1.5 - About University

12.8D EALING WITH D IFFICULT P EOPLE:A TIMELESS L EADERSHIP C HALLENGEInspired by Albert Bernstein, Sydney Craft Rozen, Robert Bramson, and Roberta Cava.No matter how skilled you become as a leader, difficult people will challenge you. Books aboutdifficult people identify these people by colorful names like Ogres, Machiavellis, Fence-Sitters,Corporate Grouches, Dinosaurs, Bulldozers, Blowhards, and Stones. This tool will help youunderstand these difficult people, whether they are employees, bosses, or customers, and suggestways of dealing with them. But first, a general word of caution: Most people, like yourself,are struggling to do the best they can. If you continually find people in your life difficult whileother people don’t find them so, you may need some feedback and coaching on your personalstyle.Principles for dealing with difficult people (whatever their organizational position):➠➠➠➠➠Every person lives by a set of values, principles, and rules. Just as a fish takes water forgranted, most people are unaware of the basis of their thoughts and actions. Self-awarenessis an essential leadership attribute. Learn about yourself and how others may bedifferent from you. [☛ 14.7 Personal Preferences]Rarely does it work to deal with the problem behavior at the level that it was expressed.Don’t get drawn into the problem person’s logic. Rather, step outside the person’sframe of reference to deal with the behavior. [☛ 8.5 Metacommunicating]Don’t take it personally. Although on occasion you would like to throttle the culprit,keep your professional cool. Our innate reptilian responses—fight, flight, or freeze—arerarely effective with difficult people. (This tool provides alternative strategies.) [☛ 15.2Emotional Intelligence]All difficult people genuinely believe that their behavior is logical and realistic. Bizarreas it may seem, difficult people may be trying to help you!Not much works with the most difficult of difficult people. If a difficult person’s behavioris a result of deep-seated insecurity, challenging the behavior, even indirectly, willpush the difficult person into an even more defensive position.Here are some common types of difficult people and how you can understand them. Achecklist of suggestions for dealing with each type of difficult person is presented in the nextsection.Type How to recognize them What drives their behaviorAggressorsMost people describe difficult people asAggressors—easy to recognize by their bullying,bombarding, pushiness, emotional arrogance, anduse of anger. Some references distinguish betweenAggressors. With Secure Aggressors, you need tostand up and fight a word battle to become one ofFor Aggressors, the world is a win–lose place.Power means being able to control people,resources, and space. Being vulnerable is anathemato them. They believe people must fear andrespect them. Aggressors need to continually384 SECTION 12 TOOLS FOR LEADING RELATIONSHIPS