April 12, 2024 • 22 mins
In this episode Dr. De Hicks talks about how to deal with difficult people at work (and at home). De puts the spotlight on the challenges of dealing with emotionally and behaviorally difficult people. Employing principles from psychology, sociology, and organizational leadership, this episode delves into effective ways to comprehend their behavioral patterns and cope with their influence.
De categorizes difficult individuals into two groups—the `situationally difficult` and the `chronic pros`, who have mastered the art of being troublesome. Drawing from his encounters with more than 2000 successful professionals and 30 years of research, he provides listeners with tools to decelerate negative interactions and foster a better understanding of oneself during such challenging times.
Diving deeper into power dynamics, he sheds light on how difficult people participate in a `power game`, gaining dominance from others' responses. This episode encourages a shift in perspective and provides guidance on altering our reactions in order to neutralize their influence. A five-step guide to successfully navigate these complexities is at the heart of this episode and is certain to provide the listener with a fresh and effective approach towards difficult people.
In the short conclusion, Dr. De introduces the listener to common archetypes of difficult individuals—the `tank`, the `sniper`, and the `manipulator`. Reasserting the importance of consistency and patience in adopting the discussed techniques, the episode conveys the critical message of shifting behavior dynamics through adapting our reactions.
Culminating on a soothing note, De anticipates savoring a new bottle of Macallan 12-year-old Double Cask Highland Single Malt Scotch Whiskey. So tune in and discover how to handle difficult individuals more effectively while savoring some good humor and perhaps a dram of your favorite whiskey!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Do you have any difficult people in your life? No, don't look in the mirror. Don't think about that.
But hopefully you're not one of those difficult people in someone else's life.
But do you have any people who just can't seem to manage their own emotions
or their own behavior, and therefore they kind of want to make everyone around them suffer for it?
(00:22):
Well, let's talk today about how to deal effectively with difficult people without
becoming one one of them.
Music.
(00:45):
Hi, I'm Dee Hicks, and welcome to the School of Leadership, leveraged lessons
from high-impact leaders.
For the past 30 years, I've researched the disciplines, disciplines,
habits, mental models, and assumptions of the most effective leaders.
This podcast takes what I've learned from over 2000 of these influencers and
(01:06):
distills it into practical tools and tips you can use immediately.
Music.
Remember the comedian John Cleese's comment? You know, he's the guy from Monty Python fame.
(01:29):
He's one of those great comedians that is a great observer, I think,
of what's going on in culture around him and turns it into a joke.
So we laugh about it and then think about it a little bit later. But remember him?
He's the one who said, if somebody can't control their own emotions,
they're left to demand that you and I control our behavior.
So they don't have to have those emotions anymore.
(02:18):
He went on to say, to be smooth so that they never have to feel frustrated and
they want all the schedules and all the stuff of work and the staff,
the people they work with to all be smoothed out around the edges so they never have to feel bad.
So let's get real. If they're difficult at work, they're probably difficult at home too.
They've probably been practicing this difficult behavior for years.
(02:43):
It was Sun Tzu in The Art of War who had some really interesting perspective about this.
Now, Now, in the quote I'm going to use from him, he used the word enemy,
but I'm going to use the word difficult person rather than enemy for obvious reasons.
The difficult person isn't necessarily an enemy, but the essence of what he
said, I think, is very applicable to this theme we have today. Here's what he said.
(03:08):
If you know the difficult person, again, he said enemy, but if you know the
difficult person and you know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred
confrontations or battles.
If you know yourself, but not that difficult person, for every victory that
you gain, you'll also suffer a defeat.
(03:28):
If you know neither the difficult person nor yourself, self,
you'll succumb in every battle.
And it's that last phrase that is the most intriguing to me.
Those aren't just fancy words, but I think they're wisdom for the ages.
So, so let's get to know them.
And along the way, maybe you and I can learn a little bit about ourselves too.
(03:49):
So, so first let's check our assumptions.
I always like to start there because with any problem or challenge or even with
any successes, those are all downstream indications of our mental models or
of our assumptions that created them. So check assumptions.
It's sort of like the check engine light on the dashboard of our life.
(04:11):
When our assumptions, we also call those mental models all the time,
or our mental maps, when those mental maps collide with reality,
we probably we should pay attention. We should notice it.
