Imagine a situation where you come home from a long day at work and walk right into a raging argument in the middle of the dining room.

Your two children are standing near the dining table, staring at an orange. They both want the orange.

What would you do?

A typical ‘adult solution’ would be to divide the orange in half and distribute it to the two children. But the children don’t want that. Both are emphatic that they each want one whole orange.

In such a case, what would you do? Would you perhaps offer another fruit, or deny them both the orange because you don’t want to encourage ‘fighting’? These are all practical and highly probable outcomes of a conflict – one offers a compromise (divide the orange), another offers an alternative (choice of another fruit), and the third simply gets rid of the conflict by removing the source of conflict (neither of you is getting the orange).

But let’s say that you initiate a dialogue by asking a simple question – what do you
want the orange for?

It turns out that one of the children is hungry and wants to eat the orange. The other isn’t hungry; this child wants the orange peel to use in a school craft project

Value creation

After you get these answers, you now realize that the one orange is actually two oranges. The first child gets a whole orange to eat, while the other child gets a whole orange to peel and use for a project. This is value creation, one of the three principles of the Dialogic Method, where a perceived resource may not be just one resource with one value, but something with multiple values dependent on the needs of the stakeholders.

And it doesn’t just end there. The metaphorical two oranges may actually be three oranges because there’s a third, intangible value – by listening to their needs, you’ve gained respect in your children’s eyes as a ‘fair’ parent. And perhaps there’s even a fourth and fifth orange in there as well, as the whole experience may have taught your children how to handle conflict and perhaps given you some insight into what your children value. These are relationship oranges that are often overlooked when one is focused on the physical or tangible aspects of a conflict. 

Non-binary approach

Another principle of the Dialogic Method that this situation highlights is the use of a non-binary approach. By accounting for the desires of all the stakeholders in this setting, a mutually useful result was obtained. This can be quite different from a mutually acceptable result, where all parties agree to a particular compromise because it’s the best of a bunch of not-so-good solutions. For example, let’s say that you only thought of yourself as the most important stakeholder; because as an implementer – the person who will divide the orange – you are a stakeholder in this situation, even though you don’t get any part of the orange. For you, the most important result is peace and quiet in the house – you’re tired and don’t want to hear a fight. So, you simply opted to divide the orange into two and give each child one half, because in your mind, that is ‘fair’.

What then? Although the children might agree to your solution of ‘a fair division’ one child remains hungry, and the other doesn’t have enough peel for a project. You may have temporary peace and quiet in the house, but from your children’s expressions, you can tell that another fight will erupt later in the evening. Essentially, the division was ‘fair’ and ‘accepted’, but none of the stakeholders are happy or satisfied with it.

However, by opting for a non-binary approach, which takes every stakeholder’s needs into account, you’ve managed to find a solution where all three of you are happy – the children have what they needed, and you have a lasting peace and quiet in the house.

Self-determination

The third principle of the Dialogic Method – self-determination – comes about because your children and you, together resolved the ‘who gets the whole orange’ problem. Since the decision came from all three of you participating in the dialogue, the solution is acceptable and useful to all three, and each of you makes an effort to ensure that the solution lasts.

But let’s say that you decide that this whole situation is too much to handle and ask your spouse to come up with a solution. Your spouse declares that the orange should go to neither child; that it should simply be stored in the fridge for later. This is a decision that is external, made by someone who may not even be a stakeholder and has no understanding of what the actual stakeholders require. In such a case, your children don’t get what they need, so they continue to fight and nag you, and you get no peace or quiet, which you crave. Since this solution was not crafted by the main stakeholders, it addresses none of their problems, and none of them have any incentive to adopt or use it.