Objective Grace: A Practical Guide
“She was eating a blueberry muffin all through our meeting…” said Kathy, still steaming with resentment after a morning in-service call, “can you believe it?”
To be honest, the violation was not clear to me. Was eating on Zoom calls against company policy? I can imagine how this might have felt, how it might have come across as unprofessional, but the degree of insult did not seem aligned with the observable behavior.
I see situations like this all the time. Professionals bring their own set of standards to the workplace and feel that their expectations are not met. Or their professional toes have been stepped on. Often, these standards have not been clearly articulated, and the ‘violator’ does not realize their error.
“He has so many phone chargers,” and “she uses too many emojis when she texts,” were two I heard this past week.
One can imagine too many phone chargers littering a workspace, or a gaggle of smiley faces cluttering a text message. But neither of those is inherently ‘bad’ and ‘too much’ is certainly relative. If standards are not made clear and parties are in the dark about what is at stake, professional strain and resentment can build. Eating a blueberry muffin in a Zoom meeting can wreck a relationship.
In these situations, leaders can work on patience. They can work on mindfulness. They can improve their communication skills, get clear on strategies and values, and be open about their professional boundaries. It would be wise to do all of this and more.
Leaders – everyone within an organization, for that matter – will want to incorporate Objective Grace. The term objective grace refers to deliberate cultivation of a mindset that combines both head and heart to ease workplace strife and improve outcomes. It is connected to empathy. It is essential for complex problem solving. And once you get good at it, it makes day-to-day interactions feel a whole lot better.
What is Objective Grace?
Objectivity refers to a process of removing opinion and preconception from observable, measurable facts. Grace can refer to elegance or refinement, but here we consider it simply as good will.
The approach can be used in professional conflict-resolution as well as personal relationships. It identifies a challenge and, with a desire for resolution, fueled by good will, investigates the situation’s objective parts. It sees those parts with grace and allows one to make future decisions from a healthy and goal-directed position.
Let’s examine the blueberry muffin incident.
Kathy felt disrespected. That needs to be honored. But what Kathy shared with me was her interpretation of another person’s behavior in a way that shines a light on her triggers, rather than an objective truth.
A coworker eating a muffin during a meeting is not necessarily a sign of disrespect, it is not an obvious offense. But it did feel disrespectful and offensive to Kathy, who woke up early jump on this Zoom call and hoped for more engagement.
This highlights the difference between personal truths and objective truths, (Davis, 2023). Personal truths (the truth of one’s experience) can be distinct from an objective truth (which is quantifiable and observable).
If two people are in a room together and one of them is hot and the other is cold, both of those things are true. They are truths about one’s personal experience, equally valid at the same time. These personal truths are separate from an objective truth which, in this hypothetical situation, is that the temperature of the room is set to 72° Fahrenheit. “It is cold in here” would not be as accurate as saying “I am cold” – the person’s feeling (cold) is true, but the room in neither cold nor hot, it is 72°.
Honoring personal truths and objective truths as ‘true’ at the same time is essential. Denying either can create problems. Being cold does not change the fact that it is 72° any more than telling the cold person that it is 72° would warm them up.
Similarly, saying “my boss was disrespectful” is not as accurate as saying “I felt disrespected.” After all, Kathy’s boss was not intending to be respectful or disrespectful, he was (objectively) eating a blueberry muffin.
It can be hard to do, but Objective Grace begins with separating the object from our perception of the object.
“I couldn’t not see it as an insult,” Kathy admits, “but I’m not sure he didn’t mean it to be.”
Kathy might still believe the behavior is inappropriate. With objectivity, that can be made clear. A conversation can begin about workplace standards. But to immediately accuse her boss of being disrespectful, when his only true feeling was hunger and his only intention was to eat, can complicate their relationship.
Ones person’s truth is that they were hungry, the other person’s truth is that they were offended. Both of those things are true and, at least for the moment, neither party is ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.
What feels obvious to one person is likely not obvious to another. This happens all the time in big and small ways. So what are we going to do about it?
How to Use Objective Grace
In the famed text The Wisdom of Insecurity, Dr. Alan Watts says that “if a problem were to be solved at all, to understand it and to know what to do about it are the same thing,” (Watts, 2010). He believes that with self-awareness and true understanding, our natural instincts will point us in the right direction. Getting to a place of true understanding requires one to recognize the role their individual perspective plays in the interpretation of an event.
