Less Said the Better.

When reading the plays of Harold Pinter, you immediately notice that the word "Pause" appears as a stage direction on almost every page of the script. The pause is often nestled between one character's long monologue followed by a one or two word response from the other. When lifted from the page to the stage, those little pauses can add significant dramatic tension to a scene.

For example, in the The Homecoming, Ruth arrives with her husband Teddy to visit his family in England. In a pivotal scene, Teddy's brother Lenny finds Ruth alone and starts up a conversation. It begins with Lenny offering a glass of water; he asks a few questions, and she delivers one-word answers.

He then asks to hold her hand; she doesn't react or rebuff, just asks "Why?" The tension builds until Lenny launches into a long, disturbing monologue describing his encounter with a prostitute, telling Ruth very matter-of-factly that he assaulted her and very likely would have killed her for no reason other than he thought she was "diseased." After sitting through this entire confession, Ruth's only reply was "How did you know she was diseased?"

Pinter understood the power of the pause; of communicating between the lines and allowing the antagonist to flounder in their own noise. As scholar John Russell Brown notes, Pinter's work displays a skepticism about language: "We can neither say what we know, nor know what we say. When we stop to think, we do not trust words."*

Philosophers throughout the ages have opined on the wisdom of silence. Zeno of Citium, the founder of Stoicism, famously said: "The reason why we have two ears and one mouth is that we may listen more and talk less." Elsewhere in the Causerie I mention Epictetus, who advised: "Let silence be your general rule; or say only what is necessary and in few words." Finally, a favorite of mine is Lao Tzu from the Tao Te Ching (Chapter 56): "One who knows does not speak; one who speaks does not know."

At this point you might be tempted to toss a bit of pop-culture Aaron-Burr-from-Hamilton at me: "You mean like 'Talk less, smile more?'" However, remember the line that follows: "Don't let them know what you're against or what you're for." Burr used silence as subterfuge, which is not a particularly desirable leadership quality. The better role model would be Washington, who used silence to achieve a monumental kind of gravity. He listened until the disparate voices in the room settled into a coherent strategy.

Speaking of leadership qualities, arguably the father of modern management, Peter Drucker (also mentioned elsewhere in the Causerie) was a proponent of this "two ears" approach. In his 1973 book, Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices, Drucker wrote that communication is not what the speaker says, but what the listener perceives. This is a reframing of what is typically expected of an arts leader. We are conditioned to expect the gregarious, outgoing visionary; the "broadcaster" of the mission. Yet Drucker argues that the leader's most vital work is to be a receiver; someone who can listen to their staff, their board, and their public, and guide the organization in the direction of success without the sturm and drang of constant drama. Author, speaker, and playwright Daniel Pink offers a modern balance to this, suggesting that we should be neither an introvert or extrovert but an "ambivert." Ambiverts know when to push and when to pause. They’re adaptable, flexible, and balanced.

Ultimately, the power of saying less is the power of self-possession. It signals to our staff and our boards that we are not rattled by the void, nor are we so insecure that we must fill every silence with the sound of our own authority. In an industry that is perpetually performative, the most effective act of management is often the one that remains unspoken. By closing our mouths, we finally allow ourselves to hear an organization's heartbeat.

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*Brown, John Russell. Theatre language: a study of Arden, Osborne, Pinter and Wesker. New York: Taplinger Publishing Co., 1972. p.15.