Reality or the truth is what we run into when we're wrong.
Reality can be the unmoving, unbending coffee table leg in the dark living room.
(04:36):
When you head to the kitchen for a drink of water or something late at night,
you run into that. You have a mental map.
So do I, that I have a clear pathway to the kitchen and then bam,
bam, reality strikes and my toe is bruised. I've been there, right? So have you.
Okay, it's like I said, let's check our assumptions about these people that
(05:01):
are difficult, difficult people.
There are two categories of difficult people.
There are situationally difficult people. They're difficult because of the situations
they're in. And then there are pros.
These folks are difficult all the time, whenever they get bumped by life.
There's a lot of situations that cause us when we're inexperienced or when we're
(05:24):
immature as people to behave in a difficult way and then take us out of the
situation that we're in.
And we won't be difficult. We might even turn back around and look at what our
behavior and apologize for it. And so there's not a lot of the other type of
difficult person, the pro.
These are the ones who are professionally difficult people.
(05:45):
It's like they've practiced it for years and they're really, really good at it.
They're pros because they're the ones who have sharpened their skills over time
and they are fundamentally different from us when we are difficult in a situation. situation.
So if you encounter a pro or a professionally difficult person,
(06:06):
who's the one we're really talking about in this podcast today,
if you encounter one of those folks like in the morning, you've actually encountered a difficult person.
But if you encounter a difficult person all day long, a different person,
every time you turn around, that person's a difficult person,
you explain that to yourself, well, just between you and I, you might be the
difficult person. Listen, well, let me put it a little more kindly.
(06:29):
If you're the one who is always acting like an ass and blaming it on other people, it's probably you.
Ah, well, anyway, I'm just talking. It's probably not you, right?
If everybody on the road's a bad driver, well, maybe you're the bad driver.
Just saying, bless your heart with all due respect.
(06:50):
So, okay, let's get back to the pros. arrows they
are better at being difficult than
you and i are at dealing with them
they've had a lot of practice that's one
of the fundamental assumptions that we have to function by they have a threat
and reward brain just like you and i do it's just that quite often what they
(07:13):
consider as a threat you and i don't consider as a threat we might even think
of it as a reward and the The reverse of that is true.
What you and I might think of as a threat, that professionally difficult person,
that pro thinks of as a reward.
Here's another assumption. We do what we do because it works,
or at least we think it works.
(07:35):
This assumption applies to all of us all the time.
Our brain likes autopilot. So if it worked before, it will quickly become a habit.
When what we do doesn't work, work.
Is the next assumption, but it has for a long time.
We will probably not just stop doing that. We will most likely double down on that behavior.
(08:01):
Here's the next assumption. And this is a crucial one.
The pros learned their behavior that we're calling difficult behavior very early
in life, maybe six years old or seven years old.
And whenever they felt threatened, they had this this behavior and it worked
and the threat dissipated.
In fact, it probably worked so
(08:22):
well that now they practice this behavior because it's rewarding to do so.
It feels good for them to practice this behavior.
And not only does it feel good, but it removes the threat.
Here's another assumption. When it doesn't seem to work,
those difficult people, the difficult difficult
pro so to speak is going to double down on
(08:45):
their behavior they're thinking maybe even wordlessly that
it this has worked before maybe i just didn't do it loud enough or long
enough or hard enough or rude enough maybe i wasn't manipulative
enough i just didn't do it well enough this time so it worked i'm just going
to keep on doing it maybe i wasn't personal enough or mean enough or cruel enough
or whatever i'm just going to dial it up and that's a flash it happens in a
(09:06):
flash so so when it doesn't work they double down the next assumption is that
difficult people don't play the truth game.
They play the power game.
The truth game is about facts. It's about curiosity, about growth and improvement.
The truth game comes out of someone who is a fan of reality.
(09:27):
They want to get closer and closer to the truth.
A power game is a completely different game. It's about me and me being right
or me being in charge and about me telling you what to do and you bowing to my power,
however I use it, whether it's direct and aggressive or whether it's manipulative
and indirect. It's about me.
(09:50):
I win. You lose. I'm right.
So lean in here with me. This is a hard assumption to grapple with.
