Improving Communication Skills

The Cooperation Challenge

Professor Maurice Schweitzer

The Cooperation Challenge

Homicide Detective Marshall Frank Paul Rowles

Interrogation

• Rowels knew Detective Frank needed a confession

• Frank still got it in 30 minutes
• Needed someone to be cooperative
• Needed it fast
• How do we get people to help us out even when it’s not in their own best
interest?
The Cooperation Challenge

• Would you let a stranger sleep in your house?

• Airbnb
• A system that allows strangers to sleep in your home
How to Cooperate in a Social Dilemma

• Social dilemmas
• Prisoner’s Dilemmas with more than two parties
• The collective is better off when individuals cooperate
• Individuals have incentives to defect
The Prisoner’s Dilemma:

cooperate with each other

w. each other
Cooperate
Social Dilemma Problems

• Reducing greenhouse gasses

• Overfishing
• Conserving water
• Contributing to public radio
• Working on a team project
• Many negotiations
• Creating vs. claiming value
What Facilitates Cooperation?

• “Shadows of the Past”

• Build relationships
• Shared identity
• Do I value my identity as part of this group?
• "Shadows of the Future"
• Will we interact in the future?
What Facilitates Cooperation?

• Communication
• Is communication clear?
• Does it demonstrate concern?
• Face-to-face is best
• Expectations
• Shift expectations: Community Game v. Wall Street Game
What Facilitates Cooperation?

• Accountability
• Is behavior observed? Is there recourse?
• Anonymity hurts
• Rating systems help
• Trust
How to Solve a Social Dilemma

• Shadow of the past

• Shared identity
• Shadow of the future
• Communication
• Expectations
• Accountability
• Trust
Improving Communication Skills
Building Trust: Vulnerability

Professor Maurice Schweitzer

Vulnerability

• Elizabeth Petrakis
• Asked to sign a prenuptial agreement
• Husband Peter keeps $20 million of real estate
• Elizabeth gets $25,000 for every year of marriage

“This prenuptial agreement was a thorn in our marriage.”

Building Trust

• Pratfalls
• High performer gains trust from spilling coffee
• Mistakes make people seem warmer and more approachable
• Must be balanced with competence

(Aronson)
Vulnerability

• Not just about sharing failures

• Making yourself vulnerable to others by off key singing or socializing
with others
Building Trust

Bosnian War
• Serbian President Milosevic
• 1995 Negotiations in Dayton Ohio

President Milosevic
Building Trust

Bosnian War
• Spent weeks negotiating

Richard Holbrooke
Federation of Bosnia
and Herzegovina

Republic of Srpska
Building Trust

Bosnian War
• Spent weeks negotiating
• Settled at 2AM on November 17th, 1995

Richard Holbrooke
Building Trust

Extradited to the Hague and charged with war crimes

Building Trust: Vulnerability

• Making mistakes
• Spilling coffee, dropping pens, telling a bad joke
• Self-Disclosure
• Admitting failures
• Risky: Too Vulnerable
• Milosevic – failed to consider extradition
• Surgeons spilling pens
Improving Communication Skills
Building Trust: Rapport, Warmth, & Equality

Professor Maurice Schweitzer

Building Trust

• Rapport
• Warmth
• Equality
The Cooperation Challenge

Homicide Detective Marshall Frank Paul Rowles

Focus on Building Rapport

Detective Frank built rapport

• Sat close
• Leaned in
• Asked about his family
• “I made friends with him.”
One Key to Building Trust

• Build Rapport
• Non-task communication
• Local events, hobbies
• Share meals
• Go to events together
Clay Shaw (13-time incumbent) v. Ron Klein, for FL 22nd Distr.
One Key to Building Trust

• Klein’s Challenge
• How could he sound articulate but also warm?
• Practice TV interview
• He never smiled
Projecting Warmth

• Having a dog as president projects warmth

• Spending time with family
• Sharing personal stories
Building Trust: Rapport

• Non-task communication
• “Chit-chat” unrelated to the business at hand
• Common experiences/interests
• Using first names - correctly
Building Trust: Warmth

• Demonstrate warmth
• Concern for others
• Kindness
• Spend time
• Family, friends, pets, volunteering
Building Trust: Equality

• Communicate a sense of equality

• Be punctual, minimize differences in clothing, seating, etc.
Key Ingredients for Building Trust

• Building Rapport
• Demonstrating Warmth
• Demonstrating Equality
Improving Communication Skills
Interdependence, Common Goals, & Common Enemies

