Inference

When listening to someone, if ever you ask yourself, "What are they implying," then the person speaking expects you to infer their meaning. There is never a good reason to rely on inference in professional communication, primarily because the wrong inference can be made. Making the wrong inference is called a "miscommunication," and miscommunications are the bane of every organization.

Anytime anyone implies anything, they run the risk of creating a miscommunication. For example, if someone says, "Nice of you to join us," when someone is running a few minutes late to a meeting, they are most likely implying something. If it were taken at face value, "Nice of you to join us," means the speaker is happy to have the person join in their meeting. If we were to infer its true meaning, however, this statement implies that the person arrived late, that they do it habitually, and that the speaker would like them to stop being late to their meetings.

Instead of relying on the person arriving late inferring the correct meaning, it would be far better to greet them professionally with a "Thank you for joining us," and after the meeting speak with them privately. In this private meeting, you can say to them, "I value your contribution, and would like for you to be present for the entire meeting. Can you commit to being on time in the future?" This is the assertive alternative to, "Nice of you to join us," and requires no inference on the part of the listener - it simply states the problem and offers a solution by being direct, honest, and respectful.

Beyond introducing the potential for miscommunication, the phrase "Nice of you to join us," is usually meant to embarrass the person who is late in front of their coworkers, in the hope that the fear of future embarrassment will make people show up on time for meetings. As deliberately embarrassing a colleague is demeaning and disrespectful, the speaker's implication has crossed the line into passive-aggression.

In a perfect world, an organization would have a communication culture that does not use implications and requires no one to infer meanings. These types of communication cultures can be found in places where a miscommunication can be deadly, such as in hospital emergency rooms, air-traffic control, or during rescue operations. These types of work environments have had to master assertive communication as it is an absolute necessity to save and preserve lives.

In the business world, however, there tend to be relatively few assertive communicators, as people can become so afraid of workplace conflict, that they feel they have no choice but to express themselves through the use of indirect, passive implications, which requires their meaning be inferred, which creates the opportunity for passive-aggression.

Passive-aggressive communication has no place in professional communication, as it is the bedrock upon which toxic work environments are built. Toxic work environments generally feature two main types of communication: aggressive communication, and passive-aggressive communication.

Aggressive communication is when someone overtly insults, disrespects, or demeans one of their colleagues. People speaking aggressively to their coworkers are usually being honest and direct, but they are in no way being respectful. Aggressive communication is usually easily identified by management, and can result in verbal warnings, written warnings, and even termination. Knowing this, people who are at the heart of creating and perpetuating work toxicity lean heavily on passive-aggressive communication.

Passive aggression can be verbal or non-verbal. Examples of verbal passive aggression are, "You're entitled to your opinion," which implies that someone's opinion is invalid; or "Don't you ever get tired of talking?" which implies that someone's verbal contributions are of no value; or "Don't you have somewhere else to be?" which implies that someone's presence is unwanted. All of these make negative implications that are meant to be insulting, disrespectful, and demeaning. Examples of non-verbal passive aggression are - when someone is speaking to you - rolling your eyes, letting out a big sigh, tapping your foot, crossing your arms, frowning, or taking out your phone and playing with it.

Toxic work environments are impossible to maintain without passive-aggressive communication, and passive aggression is only possible if people communicate while making implications whose meaning has to be inferred. Therefore, the first step in fixing a toxic work environment is to eliminate the use of implications in communication, thus eliminating the possibility of passive-aggression.

If you are listening to someone, and they are being passive-aggressive, you will face a difficult yet important choice: do you ignore the problem, or do you address the problem?

If you try to ignore the problem, consider the impact it might have to your mental health and sense of well-being. When we are not at work, we should not be thinking about work, but if work-related communication is laced with passive-aggression, your mind will be occupied with figuring out if someone has implied something negative, or if you're just being paranoid. This can cause sleepless nights, anxiety, and depression. Considering the negative consequences for you, it is advisable to address the problem.

Choosing to address passive-aggression, however, requires finely tuned communication skills, and is not for the faint of heart. At the core of addressing someone who seems to be trying to imply something, is expressing the sentiment of, "What are you implying?" Unfortunately, directly asking that question is accusatory and confrontational. For example, if someone says, "Nice of you to join us," and you reply, "What are you implying?" that will guarantee a conflict.

Instead, after the meeting, invite the person to join you for a one-on-one conversation, where you might say, "When I joined the meeting, you said, 'nice of you to join us,' and I believe you were trying to say that I should do a better job of showing up to meetings on time - is that correct?" Provided your nonverbals are non-threatening and non-accusatory, the person should interpret your question as a pure inquiry and not the start of a confrontation, creating the potential for a productive change in behavior.

Addressing someone using passive-aggressive communication directly and getting the desired outcome of them changing their behavior is very difficult to do. However, without addressing bad communication habits like passive-aggression, those habits will persist, and a toxic work environment will follow. When weighing the pros and cons of whether you should address the problem or not, remember that you will be correcting behavior not just for your benefit, but also for the benefit of your colleagues. In this way, brief yet masterful moments of communication from you have the potential to transform a toxic culture into one of peace and harmony for your entire organization for many years to come.