Search Mediators Near You:

Change the Frame: The Picture Changes

Conflict Management Coaching Blog by Cinnie Noble

When we are in conflict, we often conjure up a way to describe what’s going on when we relate it to others. And that version is not always 100% accurate. For example, we might make assumptions about the other person; we perceive the story in ways that serve us and build a case against the other person; we minimize our contribution; we construct a frame that strengthens our perspective; and so on. For the most part, we put a frame around our stories when we tell others in order to justify our viewpoint and criticize the other’s.

The thing is, the frame may be crooked; it may be unsuited to the picture we painted of our conflict; it may be too big or too small; or it may even be broken.

In this week’s Conflict Mastery Quest(ions) blog, you are invited to consider the frame you’ve put around your conflict and what one might be most appropriate.

  • In the specific conflict you have in mind, what happened?
  • When you have related the conflict to others, how do you frame your part?
  • What words do you use to describe your emotions that give depth to your experience in this conflict?
  • What part or parts do you leave out in the telling of what happened?
  • What part of the frame – regarding your part – is not altogether true?
  • How might the other person frame how you are coming across?
  • How do you frame the other person’s part in the conflict? What part of that do you not know for sure?
  • What words do you use to describe their emotions about their experience?
  • What part or parts of the other’s experience are you likely framing incorrectly?
  • What frame may work for both of you?
  • What else occurs to you as you consider these questions?
  • What insights do you have?
                        author

Cinnie Noble

Cinnie Noble is a certified coach (PCC) and mediator and a former lawyer specializing in conflict management coaching. She is the author of two coaching books: Conflict Management Coaching: The CINERGY™ Model and Conflict Mastery: Questions to Guide You. MORE >

Featured Mediators

ad
View all

Read these next

Category

DR Clauses in Contract

From ADRAC- The Australian Dispute Resolution Advisory Council Blog, organized with Shirli Kirschner This paper was prepared and settled jointly by the members of ADRAC. What are dispute resolution clauses (DR clauses)?...

By Shirli Kirschner
Category

Dispute Resolution in the Post Babel Era

What is the Post Babel Era? The narrative of the tower of Babel is an etiology or explanation of a phenomenon. Etiologies are narratives that explain the origin of a...

By Robert Bergman
Category

When Three Becomes a Crowd

How dispute resolution can help when the courts can’t There appears to be a gradual change from so-called “vanilla” relationships to throuples or polyamorous relationships. These are not only causing...

By Keri Morris

Find a Mediator

X
X
X