Читать книгу Dealing with Difficult People - David Brown, David Brown - Страница 7

When problem-solving you need first to define the problem and then form a clear view of what a good solution, or outcome, will look like. If we are to manage difficult people successfully, we need to be clear about what we mean by the term ‘difficult’.

People don’t normally turn up for work determined to be difficult. People that you find ‘difficult’ are only difficult because they are different to you, or disagree with you, or behave in a fashion that you or your colleagues find unacceptable. Being difficult takes many forms and is a matter of perception. You will have your own criteria for what makes people difficult, but here are a few examples:

case study I worked for five years with someone who was forever pushing, shaping and driving his own agenda. He constantly interrupted colleagues in midsentence. Everyone who worked with him thought him difficult, but he was a significant factor in our team’s success. My feedback, aimed at changing his behaviour,

• Perfectionists. If you want a quick result, perfectionists can be infuriating. If you are the perfectionist, you will irritate those who think that good enough is okay and makes economic sense.

• Control freaks. These types will annoy you by interfering when you want to be left alone to do things your way.

• Creative people. They are a must if ideas are an essential part of moving forward but can be painful when you just want to get on with delivering a simple result.

• Shapers. They drive the action (see Secret 5.8) and are vital in a successful team, but they take over as and when they see fit.

• Aggressive or defensive people. Few people welcome aggression in business. People who are always on the defensive present problems as well. We need assertive people (see Secret 1.5).

• Submissive people. This kind of behaviour can be caused by many things, including childhood experiences and feeling threatened. Their lack of confidence and fear of failure can be frustrating.

The examples above are caused by a host of different things, and that makes all of us different. Potentially, that makes all of us difficult in some people’s eyes. We need to understand enough about ourselves and others to recognize what we can reasonably expect to change and what we should find a way of living with.

Understand that everyone behaves differently to you.

had no effect whatsoever. One day we did a Belbin analysis (Secret 5.8) and he registered the most extreme shaper score that I have ever seen. I then concluded that this was so much a part of his personality that we needed to move him out of our team or accept him for what he was. We chose to live with him.