Supercommunicators

Todd Henry [00:00:02]:

Not long ago, a major hospital dealt with a crisis that wasn't caused by medicine, but by something far more ordinary. A miscommunication. A patient had been admitted for what was supposed to be a routine procedure. Nothing especially risky, nothing that should have raised alarms. But during a handoff between nursing shifts, one nurse assumed that the attending physician had already administered a crucial antibiotic. The doctor, meanwhile, assumed that the nurse would handle it as part of the checklist, neither confirmed with the other. On paper, it looked like everything was covered, but in reality, the patient never received the dose. Hours later, what started as a simple oversight turned into something much more dangerous.

Todd Henry [00:00:44]:

The patient developed a serious infection. And what could have been prevented with one conversation, literally one sentence ballooned into a medical emergency. And here's the sobering part. No one in that room was careless. No one was trying to cut corners. Everyone thought they were doing their job well. But the assumption that we're all on the same page proved false, and the consequences were profound. Now, most of us aren't practicing medicine.

Todd Henry [00:01:11]:

We may not be making decisions that carry life or death stakes, but we face the exact same dynamic every single day. In our teams, in our families, in the way we collaborate. Think about the times you've walked away from a meeting thinking one thing, only to discover later that your colleague thought something entirely different. Or when do you send an email that you believe is perfectly clear, but the person on the other end interprets it in a way that you never intended? This is the hidden cost of poor communication. We assume that because we've spoken, we've communicated. Other people are clearly going to understand. But communication isn't about what leaves our mouths or what we type into a keyboard. It's about what actually lands with the other person.

Todd Henry [00:01:52]:

It's about whether the meaning was shared, understood, and aligned. In the hospital, a simple check back could have changed everything. That's a term for aviation. In medicine, that means you don't just state information, you confirm it has been received and understood. You're giving the antibiotic, right? Yes, I've got it covered. Closed loop, no room for assumption, etc. That small practice is what keeps planes in the air and patients safe. So what would it look like if we applied the same principle in our everyday conversations? Instead of assuming that someone gets our meaning, what if we paused to verify instead of just jumping straight to persuasion or explanation? What if we slowed down long enough to listen for what they actually heard? Here's the challenge of that.

Todd Henry [00:02:38]:

Most of us were never taught how to do this. We grew up Equating communication with talking. But the best communicators, what today's guest calls super communicators, understand that it's less about the words and more about the connection. They don't just speak. They ensure understanding. They don't just deliver information. They create alignment and listen. This skill matters more now than it ever has.

Todd Henry [00:03:04]:

We're swimming in information. We're overwhelmed with noise, and yet somehow, we're still starving for clarity. Misunderstandings multiply quickly, especially across cultures, generations, and digital platforms. And the cost is more than frustration. It's broken trust. It's wasted time. It's missed opportunities. That's why I'm thrilled about today's conversation.

Todd Henry [00:03:33]:

My guest is Charles Duhigg. He's a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, but his new book is called Super Communicators. He dives deep into this ex problem, why communication so often fails, and how some people seem to effortlessly break through the noise and connect on a deeper level. Charles has spent years studying the science of human connection. He's spoken with psychologists, negotiators, business leaders, and everyday people who have mastered the art of cutting through confusion. And in this book, he shares frameworks and tools that can help all of us move beyond surface level talk and into meaningful dialogue. So whether you're a leader trying to rally your team, you're a parent trying to connect with your teenager, or you're simply a human being trying to navigate the complexity of modern life, what Charles has uncovered is going to be incredibly useful. This is Daily Creative.

Todd Henry [00:04:21]:

Since 2005, we've served up weekly tips to help you be brave, focused, and brilliant every day. My name is Todd Henry. Welcome to the show.

Charles Duhigg [00:04:35]:

I think that one of the things I've noticed in the last year and a half since the book originally came out, you know, we were obviously somewhat of a divided nation a year and a half ago. It feels like we're even more so now, right? That at the fringes, things are getting even more extreme. And I think one of the things that I keep hearing from crowds, which is really heartening, is that this is not what they want. Like, they don't want to be in fights with their neighbors. They don't want to be in fights with family members. They want to have relationships where, sure, you disagree about some things, but. But that you feel close to each other. And the thing that strikes me about this country, if you look at our history, is that the moments we are proudest of, right, the moments that we have come together as a nation, they are not.

Charles Duhigg [00:05:20]:

When everyone agreed with each other. They are not when everyone sort of said, like, I'm going to set aside our differences. They are when people knew how to disagree with each other in productive ways.

Todd Henry [00:05:30]:

Right.

