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Erik Larson, I think, is a spectacular writer.
I first latched onto him several years ago with his book The Devil in the White City recommended by my daughter. It tells the story of the astonishing rise of the 1893 World Columbia Exposition in Chicago and a serial murderer in the city at the time.
(This incidentally is soon to be made into a movie with Martin Scorsese directing and Leonardo DiCaprio as the serial killer. That can only be good right?)
I then globbed onto his book In the Garden of Beasts, which tells the story of an American family in Germany during the rise of the Nazis. The father of the family was the first U.S. ambassador to Hitler's Germany.
Larson tells real history stories with a novelist's flourish. But every fact is accounted for and anything that appears in quotes was actually said in written or recorded form by the quoted.
It's compelling and fascinating stuff.
This summer I made it to a book of his called Thunderstruck. It's the dual story of Marconi's invention of the wireless telegraph, which would become the radio, and the murder of a woman in England in which the wireless would be central to bringing the killer to justice.
So cool.
I bring you now a short side-story from that book, almost meaningless to the outcome, but quite significant to me and, in turn, to you.
Marconi was in America in 1907, building and testing new wireless telegraph towers. His quite unhappy wife, Beatrice, who was born and bred in an aristocratic household, was with him. They were staying with the Vyvyan's in Maine, who were supporters of his work.
Beatrice had what Larson refers to as "only limited domestic skills," but still offered Jane Vyvyan help around the house.
This Jane refused "in a manner as cold as the weather outside."
Beatrice was miserable.
She was in a foreign land in a foreign house with a woman who seemed to scoff at her helpful overtures and with a husband who was gone a large majority of the time inspecting this new wireless telegraph station.
Beatrice kept her unhappiness to herself for a while but finally broke down and told Marconi about the unfriendly exchange between her and Jane.
"The news made Marconi furious," Larson writes. "He was ready to charge out to the living room to confront the Vyvyan's, but Beatrice stopped him. She knew how much Marconi depended on Vyvyan. She resolved to confront Mrs. Vyvyan herself."
Beatrice did just that...and Jane Vyvyan broke down into tears.
"She confessed that she had feared that Beatrice, as the daughter of a lord, would act superior and dominate the house or, worse, treat her as if she were a servant.
"Their talk cleansed the atmosphere. Almost immediately they became friends-just in time."
Well, you'll have to read the book to answer the question, "Just in time for what?"
But here's what I lasered in on: A misunderstanding cleared up by a conversation!
You don't' think that's a big deal? Do you not know how many problems this simple action can solve?
How many people hold grudges, judgments and hold people at arm's length because of misunderstandings? How many people assume the worst without trying to understand the person they are assuming about?
I have been coaching leaders for 17 years. You can't imagine how many leaders have brought to me an issue they have with another. You can't begin to guess how many of those situations got cleared up with a simple conversation.
Answer: Lots.
When I've told leaders that the only chance for resolution was a conversation, there is often mild shock at the simplicity of my answer followed by the trepidation of having to have honest dialogue with someone.
Difficulties between people don't vanish without effort. These honest conversations that we so often run from is the only tool that gives us a chance at resolution.
Instead of growing bitter; instead of allowing divisions to remain; instead of turning your energy into gossip, have a conversation.
Go ahead. I dare you. Cleanse the atmosphere.
And you won't need wireless telegraph to do it.
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