There is no shortage of continuum-based models in business communication and negotiating. Although it is dangerous to oversimplify, I often force clients and students into binary decisions. One example from last fall was asking my class at Schulich Business School (during the current strike) whether they were sympathetic to the union or sympathetic to the school administration.
As an instructor/consultant, this creates better discussions because you can get away from the “it depends” that is necessarily pervasive in the domain of human behaviour. It also can get to the root of ideological divides (as people identify with different groups) and strategic trade-offs (where it really is this or that – e.g. sucking and blowing).The group identity idea made me think of a after-work beer-aided conversation I had with two of the three business partners that ran the company I was working for in Tokyo. I had just seen the movie “Lulu on the Bridge,” which is worth a watch.
In one scene, very recently acquainted Mira Sorvino and Harvey Keitel lounge in the morning (I won’t spoil it by telling you how they got there). She engages him in a game of “Are you this or that?” where you take turns asking the such questions. E.g. “Are you a river or an ocean?” Goofy, but cute, so I thought I’d throw it into our post-work drink banter.While Partner 1 pondered the decision, Partner 2 blurter out, “Come on, everyone would want to be an ocean.” In retrospect, that response actually told a lot about the personality at play. Not long after, that partnership dissolved. It was not over the river/ocean question, per se, but there was certainly something behind the metaphor in the differences of approach and vision.Sometimes there are “this and that” scenarios. It is natural to prefer one side to the other. I think. it’s dangerous to not acknowledge the other side.
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