Think Before You Type: Navigating Social Media & Workplace Conversations
This episode started with Vonda getting frustrated on a florist Facebook group. Someone asked a genuinely good business question — the kind a newer shop owner wouldn't automatically know — and while helpful people (shout-out to Ralph Giordano, one of Flower Clique's favorite people, who stops everything to help others in this industry) offered real best practices, other commenters piled on with "that's a stupid question" and "duh." What purpose does that serve? As Lori puts it, some people feel strangely powerful behind a keyboard — and the same dynamic that poisons a Facebook thread also shows up on the shop floor. So the hosts dig into how to engage online and in person without becoming part of the problem.
Five steps before you engage
Vonda brought a five-step checklist to run through before you respond to anything that gets your blood up — written or verbal:
- Clarify your purpose. Why are you responding at all? If you don't have anything constructive to say, why participate? (Both hosts' fathers said it first: if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it.)
- Check your emotions. Lori's perennial number one — and it applies to positive emotions too. She and Renee Tucci have joked about needing to rein in the all-caps-and-exclamation-points enthusiasm with people who don't know them well. And when the emotion is negative, walk away first; everyone can already read it on Lori's face anyway.
- Consider the other perspective. Approach with curiosity, not confrontation. There's a word for this — empathy — and while it's hard when it doesn't come naturally, science says it can be learned with practice.
- Gather your thoughts and facts. Real facts, from real sources — because you can always find "facts" that just prove your own point. Vonda's doctor's advice about medical Googling applies everywhere: go back to a source you know is right, like the Mayo Clinic. Bonus: research time doubles as time for your emotions to settle, and you may discover a perspective you hadn't considered.
- Prepare for different outcomes — and set boundaries. Sometimes the right move is to scroll past. You don't have to comment. Disengaging is allowed.
Ask, don't tell
The technique Lori pulled from her research (some of it dating back to the Boss's Bonus course she built with Ellie for Flower Clique members) is deceptively simple: rephrase statements as questions. "That's stupid" slams a door; "That's an interesting question — can you elaborate?" opens one, and gives the other person respect instead of knocking them down. The same move works face-to-face with an employee whose comments are rubbing you wrong.
Her real-life example of how powerful the ask can be: a commentator had publicly complained on live TV that ASL interpreters were a distraction during California wildfire emergency broadcasts when closed captions would do — and took enormous backlash for it. Later, at a Q&A, a woman stood up and asked, "Do you mind if I explain to you a little about the ASL deaf community?" She respectfully explained that many people born deaf find reading very difficult, that ASL is structurally different from spoken English so captions can misconstrue meaning, and that she suspected he simply hadn't known. His response: no one had ever explained it — she was so kind, and it absolutely changed his mind. Lori's takeaway gave both hosts goosebumps: "May I share with you what I know about this community?" accomplishes what a thousand angry comments never could. That's what leaders do.
Three ways to keep the peace in your shop
For owners whose teams are sparring over politics or he-said-she-said drama, Lori laid out the options:
Ban it. No politics inside these doors — neutral territory. It's not because you don't care about the country; it's because no matter which side anyone is on, someone ends up angry, and it's not productive. Vonda had just read about CEOs whose public political stands sent their businesses into a nosedive. Care deeply, cast your vote — outside the shop. Fair warning: banning isn't easy, and some employees will bristle at being told what they can't do.
Create a policy for how things get discussed. Harder than a ban, and it applies to gossip and local drama, not just politics: questions are okay, telling statements are not — the ask-don't-tell rule turned into house rules. The catch: the owner has to follow the policy too.
Check your own bias and build a positive culture. Everyone has unconscious bias — "if you say you don't have one, you're a liar" — because in the absence of information, we lean into what we already believe. (Lori's mother-in-law once invented an entire backstory about a family friend to explain a friendship she didn't understand.) Of the classic types — framing, bandwagon, authority, and status quo — Lori sees two dominating flower shops: authority bias ("what I say goes") and status quo bias ("we've done it this way forever"). As the owner, you're the referee whether you like it or not; setting the ground rules up front means you spend less time refereeing and more time running a shop people actually enjoy working in.
Key takeaways
- Before responding to a provocative post or comment, run the checklist: purpose, emotions, perspective, facts, outcomes.
- Rephrase statements as questions — "can you elaborate?" defuses defensiveness and preserves the other person's dignity.
- "May I share what I know?" delivered with respect changes minds; public shaming just hardens them.
- In the shop, either ban hot-button topics or set a clear policy for how they're discussed — and follow it yourself.
- Know your biases, especially authority ("what I say goes") and status quo ("we've always done it this way") — they're quietly steering your decisions.