The Inward Challenge Of Difficult People

The human race is full of hard people. Without them, what would 24 hours news channels do? In the work place, hard people are a serious problem. At best, they may be a minor irritant. At worst, they make illness, disruption, staff leaving and possible court hearings.

How do you manage a hard person? The first measure lies in the phrase "difficult person". The existent issue is hard behavior - behavior which do a negative reaction inside you. This may sound like I am blaming you for the problem. I'm not, but, as the lone individual in this human relationship that you can change is you, I am focussing on you. Therefore, bury focussing on them for the minute and focusing on you.

Can you place what in this behavior hurts you? For example, I had a foreman who barked orders and had what I perceived as an aggressive personality. My reaction was to experience frightened, demoralised, stupid and sometimes really angry. Of course of study he didn't cognize any of this!

As clip went on, I realised a couple of things. The first was he was who he was. The 2nd is that I am who I am. The 3rd was that I either needed to screen this out or quit.

So I asked him for a meeting. I started by focussing on the impact his specific behavior was having on me and my team. I was very specific, stating clearly what had happened and what the effects had been. For example, he liked to swan around my team, asking them what they were doing and then giving them other things to do. I explained that not only did my squad happen this confusing, they resented his doing so. I also explained that it tended to sabotage me and give the feeling that he had no assurance in my ability to pull off and Pb my team. I explained how his cheering caused a fearfulness reaction, making it hard for me to believe and give him the replies he wanted.

This was not a comfy conversation, but it worked because I was able to travel on to state what I wanted. He explained why he did what he did - the walking around was because his business office was elsewhere in the edifice and he did not desire my squad to experience cut off from him or ignored. He also explained what of my behavior was bothersome -yes, Iodine was bothersome him by my quiet and apparent inability to make up one's mind anything.

We worked out a via media - he would come up to more than than squad meetings, he would go on to walk around my squad but with me, and he would give me a small more clip to reply in between his questions. I agreed to believe and talk more than in slug points with him, and to do certain he had transcripts of dockets and proceedings in good time. We also make up one's mind to ran into more than often for less time.

This attack of focussing first on me - my reactions, my demands - and then moving out to concentrate on how we could work together was successful. Try it, and give hard people the one-two.