that it’s manageable, which I suppose means all of these old problems you mentioned before are manageable, does that make everything easier? Perhaps, even as you step back or float above you can see even more solutions that will deliver rapid solutions to those problems. What do you think?
Following this process through different conversations can open up the belief framework of the other person so they can see things from a different perspective and change the thought patterns and feelings around the issue expressed. You’ll notice that the coach only uses words the client has used and questions around those words to free them from ‘stuck state’.
10 Tips To Keep Your Language Clean
Okay, here are 10 tips to improve your attentiveness and support you in cleaning up your language skills.
- Set your eyes in soft focus, get into your peripheral vision so you are more aware of the big picture rather than specific facial expressions.
- Allow the other person time to pause and express their thoughts. Resist the urge to jump in and finish a sentence!
- Be curious to understand the other person’s mindset or model of the world.
- Set your personal agenda aside and just listen to what the person is saying.
- Put your attention on specifically what the other person is saying, rather than the whole person and resist thinking about what you’re going to say next.
- Imagine there’s a whiteboard in front of you in the sky. Literally draw a diagram of what the person is saying, the concepts expressed and how those concepts are linked together.
- Perhaps you might want to take notes if that helps you focus your attention.
- Practice really believing what the other person is saying. Treat it as truth and then imagine the situation from their perspective.
- One approach is to literally ask your ego to get out of the room! It sounds strange, and yet it can stop the inner voice and keep you focused!
- Respond to the person using their own words and expanding out with who, what, when, where and how questions.
The most important thing with these techniques is to keep practising. It can be challenging to resist or ignore our own assumptions and judgements. Quietening the inner voice is the first step to this!
Also be aware, when you use the other person’s words back to them, you minimise resistance and allow them to connect with finding their own solution. The gifts just keep on coming!
Find Out More About Clean Language Tools And Working With Me
Find out more about my Ultimate Destination NLP Training in 2021.
To find out more about coaching with me, or if you’d like to arrange a call to see if we’re a good fit for one another, please send me an email to sarah@sarahmerron.com.
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