Non-Violent Communication (NVC) is a powerful tool for enhancing business and personal relationships. At a high-level, it involves the integration of four things:

  1. Consciousness: a set of principles that support living a life of compassion, collaboration, courage, and authenticity
  2. Language: understanding how words contribute to connection or distance
  3. Communication: knowing how to ask for what we want, how to hear others even in disagreement, and how to move toward solutions that work for all
  4. Means of influence: sharing “power with others” rather than using “power over others”

The outcomes NVC aspires toward are, in general:

  1. Increasing our ability to live with choice, meaning, and connection
  2. Connecting empathically with self and others to have more satisfying relationships
  3. Sharing of resources so everyone is able to benefit

More specifically, regarding implementing NVC within day to day conversation, the framework involves communicating four things:

  1. The concrete actions I observe or others observe that affect well-being
  2. How I feel or others feel in relation to what has been observed
  3. The needs, values, desires, etc., that create my feelings or another’s feelings
  4. The concrete actions I request  or others request in order to enrich life

For a deep dive into NVC, check out this book.

Meanwhile, I plan to blog about this topic on a regular basis. Please contact me and share any success stories you have related to implementing NVC.