Charles Duhigg [00:05:30]:

If you think about the Constitutional Convention, they brought together all these people who basically hated each other, and they fought for week after week after week, and then they wrote a constitution together. And I think the thing is that the more we focus on in our own little sphere, in our own little world, going and bridging those gaps and having those conversations and saying, my goal here is not to convince you that I'm right and you're wrong. It's to understand you and help you understand me. The more we are creating that world around us, the more we are making the world a better place.

Todd Henry [00:06:04]:

Could not agree more. And I think, I mean, obviously we're talking about culture at large, but this plays out every day in the workplace as well, where we have conflicts, we have misunderstandings, we make. Make assumptions about one another. And in the book, you introduce the concept of three distinct kinds of conversations that we need to have in order to better communicate. What are the three conversations?

Charles Duhigg [00:06:24]:

Well, so when we're. Whenever we're having a discussion, we think we know what that discussion is about, right? We. We think we're talking about, you know, where we're going for dinner next week or vacation next year. But actually, if you could look inside people's brains, what they see is that we're having different kinds of conversations during that discussion. And they tend to fall into these one three buckets. One of these three buckets. As you mentioned, there are practical conversations where we're making plans together or solving problems. But then there's also emotional conversations where I tell you what I'm feeling and I don't want you to solve my feelings.

Charles Duhigg [00:06:58]:

I want you to empathize with me and tell me that you understand. And then there's social conversations, which is about how you and I relate to each other, how we relate to people at work, managerial issues. In all three of these different kinds of conversations, they're all equally important. And in a discussion, all three of them might occur. What researchers have found, though, is that if two people are having different kinds of conversations at the same moment, if I'm having a practical conversation and you're having an emotional conversation, it's very, very hard for us to feel connected to each other. In fact, it's almost impossible for us to fully hear each other. And if you think about a lot of the hard conversations we have, whether it be a situation where we're at work and I have to give you some negative feedback. I'm your manager and have to give you negative feedback.

Charles Duhigg [00:07:44]:

Or it's with someone, the crazy Uncle Gary, and we're talking about politics. Oftentimes a lot of the root of this tension is the fact that we're having different kinds of conversations. That I'm saying, look, I want you to be successful. I need you to do X and Y and Z. But you, you're hearing my criticisms and you're worried you're going to get fired. You're in an emotional mind headspace. Or perhaps Uncle Gary is quoting statistics at me. And I'm saying, look, Uncle Gary, for me, this issue is bigger than these statistics.

Charles Duhigg [00:08:13]:

It's about whether we're cruel to people or whether we lift them up. The reason why we have trouble hearing each other oftentimes is because we're having different kinds of conversations. And so super communicators, and we're all super communicators at one time or another, but super communicators, they know how to detect what kind of conversation is happening and match the other person or invite them to match. To match them and match back in response.

Todd Henry [00:08:39]:

I want to talk about this, this matching principle, because I have been applying this in the years since we had our first conversation, which is great. It's very helpful. And it's funny because I often will have this conversation with my wife when we're in an environment where we have people who are arguing about things. And she'll sometimes say to me, why are you always agreeing with everyone? And I'll say, I'm not agreeing with them. I'm just trying to ensure that I'm helping them understand that I understand where they're coming from. I'm trying to brush the conversation and then we'll disagree. Like, we'll have that disagreeing conversation.

Todd Henry [00:09:11]:

But it's, but it's been.

Todd Henry [00:09:12]:

It's very helpful, I think, in creating a tone for conversation that doesn't immediately feel adversarial, right? Instead of feels.

Charles Duhigg [00:09:20]:

I'm so happy to hear you say that. And you're exactly right. Like, I think that sometimes our instinct, this, this looping for understanding, right? This process of proving to you that I'm listening by repeating back what you said in my own words. I think to a lot of people who aren't comfortable with it or haven't used it, it feels like you're giving up, right? Like their job is to represent their perspective. And if I, if I repeat your perspective, even just to say, am I getting this right? Am I understanding you correctly? It feels like I've. I've somehow, you know, surrendered. But of course, that's not true at all.

Todd Henry [00:09:53]:

Right?

Charles Duhigg [00:09:53]:

We've all been in conversations where we say something and the other person says, okay, let me repeat back what I heard. Just make sure I'm getting it right. And we say, yes, you heard me correctly. And then they say, okay, I disagree with you. But I. But it's important to me that I understand what you're saying. So that. So that when I disagree with you, I know that I'm disagreeing with the right thing.

Todd Henry [00:10:11]:

Right?

Charles Duhigg [00:10:12]:

And what we know is that if I prove that I'm listening to you, you become much, much more likely to listen to me in response. It's social reciprocity. It's baked into how our neurology works. And so I'm really glad to hear that this has helped you, because I think you're exactly right. What it does is it lowers the temperature on the conversation and it lets the other person know. Even if I don't think that you're right, I respect your right to speak and I'm going to listen, and I hope you'll listen to me.

Todd Henry [00:10:45]:

One thing that I've noticed is that often in conflicts in the past, in the workplace specifically, I seem to be having a conversation that's about, let's get to the right answer, and somebody else is having the conversation about, I want to feel a certain way about the organization, right? And I think that's true of culture at large right now.

Todd Henry [00:11:04]:

There are people who want to argue.

Todd Henry [00:11:06]:

And there are people who want to feel a certain way. And it's really hard if you're not having the same conversation, to come to terms with one another. And like, for example, in terms of AI, like, I've heard this conversation where a manager's trying to explain, this is going to be better for us. And there's this massive pushback coming. And it's really rooted in just like, I'm afraid of what this is going to mean for my job, for my.

Todd Henry [00:11:30]:

Industry, for my whatever.

Todd Henry [00:11:31]:

And so one person's trying to argue with facts and logic, and the other person's just saying, I am terrified and uncertain. And so it's, I think, having that conversation on the same level and. Or the same kind of conversation first, right? Matching the conversation is such a helpful.

Charles Duhigg [00:11:48]:

Principle, and it's very easy to do. So let's take that situation, right? I'm the boss who's saying, look, AI is going to be good for all of us. And you're the employee who says, I think I'm going to get fired. I'm 50 years old. I don't know how to use these newfangled things. So how do we resolve that as the boss? If I match you, and this can literally take like, half a minute, it can take seconds. If I match you and say. What I hear you saying is that you are really anxious.

Charles Duhigg [00:12:16]:

Right. And that's totally legitimate. I. I have been. I was anxious about this technology when I first heard about it, and then I started using it, and I feel much more comfortable with it now, and I'm hoping that you will, too. If it's okay. Can I tell you about how I think it'll actually improve working together? And I promise, if you're still feeling anxious, we can talk about that. I'm not trying to close the door on that.

Charles Duhigg [00:12:39]:

I just think that. That if we talk about how it will help things, that maybe your anxiety will. Will diminish.

Todd Henry [00:12:45]:

Right.

Charles Duhigg [00:12:46]:

So what. What is the manager doing there? He's actually saying, you know, I see that you are. Are. You are in a emotional mindset. You need to have an emotional conversation. I'm going to acknowledge that. And actually, I'm going to match you at it. And sometimes matching is just a matter of saying, I see your anxiety.

Charles Duhigg [00:13:02]:

And then he's going to ask for permission. Can we talk about solutions? Can we move from an emotional conversation to a practical conversation together? And I promise we can go back to that emotional conversation if you need to. That. That takes a minute. Not even a minute, Right? Less than a minute. And what it does is it aligns everyone in that conversation. So now we're on the Safeway, same wavelength. Now, I know that you understand that this is not just a practical issue for me.

Charles Duhigg [00:13:32]:

This is an emotional issue. And when those emotions come up, I can voice them and you'll acknowledge them. That creates safety. It creates psychological safety. It creates an environment in which we can really connect with each other.

Todd Henry [00:13:44]:

That is closely linked to another principle in the book, which is you talk about the difference between asking questions and asking deep questions. What are deep questions versus just standard questions we might ask?

Charles Duhigg [00:13:55]:

So. So deep questions are really powerful. They're almost kind of magical. Basically, all. Not all questions are created the same. Right. Some of them have more than others. And deep questions are questions that ask about our values or our beliefs or our experiences.

Charles Duhigg [00:14:10]:

And that can sound a little intimidating. It could sound like I'm saying, you know, ask about someone's mom or cry on their shoulder. But actually it's as simple as, like, if you meet a lawyer, instead of saying, oh, what law firm do you work at? Asking them, oh, what made you decide to go to law school?

Todd Henry [00:14:26]:

Right.

Charles Duhigg [00:14:27]:

That second question, it is as easy to ask. It does not seem like, it's like too much information or overly personal. But what I'm doing is I'm inviting you to tell me about who you are, right? What, what are your values that, that led you to law school? What were your experiences that brought you to this place? And that deep question, it invites the other person to say something real and meaningful. And that doesn't mean that every single time we ask a deep question, someone will say something real and meaningful.

Todd Henry [00:14:55]:

Right?

