Working with difficult people.
We always will come across difficult people.
There’s people that we think are difficult in every area of our life..
Business in particular because business is a place where we:
– Bring our ideas forward
– Come to the forefront with situations that are from many
– Bring many different perspectives
– Are not always going to agree with each other
I remember having a really difficult relationship with a particular leader/manager back in my corporate days and we didn’t get along.
What happens when you don’t get along with people?
Everything that they do, you look at negatively at work.
We got along like a house on fire outside of work and we attended lots of the same social events.
We would catch up at social events and we would be really friendly at the external events.
But in the business, anytime I needed something or anytime she needed something, both of us got our backs right up.
We had a bit of a competitive thing going on.
So I want you to ask yourself if you are experiencing difficult people in the business consistently, over and over you.
You come across difficult people. Is there a part of. yourself that is the difficult person?
I had to put my hand up. Part of me was being difficult.
I did believe that everybody else was difficult at the time but I now know when I look back..
I was actually the difficult person and perhaps the other person wasn’t even difficult at all.
Perhaps they were responding back because I was being difficult.
The other thing that I want you to look at with difficult people..
When something is going on for people, something bigger under the surface. Little things get in the way. We overreact to little things that we wouldn’t normally overreact to.
I was talking to a client recently and they had admittedly reacted to something and then the person they reacted to reacted to their behaviour. So there was a bit of reaction tunnel effect happening. I listened to my client’s story and asked “what else is going on for you right now?” They admitted they were in the middle of something that they weren’t enjoying and maybe it was effecting them more than they had realised.
Things that can effect you might be
– A project at work you are not enjoying..
– It might be a project at home,
– It might be difficulties with children at home.
I remember that I was in one of the most difficult places I had ever been in when I was having some trouble with my oldest daughter. She was in between 14 and 18 years of age and I was a control freak. I was trying to control her life. She was trying to find out who she was. We were at loggerheads all the time and I was bringing that conflict to work with me.
Not at the forefront, but in the undercurrent. It was coming with me to work and I was responding and reacting to things a lot faster than usual and the reactions were more explosive than they would’ve normally been.
To be truthful.. Back in corporate, I was pretty difficult all the time.
When the challenges were going on at home as well as at work then things were even more difficult for me.
So I want you to ask yourself the question.
If you are having challenges with difficult people recurring and often,
“What part do you play?”
“Are you one of those difficult people?.”
Something to think about.
Mary Jensen
Mindset Master and Behaviour Specialist
M Power Services