Objective grace begins with humility. It begins with a recognition that emotions matter, objectivity is necessary, and grace can be helpful. Slow down. Look closely. Get the facts.
But in the words of Stuart Firestein, in another celebrate text, Ignorance: How it Drives Science, reminds us that good problem solvers “don’t stop at the facts; they begin there,” (Firestein, 2012).
Leaders, in a quiet moment, reflect on the last time this might have happened to you. In either direction. Did someone misinterpret your intentions? Might you have misinterpreted theirs? Did anyone slow down to ask clarifying questions? (Davis, 2022).
What was needed in Kathy’s situation was not necessarily patience (just let the guy eat his muffin) or professionalism (just save the muffin until after the meeting) … it was communication. Expectations for Zoom meetings were not clearly articulated. One party felt disrespected, but did not feel comfortable communicating her boundaries. Plenty of opportunity to improve.
Bring in objective grace, which has to be consciously called upon. Are you willing to slow down now and then and whittle a situation down to its objective pieces? If not, you’ll be subject to a potential of flurry of emotions and contextual distractions. But if you are willing, you might recognize an important truth, which is that you have created space for grace. For understanding, patience, and repair.
If it feels difficult, no worries. It is! Especially at first. But you will get used to it. People develop a ‘fitness’ for this approach – eventually, the process will be quicker, almost automatic, if you are willing to work on it.
For the Teacher Leader
Teacher leaders are tasked with using this approach on a daily basis. In a recent leadership meeting, a group of us reflected on some of the pain points we experienced that day. Recruiting external perspectives can make objectivity easier. Here are two moments we were able to bring some grace to, after separate objective truths from perspectives that were (as is too often the case) somewhat clouded by stress and strain.
A parent sends an email that appears angry.
- This comes up often. We ask clarifying questions about what was said. The way an email makes the reader feel is important, but the objective language should be carefully considered. The vast majority of human communication is visual and tonal, so when we receive a written message, it is always a good idea to be cautious about interpreting how an email “sounded.” To say that a parent sounded mad in that email is tricky, as there was no sound, but our personal interpretation of written words. What was the actual message? Can we begin with the assumption that we each have the student’s best interest in mind? S
An administrative policy is rolled out without considering teacher perspectives.
- Oh boy. The COVID-19 pandemic was riddled with these moments. Administrators attempting to make thoughtful decisions is a process constantly ping-ponging off faculty and community perspective of those decisions. It can feel like a heavy load. There is almost certainly not a ‘right’ was to go about these processes, though there are varying degrees of thoughtfulness in approach. One school we worked with conducted thorough surveys of staff, students, and parents regarding how to conduct classes during the pandemic. The responses were striking. Nearly 90% of the school’s community was comfortable with, and strongly favored, returning to in-person learning. About 83% of the school’s faculty and staff did not feel comfortable and preferred to stay remote. Whatever decision was made, one large and important party (either faculty or parents) was going to feel upset, and like their perspective was not fully considered. Not so. In this case, school leaders stressed and strained and lost sleep while considering every possible angle and how it would impact stakeholders. Objectivity would have revealed that teacher perspectives were heavily considered as policies were rolled out. It was a scary time. But a little more patience, a little more grace, would have been nice.
Important to note that incorporating grace does not mean that all behavior should be allowed or forgiven. (Not all administrative decisions are good, and muffin-eating might ultimately have to go.) Objective grace allows you to see things with clarity. It improves the odds of communicating well, provides an opportunity to set boundaries around behaviors you are willing to accept in your life, express those expectations in a healthy way, and not foster unnecessary (and occasionally, unwarranted) resentment.
Unwarranted is a personalized term. It is not meant to invalidate a feeling. Only a suggestion that the person who is offended has an opportunity to evaluate the offense with greater depth. It can be truly liberating.
Kathy’s boss no longer eats in meetings. Her resentment has decreased, and their communication has improved. Now, Kathy is attempting to carry this approach with her wherever she goes, including her personal life. “I used to be so judgmental,” she admits, “it was hard on everyone. Things are much better now.”
References
Davis, J. (2023). The Difference Between Personal Truths and Objective Truths. Bedrock EDU
Davis, J. (2022). Practical Empathy. Northwestern University Teacher Leadership Magazine,
Firestein, S. (2012). Ignorance: how it drives science. Oxford [England] ; New York, Oxford University Press.
Watts, A. (2010). The Wisdom of Insecurity. Second Vintage Books. New York, Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc.