What are the circumstances? Why would we need to have a difficult conversation at work?

To me, difficult conversations arise at work or in our relationships, something that needs to be addressed.

So for example, the way that I think about it is if my arm was on fire, something would go off in my brain that would be like, "Aah, pain, pain, pain," and pain located at arm.

I would go to my arm.

I would be able to put out the fire.

Because the pain is like the smoke signal that's telling me, "Oh, there's a fire." To me, having hard conversations, having conflict in your dynamics with people at work, is the smoke signal that's telling me, "Hey, there's something off here.

There's something about you that I don't get.

Yeah.

You know, like, in a situation, I think it's pretty obvious, but if the situation is drawn out, you know, over the course of, you know, days or weeks, then I think you need to make reference to what has happened.

Yeah.

I'll share a personal story of, of a recent time that I had a really hard time apologizing.

I was in a fight with someone who I was dating, and I did something that was clearly a mistake but also really impacted him.

And he was very hurt.

And I was really focused on how it was a mistake.

[laughs] Like, how obviously I didn't mean to hurt him, 'cause I know that my intentions are good, and I'm often in the trap that I've discussed before, which is, "Oh, I know my intentions are good." Therefore, if it's clashing with how it's impacting you in a bad way, I'm like, "Well, how is that possible? My intentions are good.

That's really funny.

What have you learned about what feedback is, how it works, how it's received, how it's given?

Well, maybe I can start by saying how completely feedback obsessed I am.

So my first job out of college, I was a management consultant, and the firm that I worked at was obsessed with feedback.

You had feedback with your supervisor, your direct supervisor every week.

You had feedback with everyone else on your team every other week.

You had feedback with the partner on your case once a month, like a direct time, and it wasn't called feedback, it was called PD, professional development.

And it was a huge part of the culture.

And you receive it as such.

And, and what if you're, you know, one or two or three levels down, do I, how I listen up to the boss, do I just nod my head and go, "Uh-huh, uh-huh"? Like is listening just taking it all in and not responding? Like h- talk to me about power dynamics and l- and, and listening techniques.

So let's start if you're in a position of authority.

How do I listen to someone who's coming to me with something? I think what I try to think about is how do I create an environment so that they feel safe to tell me what they need to tell me.

If it's an environment of fear, then what happens is someone is gonna withhold the information that you need as a supervisor.

They're not gonna tell you what actually is going on.

So when you feel heard and understood, and your nervous system is not in kind of fight or flight mode, that's how you end up being more collaborative, more flexible, more open to different things, more curious, more able to like share your truth.

As opposed to when you don't feel that way, when you feel like you're in a threatened state, then that's when you escalate, when you repeat yourself, when you shut down, when you defend yourself.

What about in the opposite direction? What about if my boss is talking to me, um, what am I supposed to do?

Go on.

Yeah.

'Cause often when someone asks me for something, I feel mixed, right? Part of me wants to do it, part of me knows I can't, part of me thinks maybe I can if I do this thing.

And we often f- put ourselves in a position of needing to say a yes or a no, when sometimes we can share something other than a yes or no, and that can be truer to our experience.

So there are many different ways to share the dilemma.

Um, one way is to share the context of, "Okay, I wanna do this thing.

I'm also thinking about this.

So go to a colleague and be like, "I need you to do this."

Can you talk about that a little bit?

Yeah.

Back in 1996, Mark Dewey actually protested the Until There's a Cure night.

That was a night where the Giants were honoring the people in San Francisco who had been affected by the HIV and AIDS epidemic in the 80s and 90s.

And it was led by Rod Beck, one of their big pitchers at the time.

But Mark Dewey decided to turn the ribbon that players were wearing on the field to honor that day sideways to kind of turn it into the Jesus fish.

And I'd be remiss to also mention Ann's colleague Susan Slusser two years ago wrote about Nick Ahmed, the giant shortstop at the time, who when they wore the pride hats on the field, also wrote a Bible verse.

Do any other reporting on what's happening inside the Giants organization as they try and figure this out?

Yeah.

And I almost kinda like...

My mental calculation, I, I was counting one win for the Knicks in San Antonio, but then Wemby just decides, you know, "I'm gonna have my Steph 54 night or my Kobe 60 night," whatever, and just say, like, "I, I am having my MSG night," at some point from Wemby.

And that sets you up for a seventh where I, I probably would say in a game seven, I would take the best player on the court over everything else.

But, you know, the Knicks look like...

If, if Karl-Anthony Towns can drive the way that he did against Wemba Yama-

Mm-hmm

... here for a little bit.

Like, how realistic do you think that kind of talk is about adding a superstar to this existing roster that they have now?

I mean, it depends on your definition of superstar.

I'm not sure – I mean, if we look at what the Lakers are doing at the end of the year, they kind of shifted LeBron into the third anchor role.

He was very much even kind of playing second fielder to Reeves, and he was unreal at that.

And frankly, like, look, if 30 is on the court, if he's healthy, and if he's got even just somebody who can help with defense, which usually is Draymond and one other – I can see the Warriors just say, just get us in the fight.

We know how to fight that fight in the playoffs.

But as this season proved, one, as these guys get older, you just can't count on them to be in there on a nightly basis.

Like, how do you feel about that whole situation?

Yeah.

um i agree i think he needs to be here he's proved himself i think he is probably at the peak of his powers i love his ability he's been great at catching the ball um i don't know it'll be interesting to see because perry will probably be moved on and they will probably bring somebody else in and as well as mellier um Yeah, I mean, having a keeper confident at the end of the season is really all we can ask for.

And I think he's proving me, certainly proving me wrong in terms of how good he can be.

So long may it continue.

All right, let's get back to seeing this season out.

Are we safe? I'm going to talk a little bit about the run-in.

Well, the gap is now eight.

So they've got something to