Charles Duhigg [00:14:56]:

That's why it's an invitation rather than a mandate. You might say, oh, what made you decide to go to law school? And they say, oh, you know, it just seemed like a good idea. I didn't know what else to do. Okay, they don't want to get deep on law school. That's totally fine, right? Maybe they're, maybe they're just like sort of passing time until this other guy that they, that they see out of the corner of their eye, that's the one they want to talk to. But the point is that by asking that question, we invite someone to really let us know who they are. And what's really interesting about deep questions is that the most natural thing to do if I ask you a deep question is then to answer that question myself. It doesn't seem like I'm shoehorning myself into the conversation.

Charles Duhigg [00:15:33]:

Oh, you went to law school because you saw your uncle get arrested when you were a kid. I'm a doctor, and I became a doctor because I saw my dad get sick when I was young. Right now we're having a real conversation and it's this very graceful way of showing someone that you really want to connect with them.

Todd Henry [00:15:50]:

Another way that you talk about in the book that we can connect with people in a graceful way is through the use of non linguistic cues, right?

Todd Henry [00:16:00]:

Yeah.

Todd Henry [00:16:00]:

And it's so funny because I don't know if I travel a ton. I know you travel a ton. I'm sure you travel a ton. One of my favorite things to do at the airport is to just sit and observe people who are in conversation and just try to figure out what.

Todd Henry [00:16:12]:

The scenario is in my mind.

Todd Henry [00:16:14]:

And you can immediately tell, okay, this person is angry at the other person or there's a conflict, or they're excited about the trip. They're going or whatever.

Todd Henry [00:16:23]:

And you can tell all that just.

Todd Henry [00:16:24]:

By, by watching from a distance, not even listening. What is the importance of non linguistic linguistic cues and how can we leverage them better to do what they talk about?

Charles Duhigg [00:16:33]:

Hugely important. So let me ask you this. When you're, when you're in the airport or when you're talking to your partner, how do you know that they're upset? Like, like if they don't say I'm upset, if they're trying to pretend like they're not upset, what's the, what's the clue that lets you know that like there's more going on underneath the hood?

Todd Henry [00:16:50]:

There's.

Todd Henry [00:16:50]:

Well, for me it's often they lean back and they cross their arms or they, they almost look like, like, like it's like a defensive posture. Like they're ready to sort of, you know, like, like ward off attacks, right? Yeah, exactly.

Charles Duhigg [00:17:05]:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And what's interesting is now I'm sure that there's been many cases where like somebody leans back and they cross their arms and, and it doesn't occur to you that they're, they're in their upset. But we are so good at communication. Our brains have evolved to be such fine instruments at detecting how other people communicate that we can pick up on so many of these non linguistic signals. And it's not just non verbal. A lot of it is non verbal, right? Crossing my arms, my expressions. But sometimes it's the sounds I make, which is a verbal activity, but it's not linguistic. We're really, really good at this.

Charles Duhigg [00:17:42]:

The thing is that sometimes because language is so information rich, it's so easy to just focus on someone's words. Sometimes we stop paying attention to the other signals that they send us, right? We kind of look off into the corner and we aren't looking at them anymore. And so we don't see the frown that crosses their face or we're really focused on what they're saying. And so we don't notice that they've sat back and they've crossed their arms and there's probably something important.

Todd Henry [00:18:11]:

There's.

Charles Duhigg [00:18:12]:

And so the first lesson that we can do is we can just remind ourselves, particularly when we're in important conversations, just take a half beat and think to yourself, besides what this person is saying, what do I think they're trying to tell me through everything else except for the words that are coming out of their mouth? And if we do that, if we prompt ourselves that way, we tend to be very, very good at it. We tend to get even better when we make it into a habit. There's a second thing we can do, which is when it comes to communication, where we can't see each other, right. Or we're not in the same room, we can recognize that we oftentimes need to change how we speak in order to capture all the things that normally I would get by looking at you. A great example of this is telephones. When people speak on phones, they tend to over enunciate their words by about 30%. They tend to put about 35 more emotion into their voice in a phone conversation. Now, nobody's aware that they're doing this.

Charles Duhigg [00:19:12]:

They're not doing this on purpose. But we've learned that as you use phones, you have to kind of overemphasize. You have to make it clear to the other person because they can't see your face. Each form of communication has its own set of rules like this. And we know what those rules are when we remind ourselves to pay attention to them. It's just when we are in a big hurry and we forget them that we'd run into trouble.

Todd Henry [00:19:36]:

It's so easy to do when we're busy, when, you know, we have to be.

Todd Henry [00:19:39]:

We feel like we have to be.

Todd Henry [00:19:40]:

Efficient in our communication, which is also a problem.

Charles Duhigg [00:19:42]:

Right? We.

