Start Reading Unspeakable

START READING UNSPEAKABLE

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Some conversations are the hardest to have and the most important. In this preview, you’ll begin to:

Understand the idea behind an Unspeakable, and why taboo and sensitive subjects can become so difficult to address openly.

Recognize the patterns of avoidance that show up in families, workplaces, classrooms, and relationships.

See why the conversation itself matters—who’s part of it, what we may be assuming, and what happens when we continue to put it off.

Christina Wing’s perspective has been shaped by more than 30 years of global business experience and by the many different settings in which she has lived and worked.

She grew up in a founder family, began her professional career in investment banking, and later led a family office. Today, she’s a faculty member at Harvard Business School, where she created the MBA course Demystifying the Family Enterprise and chairs the Executive Education program Families in Business. She’s also the founder of Wingspan Legacy Partners.

Across families, classrooms, boardrooms, businesses, and communities, Christina has seen the same pattern: people often know what the issue is. They may even talk about it privately. What they struggle to do is address it openly with the people involved.

That observation—and Christina’s own experience with conversations she wishes had happened—became the foundation for Unspeakable.

Money. Succession. Age. Mistakes. Death. Inheritance. Fear. Ownership. Religion. Politics. Work and family.

These subjects aren’t always ignored. Often, people are already talking about them—privately, with people who think like they do, or without the person who most needs to be part of the conversation.

Unspeakable is a practical, case-led guide to understanding why certain subjects become taboo and what it takes to bring them into a real conversation.

Through stories drawn from business, family life, classrooms, and Christina’s own experience, the book asks readers to think more carefully about the purpose of a conversation, who needs to participate, what they know versus what they’re assuming, and how timing, setting, questions, and listening can shape what happens next.

It isn’t about finding perfect words or guaranteeing agreement.

Sometimes progress is greater clarity. Sometimes it’s understanding. Sometimes it’s getting facts, intentions, and feelings into the open so people have something real to work from.

And like any skill, having conversations around difficult subjects takes practice.