There's no amount of truth that will persuade someone playing the power game.
So if someone is about power, where does that power come from? Huh.
(10:12):
Difficult people get their power from our reaction to them.
Change our reaction and their power evaporates.
So another crucial assumption, they get their power from our reaction.
So wrap your mind around that. I'm not saying it's your fault or my fault.
I'm not saying you're the one to blame or I'm the one to blame when I react
(10:35):
to someone in this way, but it is our reaction to them that gives them their power.
It's exactly what they want. It's what they need in order to remain in power.
So know yourself and know the difficult person. Listen, we could stop right here.
There's a lot to think about, but I want to get really practical with you.
(10:56):
Here's a few tips that might help.
Number one, when encountering a difficult person, slow down.
You're not in a hurry to change the dynamic. It's probably been going on for
a while, so this isn't a fire drill.
To react quickly to the difficult person, not the situationally difficult person,
(11:18):
but the pros, difficult with anybody and everyone at any point in time whenever they feel threatened.
To react quickly with them is to really play into their power game.
So that's tip number one. Slow down. You're not in a hurry to solve this.
It's been going on for a while. profile here's tip number two first
of all study yourself how do i react to
(11:39):
them when that difficult person is acting
out how do i react when there's even a
possibility that they might act out and i might want to actually write about
that i might want to step off the side and some quiet and write about this in
a notebook or at least think about it in a way that's beyond emotions and turn
it into a deep understanding of how is how do i react what do i actually do
(12:01):
look at my my own behavior? What do I not do?
I call this noticing what you're drawn to do.
What am I drawn to do whenever the difficult person acts out around me?
And remember, we are, like Damasio said back in the day, we are feeling beings
that think, not necessarily thinking beings that feel.
(12:22):
Now, that's not all we do, obviously, but a feeling being that thinks,
that phrase captures is the idea that our limbic system and our emotions and
our threat reward system is much, much faster than our cognitive processing,
where we turn things into words and concepts. So we feel first.
Remember that about us. It's so much faster to have a sensation or a feel or
(12:46):
a kind of a deep down neurobiological response to something than to turn it into a concept.
So remember that. That's tip number two. We feel things first and then if we
write it down, it'll help us wrap our mind around it later. Okay, the third tip.
All right. Once I've studied myself and I've noticed what my behavior is and
(13:07):
I notice what I'm drawn to do, then I need to stop that behavior.
Just don't do that behavior anymore. Kind of sounds simple, right?
Right. But if you're ready for it, you can decide in advance that you're not
going to do that behavior.
I call that getting clinical.
What I mean by that is that you you just kind of turn off your emotions a little
(13:30):
bit and you don't let yourself get batted around by the manipulative behavior
of the difficult person.
It's like a parent in a mall. I don't think people go to malls anymore,
but imagine a parent with a few of their kids in a mall and one of the children
just freaks out and so the parent freaks out too, right?
But if you know that kid's always gonna freak out whenever they walk by the
(13:51):
Cinnabon store and they want one of those and they want one and you know it
and you can prepare for it, then you won't let your emotions take over and you
won't get swept into the behavior of the child.
Now I realize the person at work who's a difficult person and is not a child,
although you might roll your eyes even as I say that, right?
Or maybe you've got a supervisor who just blames people all the time and is
(14:12):
always looking for fault and comes across in a very rude and direct way.
And you know that behavior is going to happen. If you know it's going to happen
and you know that your response is to try to defend yourself from that behavior
and you've studied yourself long enough to realize that, okay, I'm not going to do that.
And you will get clinical with that person.
You turn off the ability to be manipulated by another person's emotions in that moment.
(14:36):
So maybe you've got a drama queen or a drama king.
It's kind of a gender neutral term now, right? Somebody who creates drama all
the time whenever they get pressed.
And you know they're going to start creating drama and you know what you're drawn to do.
You're drawn to try to tamp down the drama or you're drawn into the drama.
I'm not sure what happened. Just study yourself a little bit and understand
(14:56):
that this is my behavior when they have that behavior.
So then stop doing that behavior.
Don't let your behavior, as a sidebar thought here, become an excuse for the
difficult person's behavior.
