What's the good intention other has in mind?

Sometime ago my old boss tough me this learning about arguing. When someone starts to argue with you on something, always think: "What's the good intention other have in mind when they disagree with you." I think this might have been learning from NLP or something, but the main thing is that for me it has worked well.

When I get feedback or someone disagrees with me, most often its nothing personal. Most often the other party has something worrying in their mind, but they can't really speak it out loud. Instead of only disagreeing, I've learned to start to finding out what's the thing worrying or why someone wants to do something differently.

It's not easy, but its worth of trying. Always think from the positive side: "what's the good intention other has in mind, when disagreeing."

Written by +Henri Hämäläinen