This Element is an excerpt from Focus: Your Key to More Productivity at Work (ISBN: 9780137002566) by Jurgen Wolff. Available in print and digital formats.

How to make sure virtually all your conversations and meetings achieve the goals you’ve set for them.

We like to think of conversations as exchanges in which we listen to the other person and share our thoughts and feelings with them. It should be easy, yet often we leave a conversation or meeting feeling frustrated that the other person didn’t seem to understand. The other person leaves feeling the same way. Why is it so difficult?