If they are frustrating in their behavior, they're being difficult and you flip
out and you're angry or frustrated or you triangulate or you manipulate them back,
(15:21):
it's very easy for them to use your behavior as an excuse for their behavior.
So don't let that happen. happen.
The fourth tip is just stand your ground without letting that behavior get in.
Now, that takes quite a bit, but you'll have to play a little bit of a trick
in order to make that happen.
I remember running across a Starbucks barista a while back, back in the day
(15:43):
when they first started having the black apron.
Coffee gurus, I don't even know what they're called now, but I asked the Starbucks
barista, what's up with the black apron?
And he went on to describe to me that it's a certain level of expertise having to do with coffee.
And it was kind of fun. And And I asked him at one point, do you ever have difficult customers?
And if so, how do you deal with them? Oh, he rolled his eyes and he started
(16:04):
to tell me a story about how they had been trained to think of that apron that
they were wearing as a shield, almost like a superhero shield,
a superpower of some sort.
When they put on that apron, it enabled them to let the negative emotions of
difficult customers just bounce off of their apron.
And he said, I know it's a game. It's just a little bit of canvas here with
(16:27):
me and a little bit of ink and thread, but man, he said it really,
really worked. So here's a fifth tip.
This might be the hardest tip of all. Once you have not reacted to the difficult
person's behavior, once you have not let it get in and you've noticed what you've
been drawn to do and you now don't do it anymore,
you've stopped that behavior, get ready. This is the hardest part.
(16:48):
Don't talk about what the difficult person did with other people.
Because if you just deal with a difficult person's behavior by not getting drawn
into it and you just stand your ground and then you move on and then you do
not go out and create drama around it,
you are taking away the power that that person needs to be difficult,
(17:09):
certainly with yourself and with your friends.
So it's gonna be interesting. It's gonna be fascinating to go talk about and
triangulate about that difficult person, but don't do it.
It's demeaning to you, it's demeaning to the difficult person.
Here's some examples real quickly, by the way. There's a person we like to call the tank.
The tank is somebody who learned early on in life that the only way to protect
(17:32):
himself was to be aggressive.
And so they attack back and they attack personally whenever they feel threatened in a group.
It's rare that they would do that in an individual or private setting.
It's usually in a group setting when they do that. They're drawn,
they are drawn into a battle of some sort.
They attack individuals. Individuals, they're very crass when they do so and
very powerful when they do so.
(17:53):
And what you are likely drawn to do is to defend yourself.
Well, don't defend yourself.
Just stand up quietly and gently and look at the person in the face and use
their first name, Tom, stop.
And then don't say anything else. Don't scream. Don't holler.
Don't tip over the table.
Don't cry. Just Tom, stop. Of course, that only works if the person's name is Tom.
(18:20):
So here's another example. I call it the sniper. This is a person who is threatened
by authority and threatened by expertise, but they don't want direct conflict.
So they triangulate about you behind your back, but just loud enough for you
to hear, usually in group settings.
And when they do that, it's like, oh, what did you say there?
And so you'll want to kind of ignore it. That's what you'll be likely drawn
(18:40):
to do or laugh it off. off.
But the way to deal with it is to deal with it like you would any sniper.
You get rid of their cover.
You would turn to that person, for example, if they were doing sniping off to
the site in a group meeting about your idea or about your expertise or something
like that, you would turn to that person directly and say, what did you say?
And then if they, oh, nothing, nothing. Oh, I heard you say this.
(19:01):
Is that what you said? And you're very calm. You're very direct.
And then they will just shrink and they'll never snipe you again.
Of course, sadly, they'll snipe other people.
The manipulator is another example of one of these difficult people.
They're kind of the same sort of thing. They use emotions to get their way.
Big, strong emotions that make everyone uncomfortable around them.
They use those emotions to create emotions in you that are unpleasant.
(19:25):
And so you change your behavior or I change my behavior. so that I don't have
those emotions and I get drawn into something that I will want to do just to
make them feel better and shut them up.
And the way to deal with that, of course, is to get that person who's manipulating
out in the open and get them away from the group out in the open where you can
(19:47):
talk with them directly and say, I feel like you're manipulating me here.
And they won't change their behavior right away, but the power over you will go away. way.
I feel like you're trying to manipulate me here and do that off to the side
because manipulative people like to do that in crowds and in groups most of the time.