Professor Maurice Schweitzer

Interdependence

Interdependence
• The need to rely on each other
Interdependence

• Assigning people to a group

• Caused loyalty within: participants to favor their group and increase trust in
group members

186 Societies (Cohen 2006; Tajfel , 1970)

Common Goals Build Trust

• Common enemies
• The United States and Pakistan grow closer after the 9/11 attacks
• Russia and France changed their dynamics after attacks in the Middle
East
13 Colonies United for Common Defense

• French Indian War (1754-1763) in North America

• British & Colonies v. France
• British trained Americans (including George Washington)
American Revolutionary War (1775-1783)

• US rebelled against the British

• Intolerable acts 1774 (taxes)

• US & France became allies

• Common enemy: British
• French support material in 1776, enter war 1778
Super-ordinate goals

• A common enemy
• Such as a competitor
• Identify common goals
• To develop the best process for the company, to solve a shared
environmental concern
Building Trust

• Warmth & Competence

• Vulnerability
• Communication
• Institutions
• Reputations
• Common Goals
Improving Communication Skills
Communication & Institutions

Professor Maurice Schweitzer

Communication & Institutions

• In 2008, Ford, Chrysler, GM requested $25 Billion Federal Loan

• First trip to DC: All three CEOs flown on separate corporate jets
• Second trip to DC: Arrived in hybrid vehicles
Communicate as Equals

• Show equality
• Being punctual
• Minimize differences
• Such as clothing and seating
Language Matters

• Community Game v. Wall Street Game

• Despite having the same incentives, participants cooperating more in
the Community Game over the Wall Street Game
• Partner v. Opponent
• Team member v. Employee
Seating Matters

• Seating communicates ideas

• Sitting on the same side of the table communicates working together
Alton Logan Andrew Wilson
Institutions

• 1982 Robbery
• Eye witness testimony
• Convicts Alton Logan- life in prison
• Wasn’t even at the crime scene
• 26 Years later, after Wilson’s death, Alton finally went free

Alton’s aunt: “They did what they had to do”

 If your friends gossip to you,
you know they also gossip about you.
Rating Systems

• Airbnb
• Website is devoted to trust
• Their rating system makes a big difference
• Uber
• Rating systems increase trust in other people
• Ebay
• Reputations are effective in solving the trust problem
Improving Communication Skills
Signaling & Trust

Professor Maurice Schweitzer

Signaling & Trust

• How can we convey unobservable information?

• How committed is your partner to the relationship?
• How interested is the candidate in a career?
• How intelligent is a candidate?
• How sure is our new partner that this product will succeed?
Signal

• Signals can be clear

• Signals can be powerful
• Observable action that conveys unobservable information
• Affordable to some types of people, but too expensive to others
Investments to Signal Information

• How committed are we to a relationship?

• Expensive gifts
• How interested are we in a career?
• Internships
• How intelligent are we?
• Higher education
• How sure are we that we will succeed?
• Guarantees, warrantees
Dimensions of Signals

• Clarity
• Does the signal convey the right information?
• Flowers and jewelry convey well-understood information in
relationships
• Power
• Is it too expensive for people to bluff?
• Flowers are inexpensive
Guidelines

• Send signals that are clear

• Trust signals that are powerful
• Time and money
Improving Communication Skills
Trust, Emotion, & Limited Feedback

Professor Maurice Schweitzer

How Do You Feel?

• Feelings are a summary statistic for complicated judgments

• Should we hire this candidate?
• Do I like this house?
• Do I trust this person?
Incidental Emotions Influence our Feelings & Trust

• Incidental Emotions- emotions that are unrelated

• Incidental anger harms trust
• Incidental happiness boosts trust
• Our trust judgements can move
• But incidental emotions don’t have an effect with people you know well
• When you are asking others to trust you
• Recognize that their feelings will bleed into the current situation
Whom Should You Trust?

• Guilt-prone people are more trustworthy than people who are not prone to
feeling guilt
• Describe a time when you made a mistake at work. How did you feel when
this occurred? What did you do? What did you learn from this experience?
• How likely is this person to feel badly if they did something wrong, even
in no one knew about it?
• Does this person have a strong sense of responsibility for others?
• Would this person feel bad about letting others down?
The Challenge of Limited Feedback

• We often cannot observe every behavior

• Beware when monitored behavior is anticipated
• People often engage in strategic behavior when they know they’re
being observed
• Observers fail to appreciate how strategically people behave