Conflict Resilience with Bob Bordone — How to Disagree Without Giving Up or Giving In

Can you stay in hard conversations without trying to “win” or walk away? In this episode, Harvard Law School Senior Fellow and USA Today bestselling author Bob Bordone joins us to unpack conflict resilience—the ability to stay grounded, curious, and compassionate when everything in you wants to shut down or strike back. Bob helps us understand how to build this muscle in our homes, workplaces, and even in our faith communities. He explains why persuasion mode often backfires, how identity threat hijacks our nervous system, and what neuroscience reveals about giving our brains a “bigger, better offer” than defensiveness. Together we explore the cost of avoidance, the limits of performative civility, and how faith can model a braver kind of engagement that doesn’t sacrifice truth or relationship. By the end, Bob leaves us with tools to disagree well—without giving up or giving in—and reminds us that healing our political divides begins in the small, sacred act of really listening.

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Guest bio:

Bob Bordone is a USA Today bestselling author, Senior Fellow at Harvard Law School, and one of the nation’s leading experts on negotiation, mediation, and conflict resolution. For more than two decades, he has helped organizations, governments, universities, and faith communities navigate their toughest conversations. His latest book is Conflict Resilience: Negotiating Disagreement Without Giving Up or Giving In.