So there's a bunch of other ones. There's complainers and exploders and all
(20:08):
kinds of other examples that are out there about difficult people.
But you got it now. You get the idea, right? The difficult person gets their
power from your reaction to their behavior.
So if you change your reaction, their power will will dissipate with you specifically.
It won't dissipate quickly, but it will do so slowly.
Remember, when you don't react the way you want to react and you don't behave
(20:34):
in a way that gives them an excuse to continue their behavior,
they will double down on their behavior because it's always worked before. So be patient.
You knew this would happen. Stand your ground.
Get clinical, talk about their behavior, very few words about their behavior,
and tell them they need to stop that behavior.
(20:56):
They will stop that behavior with this approach, with you.
They'll keep doing it with other people, and they'll keep doing it when you're
not around, but they'll stop it with you. Fun, right?
You got this. You've got some important work to do, and we need you to be pretty
pretty successful in that work.
So I hope you're having a great time at work and I hope that this helps you in a great deal.
(21:20):
What's going to help me is I'm about ready to open up this brand new bottle
of Macallan 12-year Scotch. This is the Double Cask Highland Single Malt Scotch
Whiskey. And I'm going to open it.
There we go right now. That's the first open of it. And it's It's been probably
up at two or three years since I've had any of the McAllen Highland Single Malt Scotch Whiskey.
(21:46):
It's 86 proof, as a lot of scotches are right around that proof, maybe slightly higher.
And it's 12 years old.
Music.
Thanks for joining me in today's School of Leadership. This podcast is part
of the Archimedes Experiment.
(22:08):
Leveraged wisdom from the world's most effective leaders. If you're interested
in more, go to my website, dhicks.com.
Remember, my first name has only one E.
Well, you'll find more short and helpful podcast books and blog posts.
If this was helpful, maybe even share it with some of your friends.
(22:29):
Music.
Do you have any difficult people in your life? No, don't look in the mirror. Don't think about that.
But hopefully you're not one of those difficult people in someone else's life.
But do you have any people who just can't seem to manage their own emotions
or their own behavior, and therefore they kind of want to make everyone around them suffer for it?
(00:22):
Well, let's talk today about how to deal effectively with difficult people without
becoming one one of them.
Music.
(00:45):
Hi, I'm Dee Hicks, and welcome to the School of Leadership, leveraged lessons
from high-impact leaders.
For the past 30 years, I've researched the disciplines, disciplines,
habits, mental models, and assumptions of the most effective leaders.
This podcast takes what I've learned from over 2000 of these influencers and
(01:06):
distills it into practical tools and tips you can use immediately.
Music.
Remember the comedian John Cleese's comment? You know, he's the guy from Monty Python fame.
(01:29):
He's one of those great comedians that is a great observer, I think,
of what's going on in culture around him and turns it into a joke.
So we laugh about it and then think about it a little bit later. But remember him?
He's the one who said, if somebody can't control their own emotions,
they're left to demand that you and I control our behavior.
So they don't have to have those emotions anymore.
(02:18):
He went on to say, to be smooth so that they never have to feel frustrated and
they want all the schedules and all the stuff of work and the staff,
the people they work with to all be smoothed out around the edges so they never have to feel bad.
So let's get real. If they're difficult at work, they're probably difficult at home too.
They've probably been practicing this difficult behavior for years.
(02:43):
It was Sun Tzu in The Art of War who had some really interesting perspective about this.
Now, Now, in the quote I'm going to use from him, he used the word enemy,
but I'm going to use the word difficult person rather than enemy for obvious reasons.
The difficult person isn't necessarily an enemy, but the essence of what he
said, I think, is very applicable to this theme we have today. Here's what he said.
(03:08):
If you know the difficult person, again, he said enemy, but if you know the
difficult person and you know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred
confrontations or battles.
If you know yourself, but not that difficult person, for every victory that
you gain, you'll also suffer a defeat.
(03:28):
If you know neither the difficult person nor yourself, self,
you'll succumb in every battle.
And it's that last phrase that is the most intriguing to me.
Those aren't just fancy words, but I think they're wisdom for the ages.
So, so let's get to know them.
And along the way, maybe you and I can learn a little bit about ourselves too.
