[asplake]

> “Studies in labor-management negotiations demonstrate that the time required to reach conflict resolution is cut in half when each negotiator agrees, before responding, to accurately repeat what the previous speaker had said.” - Marshall B. Rosenberg in Nonviolent Communication.

Followed by:

> Paraphrasing minimizes misunderstandings. At the end of a conversation, you and the speaker will leave with the same interpretation, which will reduce the need for a follow-up.

"Accurately repeat" vs "Paraphrasing" – quite the contradiction there.

I'm really not a fan of paraphrasing. It shifts the burden on your counterpart to understand you accurately, and it can be annoying, even destructive of a train of thought. Practice accurate quoting and non-leading questions instead! To take this to an interesting extreme, check out Clean Language [1], a style of questioning that make it as hard as possible to insert assumptions into your questions. A blog post of mine 'My favourite Clan Language question' [2] helps explain its relevance.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_language [2] https://blog.agendashift.com/2019/01/18/my-favourite-clean-l...

[NikolaNovak]

I kind of disagree. If I "parrot" (Accurately repeat) the original statement, it does not in any way demonstrate understanding, only memorization/note-taking.

Restating, summarizing, or paraphrasing, shows that I understand sufficiently that I can describe it in my own words rather than memorization.

Day in and day out I find that my team members who accurately repeat a statement of problem or solution, may not have a clue what it actually is. Only by asking them to summarize or paraphrase, do we both discover that there's a lack of actual, internalized understanding.

(in negotiations, discussions or conflict, it's also an opportunity to focus and agree on key points; accurately repeating may include any percentage of stylistic content)

[nobody9999]

>I kind of disagree. If I "parrot" (Accurately repeat) the original statement, it does not in any way demonstrate understanding, only memorization/note-taking.

>Restating, summarizing, or paraphrasing, shows that I understand sufficiently that I can describe it in my own words rather than memorization.

That's absolutely correct. Restating the concept(s) presented definitely provides confirmation that they have been heard and understood[0].

I'd only add that doing so may also alert the other party to a lack of understanding, requiring further discussion, which is arguably as or more useful than just assuming you are understood.

[0] See what I did there? :)

[lkbm]

Agreed. My coworker recently shared[0] with us, which is largely jsut an expanded part of the TPS section. "Yes, I'll send over the TPS report this evening" doesn't solve the confusion around what "TPS" stands for.

If nothing else, paraphrasing helps you disambiguate term you didn't consciously recognize as ambiguous.

Maybe the other party should have used less ambiguous terms, but "well the other person caused the problem with their language choice" solves the blame, not the problem.

[0] https://m.signalvnoise.com/dont-take-their-word-for-it/

[_y5hn]

I know it may frustrate at times, but instead of relaying instruction, I ask questions and challenge assumptions, though only if any ambiguity remains. Covering it up is the worse option.

[happytoexplain]

There is no contradiction between accurately repeating and paraphrasing. You can do either or both or neither. Yes, paraphrasing is dangerous in your context (repeating to a 3rd party), but it's fantastic in the quoted context (confirming understanding with the 1st party, which can not happen if you repeat using the exact same words).

[ipadmini]

Agree. Paraphrasing and mirroring are two different ways of reflecting what the speaker is saying. Some situations call for both. In imago therapy (meant for couples), the script calls first for mirroring (repeating word for word), followed by a summary (to demonstrate understanding, and to seek clarification).