Not difficult people “at work” but more likfe difficult people who are AT work. Get me?

We are pretty sure that dang-near ALL of you have dealt with a difficult person, and just as sure there are times when you WISH you had handled it a little differently? Am I right?

Here are some reminders, and an advanced tip for those of you that are pros at interpersonal management.

Video Transcript

Katie: Hi it’s Katie from Skirt Strategies and this is the monthly tip for women in leadership. We give you a small little leadership tactic that you can work on immediately to help be more effective as a woman.

I’m at a conference here in Portland, Maine of women educators and this is the merchandising portion of the conference so you see a little bit of shopping going on behind me.

This month’s discussion is around dealing with difficult people. I know you never have problems with difficult people. God knows I’ve never been guilty of that myself. But there are two things I want to leave with you.

The first one is the value of empathizing. This is a basic skill. In fact if you want to talk about conflict management too, where difficult people lead to conflict, it’s perhaps the most basic common technique that’s important in de-escalating conflict. And it looks nothing more than reflecting to the other person how you are sensing them feeling. It doesn’t mean you agree with what they are feeling. It doesn’t mean you are saying, “Oh I’m really sorry.” All it means is that you are acknowledging what they might be going through.

When you are dealing with a difficult person it’s a great idea to be reflective of what you are hearing from them. If you hear them say they disagree with something, say “Aha, that sounds like it is difficult for you.” If you hear them being angry about something, say, “Hmm, well I can see how that might make you angry.”

Now you don’t want to become a parrot, but you want to be someone that is sending the message that you are listening. You’ll find that this keeps the person from being able to engage you. Often they want to be difficult and engage you in a negative way. And boy, if you are not careful, that will happen really quickly.

So the first tip is to be empathetic in such a way that you are reflecting and am acknowledging.

The second technique is an advanced one and that has to do with backing down. When do you back down? When do you have the backbone to back down? And how does it show strength to back down because it does.

The first thing to keep in mind is that it does show strength. It doesn’t mean that you are being weak and you are giving up. In fact, a lot of times it shows that you have risen above it and you are not going to engage the difficult person in whatever it is that they might be looking for.

The second thing is to think of backing down as stepping aside with the verbal part of what you are doing and listen to the amount of air time that you might have with this difficult person. For most of them they are trying to get you to be in the game with them and if you are not going to play that game, then you are going to watch the amount that you talk.

So identify how much you are verbally engaging with them and maybe stop talking.

Then third, to keep from looking like you’ve really checked out, you still want to show that you are listening, that you are attentive, so you are going to be nonverbally attentive, but you might start considering how your questions are going.

So, the third tip is to move in with some questions that can direct them n the way that you want. This can be kind of tricky. If the person is super negative, maybe a couple of positive questions like, “Well if you had to solve this problem, where would you say that I could go ideally?” Or “Well it sounds like really you’ve hit up against the wall. Could you tell me what you think is causing that?” Now you are reflecting again how you think they are of value and they are less likely to be negative about it.

I know difficult people are going to happen in all sorts of flavors left and right and we have them day-to-day. The best thing that I can have you remember is to keep your wits about you, be a strong Skirt Strategist, and stay focused.

Those of you that are in the monthly membership know that you’ll be getting once each week about this topic to drill down just a little bit more. If you’d like to join the ranks of those members, it’s only $8 a month and we’d love to have you. We’ll hold you accountable and you’ll be a part of the cause. Thanks and have a great one.

(Music plays)

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