(03:49):
So, so first let's check our assumptions.
I always like to start there because with any problem or challenge or even with
any successes, those are all downstream indications of our mental models or
of our assumptions that created them. So check assumptions.
It's sort of like the check engine light on the dashboard of our life.
(04:11):
When our assumptions, we also call those mental models all the time,
or our mental maps, when those mental maps collide with reality,
we probably we should pay attention. We should notice it.
Reality or the truth is what we run into when we're wrong.
Reality can be the unmoving, unbending coffee table leg in the dark living room.
(04:36):
When you head to the kitchen for a drink of water or something late at night,
you run into that. You have a mental map.
So do I, that I have a clear pathway to the kitchen and then bam,
bam, reality strikes and my toe is bruised. I've been there, right? So have you.
Okay, it's like I said, let's check our assumptions about these people that
(05:01):
are difficult, difficult people.
There are two categories of difficult people.
There are situationally difficult people. They're difficult because of the situations
they're in. And then there are pros.
These folks are difficult all the time, whenever they get bumped by life.
There's a lot of situations that cause us when we're inexperienced or when we're
(05:24):
immature as people to behave in a difficult way and then take us out of the
situation that we're in.
And we won't be difficult. We might even turn back around and look at what our
behavior and apologize for it. And so there's not a lot of the other type of
difficult person, the pro.
These are the ones who are professionally difficult people.
(05:45):
It's like they've practiced it for years and they're really, really good at it.
They're pros because they're the ones who have sharpened their skills over time
and they are fundamentally different from us when we are difficult in a situation. situation.
So if you encounter a pro or a professionally difficult person,
(06:06):
who's the one we're really talking about in this podcast today,
if you encounter one of those folks like in the morning, you've actually encountered a difficult person.
But if you encounter a difficult person all day long, a different person,
every time you turn around, that person's a difficult person,
you explain that to yourself, well, just between you and I, you might be the
difficult person. Listen, well, let me put it a little more kindly.
(06:29):
If you're the one who is always acting like an ass and blaming it on other people, it's probably you.
Ah, well, anyway, I'm just talking. It's probably not you, right?
If everybody on the road's a bad driver, well, maybe you're the bad driver.
Just saying, bless your heart with all due respect.
(06:50):
So, okay, let's get back to the pros. arrows they
are better at being difficult than
you and i are at dealing with them
they've had a lot of practice that's one
of the fundamental assumptions that we have to function by they have a threat
and reward brain just like you and i do it's just that quite often what they
(07:13):
consider as a threat you and i don't consider as a threat we might even think
of it as a reward and the The reverse of that is true.
What you and I might think of as a threat, that professionally difficult person,
that pro thinks of as a reward.
Here's another assumption. We do what we do because it works,
or at least we think it works.
(07:35):
This assumption applies to all of us all the time.
Our brain likes autopilot. So if it worked before, it will quickly become a habit.
When what we do doesn't work, work.
Is the next assumption, but it has for a long time.
We will probably not just stop doing that. We will most likely double down on that behavior.
(08:01):
Here's the next assumption. And this is a crucial one.
The pros learned their behavior that we're calling difficult behavior very early
in life, maybe six years old or seven years old.
And whenever they felt threatened, they had this this behavior and it worked
and the threat dissipated.
In fact, it probably worked so
(08:22):
well that now they practice this behavior because it's rewarding to do so.
It feels good for them to practice this behavior.
And not only does it feel good, but it removes the threat.
Here's another assumption. When it doesn't seem to work,
those difficult people, the difficult difficult
pro so to speak is going to double down on
(08:45):
their behavior they're thinking maybe even wordlessly that
it this has worked before maybe i just didn't do it loud enough or long
enough or hard enough or rude enough maybe i wasn't manipulative
enough i just didn't do it well enough this time so it worked i'm just going
to keep on doing it maybe i wasn't personal enough or mean enough or cruel enough
or whatever i'm just going to dial it up and that's a flash it happens in a
(09:06):
flash so so when it doesn't work they double down the next assumption is that
difficult people don't play the truth game.
They play the power game.
The truth game is about facts. It's about curiosity, about growth and improvement.
The truth game comes out of someone who is a fan of reality.
(09:27):
They want to get closer and closer to the truth.