Todd Henry [00:19:43]:

Yeah, we take shortcuts. And this is especially true, I think, with online communication or written communication. And that's something so far we've been talking about face to face. But increasingly we're communicating online, which I think is also part of why we're seeing some of this divide happening in cultures, because we're misunderstanding people's intent or, you know, whatever.

Todd Henry [00:20:04]:

What are some things we can do.

Todd Henry [00:20:05]:

To better become super communicators in written form or an online form?

Charles Duhigg [00:20:10]:

There's been a lot of research on this, and there's a couple of things that are pretty clear. The first one is sarcasm is like poison when it's written or online. So when I. When I say something sarcastic to you, you know it's sarcastic because you can hear it in the tone of my voice. But when I type something sarcastic, there's as good a likelihood that you're gonna think I'm being serious and you might get offended or you might get upset. So the first thing we can do is just remember sarcasm is fine if they can hear my voice, but if they can't hear my voice, let's go ahead and put that sarcasm in the back pocket and not use it. The second thing that's been really interesting is that studies show that being polite online has these hugely disproportionate positive rewards. There was this one really interesting study that looked at editors on Wikipedia, and they would get into these flame wars, and then if just one person started saying please or thank you in this, like, back and forth on Wikipedia, everyone else suddenly was much better.

Charles Duhigg [00:21:10]:

Everyone else would suddenly start being more polite themselves. They would listen to each other better. They would consider each other's arguments being polite. We know that we should do this right. Our parents taught us to be polite. But it's even more powerful when we're online. And then finally, when it comes to written communication, I think that one of the most powerful tools we have as writers of any kind is that we can reread what we typed and try and see it through the eyes of the person we're sending it to.

Todd Henry [00:21:40]:

Right?

Charles Duhigg [00:21:41]:

When I write books, I do the exact same thing. I write. And then I edit and edit and edit over and over much. It takes much longer for me to edit myself than it does for me to write something because I'm constantly asking my question, how is the reader going to see this? What are the assumptions in my head that the reader doesn't carry in their head that I need to explain? It's really, again, and you mentioned kind of like efficiency, right? That part of good communication is slowing down a little bit because you'll find that if you slow down a little bit and you communicate better, you actually become more efficient over time because there's just less confusion around you.

Todd Henry [00:22:17]:

When you said the thing about sarcasm, it made me think of again being an old man that I am Homer Simpson typing, yes, I would love to come to your party or whatever. And then, in case you can't tell by my tone, I am being sarcastic, you know, but it's like as he's typing it out, which is hilarious. But, you know, of course, the, the, the, the, the response was like, great.

Todd Henry [00:22:37]:

Come to my party.

Todd Henry [00:22:38]:

He's like, oh, yeah, he's being sarcastic.

Todd Henry [00:22:40]:

Yeah, right, right.

Todd Henry [00:22:40]:

So it's funny. So, listen, just to kind of bring a wrap to our conversation here, what is one simple, small thing that you would encourage people to listening to this to immediately apply something that they could do immediately after turning off this interview and go apply.

Charles Duhigg [00:22:57]:

So there's two challenges. The first is ask someone a deep question today. Just decide what that deep question is going to be right now. Like, something that, like, it's easy to ask, but push yourself to ask it. And the second thing is, there is some friend of yours or former colleague or relative that you haven't spoken to in weeks or months or possibly even.

Todd Henry [00:23:20]:

Years.

Charles Duhigg [00:23:22]:

Schedule a call with them. Because what we know is that it's our connections with other people that make us happy. And that doesn't mean you have to talk to them every day or every month or even every year. But when we renew those connections, we feel healthier, we feel happier, we become more successful. And so the best thing that they can do is just choose someone that you wish you talked to more, more recently, send them an email and say, hey, can we set aside 20 minutes to talk, you know, a week from now?

Todd Henry [00:23:59]:

Charles Duhigg's book Super Communicators is now available in paperback wherever books are. I love his challenge. At the end of our interview, ask a deep question of someone. Today, pick up the phone and call someone you haven't talked to in a long time. Or schedule a conversation with someone who maybe you've been avoiding because you didn't want to have a difficult conversation. And see if you can apply some of the ideas in the episode today about matching conversation, about deep listening to your conversation. And if you'd like to hear the full interview with Charles or any of our guests, you can do so for free@dailycreativeplus.com just enter your name and email address and we'll send you a feed where you can listen to all of our full interviews absolutely free. My name is Todd Henry.

Todd Henry [00:24:47]:

You can find my books, all seven of them, my speaking events, and all of my work@todhenry.com until next time. May you be brave, focused and brilliant. We'll see you then.