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By Chrystin M. McHugh, PICPA manager of strategic marketing

Kristen Rampe, CPA, owner of Kristen Rampe Consulting, is on a crusade. A crusade for CPAs to be known as great communicators. At the Women’s Leadership Conference on May 10, Rampe is leading the discussion, Taking the Difficult Out of Difficult Conversations.

In general, having a difficult conversation ranks among the top fears for CPAs and other professionals. According to Rampe, “People want to ignore, or put off, the things they fear the most. With difficult conversations, the biggest source of anxiety is the reaction of the person on the other end. What do you do when the other person is silent, starts crying, or even goes into a fit of rage?”

Professionals cannot ignore having difficult conversations forever. Rampe says that there are three key things to remember when preparing to have a difficult conversation so that the outcome is effective:

1. Check in with yourself.
   Get in the right state of mind. Acknowledge any strong feelings you have about the situation or other things that distract from the conversation, and wait until you’re feeling calm before proceeding.
2. Do your homework.
   Ask yourself: What is the purpose of this conversation? What’s the goal? What’s the worst-case scenario? Write down your talking points, paying special attention to the actual words you want to use. This will allow you to combat the fear and have a plan. Scripts and other tools that can take the difficult out of difficult conversations will be discussed at the conference.
3. Focus on facts, not judgments.
   Back up your talking points with specific observations. “You’re late to meetings all the time” is too vague. “You were 20 minutes late to the meeting on Tuesday” is a specific example of the problem being discussed.

Rampe believes that CPAs and great communication don’t have to be like oil and water. Breaking down barriers to effective communication enhances relationships with clients and coworkers and builds stronger teams. It also leads to higher productivity and profitability.

Rampe references The New York Times coverage of Google’s research into productive teams, titled “What Google Learned from Its Quest to Build the Perfect Team,” as a strong resource for understanding the connection between effective communication and productivity. Rampe notes, “The key takeaway is that people who work in places where they feel psychologically safe are more productive and empathetic.” The 2012 Google Initiative, Project Aristotle, studied hundreds of teams at Google. The study found that all productive teams had two components of psychological safety in common:

• Conversational turn taking -- Groups where one person or a small group were dominant did not perform as well as those where everyone on the team contributed evenly.
• High average social sensitivity -- Teams where others could sense how someone felt based on tone of voice, facial expression, and other nonverbal cues were more productive.

“When you are an effective communicator, you have more time,” Rampe explains. “Time otherwise spent dwelling and worrying about a problem is freed up to take on your next task.”