A power game is a completely different game. It's about me and me being right
or me being in charge and about me telling you what to do and you bowing to my power,
however I use it, whether it's direct and aggressive or whether it's manipulative
and indirect. It's about me.
(09:50):
I win. You lose. I'm right.
So lean in here with me. This is a hard assumption to grapple with.
There's no amount of truth that will persuade someone playing the power game.
So if someone is about power, where does that power come from? Huh.
(10:12):
Difficult people get their power from our reaction to them.
Change our reaction and their power evaporates.
So another crucial assumption, they get their power from our reaction.
So wrap your mind around that. I'm not saying it's your fault or my fault.
I'm not saying you're the one to blame or I'm the one to blame when I react
(10:35):
to someone in this way, but it is our reaction to them that gives them their power.
It's exactly what they want. It's what they need in order to remain in power.
So know yourself and know the difficult person. Listen, we could stop right here.
There's a lot to think about, but I want to get really practical with you.
(10:56):
Here's a few tips that might help.
Number one, when encountering a difficult person, slow down.
You're not in a hurry to change the dynamic. It's probably been going on for
a while, so this isn't a fire drill.
To react quickly to the difficult person, not the situationally difficult person,
(11:18):
but the pros, difficult with anybody and everyone at any point in time whenever they feel threatened.
To react quickly with them is to really play into their power game.
So that's tip number one. Slow down. You're not in a hurry to solve this.
It's been going on for a while. profile here's tip number two first
of all study yourself how do i react to
(11:39):
them when that difficult person is acting
out how do i react when there's even a
possibility that they might act out and i might want to actually write about
that i might want to step off the side and some quiet and write about this in
a notebook or at least think about it in a way that's beyond emotions and turn
it into a deep understanding of how is how do i react what do i actually do
(12:01):
look at my my own behavior? What do I not do?
I call this noticing what you're drawn to do.
What am I drawn to do whenever the difficult person acts out around me?
And remember, we are, like Damasio said back in the day, we are feeling beings
that think, not necessarily thinking beings that feel.
(12:22):
Now, that's not all we do, obviously, but a feeling being that thinks,
that phrase captures is the idea that our limbic system and our emotions and
our threat reward system is much, much faster than our cognitive processing,
where we turn things into words and concepts. So we feel first.
Remember that about us. It's so much faster to have a sensation or a feel or
(12:46):
a kind of a deep down neurobiological response to something than to turn it into a concept.
So remember that. That's tip number two. We feel things first and then if we
write it down, it'll help us wrap our mind around it later. Okay, the third tip.
All right. Once I've studied myself and I've noticed what my behavior is and
(13:07):
I notice what I'm drawn to do, then I need to stop that behavior.
Just don't do that behavior anymore. Kind of sounds simple, right?
Right. But if you're ready for it, you can decide in advance that you're not
going to do that behavior.
I call that getting clinical.
What I mean by that is that you you just kind of turn off your emotions a little
(13:30):
bit and you don't let yourself get batted around by the manipulative behavior
of the difficult person.
It's like a parent in a mall. I don't think people go to malls anymore,
but imagine a parent with a few of their kids in a mall and one of the children
just freaks out and so the parent freaks out too, right?
But if you know that kid's always gonna freak out whenever they walk by the
(13:51):
Cinnabon store and they want one of those and they want one and you know it
and you can prepare for it, then you won't let your emotions take over and you
won't get swept into the behavior of the child.
Now I realize the person at work who's a difficult person and is not a child,
although you might roll your eyes even as I say that, right?
Or maybe you've got a supervisor who just blames people all the time and is
(14:12):
always looking for fault and comes across in a very rude and direct way.
And you know that behavior is going to happen. If you know it's going to happen
and you know that your response is to try to defend yourself from that behavior
and you've studied yourself long enough to realize that, okay, I'm not going to do that.
And you will get clinical with that person.
You turn off the ability to be manipulated by another person's emotions in that moment.
(14:36):
So maybe you've got a drama queen or a drama king.
It's kind of a gender neutral term now, right? Somebody who creates drama all
the time whenever they get pressed.
And you know they're going to start creating drama and you know what you're drawn to do.
You're drawn to try to tamp down the drama or you're drawn into the drama.
