Rational, Reasonable but Conflicting: Grid-Group Cultural Analysis of 'good' and 'bad' workplace conversational dynamics

Abstract

We asked interviewees ‘Please describe the best and the worst workplace conversations you have ever had?’ They talked freely and at length. This study applies Grid-Group Cultural Theory (G-GCT or GGCT) to identify the features of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ workplace conversations, understood and explained as the dynamic outcome of four equally rational yet conflicting, culturally enabled, forms of reasoning (Thought-Styles), here between manager and employee. Each rationality has a different preoccupation and therefore its own evaluation criteria: Hierarchical reasoning is preoccupied with Order and Deviance; success is defined by the steady reduction, control and eventual elimination of deviance. Egalitarian reasoning is preoccupied with system change beneficial to all; success is defined by radical transformation of the status quo, even if this takes a long time. Individualistic reasoning is preoccupied with efficient competitive elimination of weak proposals. Success should be accomplished quickly with clear winners and losers. Fatalistic reasoning is preoccupied with immediate survival. Thus, each Thought Style evaluates nature and time differently. The existing literature on workplace conversation dwells instead on its functional importance as a mechanism of ‘leader-member exchange’ (LMX), with claimed effects on ‘organisational performance’ and ‘knowledge-sharing’. Several authors emphasise how ‘effective’ and ‘ineffective’ conversations affect organisational success and failure. This literature is naïve, containing common-sense and non-explanatory circular assertions. It fails to distinguish causes of good conversation from those qualities which are supposed to define good conversation. Terms such as trust and openness are used imprecisely in ways that suggest unawareness of the cultural derivation of feelings, thoughts and actions. The literature also shows strong and unexamined cultural biases. Researchers’ Thought Styles affect their work in ways that are obvious to a Grid-Group Cultural Theorist. G-GCT provides straightforward causal explanations for what protagonists say to each other, why they disagree and a clear evaluative framework which we then apply to conversational data generated through several re-enactments of prepared role-plays exploring vexed workplace difficulties. We classify managers’ and employees’ deployment of the four rationalities and plot every conversational utterance graphically, along with the outcomes. The methodology is original: - Semi-structured interviews with nine employees from different industrial backgrounds - Participatory Theatre Research (PTR) workshops with 34 participants including experienced MBA students, other professionals and actors using plausible prepared role-plays, consistent with the kinds of difficulties which interviewees reported - Graphical representation of what is said in time series and pie charts The interviews were ‘open-coded’ for interviewees’ ordinary common-sense evaluations of their best and worst workplace conversation experiences. These assisted in developing plausible ‘HR scenarios’ which were role-played by professional actors and MBA students in role as Managers and by volunteers in role as Employees. Several repeat runs of each prepared role-play were evaluated moment-by-moment using G-GCT using sentence fragments. Third party (focus-group) evaluations of a number of iterations of each prepared role-play are also included. G-GCT provides a fresh unifying scientific causal theory of conversation in which equally reasonable but conflicting ways of thinking create uncomfortable differences and happy outcomes. Moreover, even when protagonists apply the same Thought Style, the outcome may be unsatisfactory to both.