Professional Documents
Culture Documents
4 Communication Styles
4 Communication Styles
1. Passive
2. Passive-Aggressive
3. Aggressive
4. Assertive
Some sources even add a “manipulative” communication style, but that’s a
different thing in our opinion, and passive, passive-aggressive, and aggressive
can all be manipulative.
Communication Styles
Do you know what’s your current style of communication?
At least in the most extremes of the passive forms, this symbolism is correct.
Since the passive communication style enforces no boundaries, it allows
others to “walk all over”.
Of course, not everyone is going to walk all over an overly passive individual.
Not everyone is looking to advantage of others, after all.
But, alas, some people are. And some people will walk all over the passive.
https://youtu.be/P4FBPsFL-bE
Aggressive: look Jerry, you’re not selling me a damn car. It’s my show
here. That’s that
Passive: (puts his head down, looks up to the second highest authority
in the room)
The passive man is often passive in an effort to avoid conflict.
He:
Apologizing if you’ve done a mistake is what you should do. But avoid over-
apologizing if you’ve done nothing wrong, or if someone else is at fault.
PRO Tip: If you have a tendency for over-apologizing, a quick fix can be to
switch from “sorry” to “excuse me”.
This an important information for us since our goal is to make you successful
socially, and at life:
Passive individuals struggle to enter win-win exchanges and are more likely to
remain stuck in win-lose exchanges, as well as in manipulative relationships
Why?
This is also why you want to avoid passive-aggression at all costs: it poisons
your interactions as well as your mood.
For example, they might see you’re about to commit a mistake, but don’t tell
you anything because they think that your loss is their win.
Or they might be the coworkers who “forget” to CC you in the customer email,
so that you don’t stay in the loop.
Do Things Improperly
They fear saying no, so they say yes.
But they still want to find a way out.
Result?
They half-ass their work.
Are Non-Committal
Passive-aggressive individuals are masters of ambiguity.
It can be hard to pinpoint whether they’re telling you yes or no, and it’s often
premeditated.
That way, they keep their options open to do whatever they please.
Afraid of talking straight, they’re also foggy and noncommittal with their
requests.
You know, “you don’t have to if you don’t want to”, they’ll say. But if you don’t,
they’ll sulk.
https://youtu.be/Kt-US8IjtYw
I owe to the victim and to his family (= you’re being a selfish, low-
quality citizen for stopping justice)
But it wasn’t strictly necessary here.
They can get some power because many passive-aggressives crave power.
So the more Machiavellian ones can find sneakier and more indirect ways to
win.
Problem is, of course, sneaky and undercover ways only get you so far.
And “so far” rarely is to the top.
How?
Well, since anger and enmity are frowned upon, people can sometimes over-
deny those feelings.
But then, when they show up, they will look like hypocrites.
Rossi is high-power in the video above, but lacks assertiveness and falls into
the passive-aggressive trap.
And later you will see a very similar situation, but with an assertive approach.
Handling passive-aggressive
A few tips:
Remain calm
Passive-aggressive individuals use covert-aggression to attack others.
Letting them fester means allowing them to go beyond your back spreading
rumors and breeding malcontent in the team.
Pull them up
If you’re in a close relationship with a passive-aggressive, consider pulling
them up into self-development.
Anyone can become less passive-aggressive and more assertive, and you
might be able to help them.
1. Yelling
2. Visible signs of anger
3. Rude or disrespectful behavior (dismissive in the case of covert
aggression)
4. Visible signs of emotional turmoil (or the opposite with total icy
detachment)
5. Open and direct threats, even if delivered calmly
6. Body language that suggests the possibility of an attack
7. Physical shoving or pushing, or the threat of physical aggression
8. Stand closer, or purposefully far away to communicate superiority or
disgust
There are some use cases for aggression, as well as some situations in which
it’s a good approach.
Indeed, from a point of view of effectiveness, aggression is better at getting
things done than both passiveness and passive-aggression.
And that makes it hard for the aggressive type to be an effective leader, and
especially hard to make him a good leader for a team of talented people with
lots of options.
After all, why would anyone with options stick with an aggressive ahole that
demeans them?
Ultimately, too high levels of aggression backfire both in personal life, and at
work.
4. Assertive Communication Style
And since they don’t overpower others, they also tend to develop strong long-
term relationships, which enables them to develop win-win far more than
aggressive individuals can.
Assertion includes:
https://youtu.be/1KDcWWIo30o
Rossi was being high-power, but he didn’t add the high-power vulnerability of
admitting his negative feelings.
Interviewer: So in the past 2 years you’ve been like two old friends
again..
Lorenzo: (after talking about Rossi as a great champion) No, I don’t
think we are friends (states the truth, openly and frankly)
(…)
But the most important thing is to have respect, and I have huge respect
for Vale, and I think he has the same for me (moves into a collaborative
frame)
BOOM!
This is “high-power assertive”.
Rossi was high-power in the previous video example, but NOT assertive in
admitting and standing behind his feelings.
And that made him come across as sneaky.
Lorenzo admits very candidly of not being friends with Rossi. All the while
complimenting him and building him up.
Very high-quality.
Communication Styles
The different styles differ in their:
1. Openness to communication
2. Respect towards others
Charting these two important variables, we can draw a quadrant:
They speak:
“Dark” feelings such as anger and will to power are bad to have an
even worse to show
This is what we’ve just seen with the video example.
What happens when people unconsciously hold this belief is that they deny
their feelings of anger, disappointment, or resentment with words, but then act
them out with actions and body language.
See an example from Ray Dalio, and read this good discussion on why some
(some!) left-wing folks come across as hypocrites (hint: they don’t understand
and accept their dark side).
Better belief:
Many people, especially other high-quality people, actually love to deal with
someone who is frank and honest.
And if some people find your assertiveness to be “too much”, then you can
always calibrate and reduce the intensity.
From an assertiveness point of view, when you hold this belief, you either
don’t believe that you should tell them to act differently since
they should know, or you believe that you must yell at them because they
should know better and you have to set them straight.
Fear of failure is associated with a fixed mindset and with fragile egos. You will
learn how to overcome this mindset in the “Ultimate Power” ebook.
All the “I have to” put unneeded and often counterproductive pressure on you.
When you hold this belief, you either never start sharing your opinion, or you
get angry when you cannot change other people’s minds.
You can always seek to persuade others, but you never “have to”.
Again, this goes back to basic mindsets and beliefs. A cognitive-behavioral
therapy called REBT helps with this one (Ellis, 1988), more in “Ultimate Power”.
Some women hold back their anger, and many men feel it’s not OK to admit
their personal struggles or request (emotional) help.
So they deny their true feelings to others and to themselves and seek to have
their needs met with aggression or covert-aggression.
Learning to use and adapt the right communication style for the right
situation is a crucial skill for social and life effectiveness.
As a general rule, the assertive communication style is the most effective, the
most important to learn, and the style that people should use most often.