I'm not sure what happened. Just study yourself a little bit and understand
(14:56):
that this is my behavior when they have that behavior.
So then stop doing that behavior.
Don't let your behavior, as a sidebar thought here, become an excuse for the
difficult person's behavior.
If they are frustrating in their behavior, they're being difficult and you flip
out and you're angry or frustrated or you triangulate or you manipulate them back,
(15:21):
it's very easy for them to use your behavior as an excuse for their behavior.
So don't let that happen. happen.
The fourth tip is just stand your ground without letting that behavior get in.
Now, that takes quite a bit, but you'll have to play a little bit of a trick
in order to make that happen.
I remember running across a Starbucks barista a while back, back in the day
(15:43):
when they first started having the black apron.
Coffee gurus, I don't even know what they're called now, but I asked the Starbucks
barista, what's up with the black apron?
And he went on to describe to me that it's a certain level of expertise having to do with coffee.
And it was kind of fun. And And I asked him at one point, do you ever have difficult customers?
And if so, how do you deal with them? Oh, he rolled his eyes and he started
(16:04):
to tell me a story about how they had been trained to think of that apron that
they were wearing as a shield, almost like a superhero shield,
a superpower of some sort.
When they put on that apron, it enabled them to let the negative emotions of
difficult customers just bounce off of their apron.
And he said, I know it's a game. It's just a little bit of canvas here with
(16:27):
me and a little bit of ink and thread, but man, he said it really,
really worked. So here's a fifth tip.
This might be the hardest tip of all. Once you have not reacted to the difficult
person's behavior, once you have not let it get in and you've noticed what you've
been drawn to do and you now don't do it anymore,
you've stopped that behavior, get ready. This is the hardest part.
(16:48):
Don't talk about what the difficult person did with other people.
Because if you just deal with a difficult person's behavior by not getting drawn
into it and you just stand your ground and then you move on and then you do
not go out and create drama around it,
you are taking away the power that that person needs to be difficult,
(17:09):
certainly with yourself and with your friends.
So it's gonna be interesting. It's gonna be fascinating to go talk about and
triangulate about that difficult person, but don't do it.
It's demeaning to you, it's demeaning to the difficult person.
Here's some examples real quickly, by the way. There's a person we like to call the tank.
The tank is somebody who learned early on in life that the only way to protect
(17:32):
himself was to be aggressive.
And so they attack back and they attack personally whenever they feel threatened in a group.
It's rare that they would do that in an individual or private setting.
It's usually in a group setting when they do that. They're drawn,
they are drawn into a battle of some sort.
They attack individuals. Individuals, they're very crass when they do so and
very powerful when they do so.
(17:53):
And what you are likely drawn to do is to defend yourself.
Well, don't defend yourself.
Just stand up quietly and gently and look at the person in the face and use
their first name, Tom, stop.
And then don't say anything else. Don't scream. Don't holler.
Don't tip over the table.
Don't cry. Just Tom, stop. Of course, that only works if the person's name is Tom.
(18:20):
So here's another example. I call it the sniper. This is a person who is threatened
by authority and threatened by expertise, but they don't want direct conflict.
So they triangulate about you behind your back, but just loud enough for you
to hear, usually in group settings.
And when they do that, it's like, oh, what did you say there?
And so you'll want to kind of ignore it. That's what you'll be likely drawn
(18:40):
to do or laugh it off. off.
But the way to deal with it is to deal with it like you would any sniper.
You get rid of their cover.
You would turn to that person, for example, if they were doing sniping off to
the site in a group meeting about your idea or about your expertise or something
like that, you would turn to that person directly and say, what did you say?
And then if they, oh, nothing, nothing. Oh, I heard you say this.
(19:01):
Is that what you said? And you're very calm. You're very direct.
And then they will just shrink and they'll never snipe you again.
Of course, sadly, they'll snipe other people.
The manipulator is another example of one of these difficult people.
They're kind of the same sort of thing. They use emotions to get their way.
Big, strong emotions that make everyone uncomfortable around them.
They use those emotions to create emotions in you that are unpleasant.
(19:25):
And so you change your behavior or I change my behavior. so that I don't have
those emotions and I get drawn into something that I will want to do just to
make them feel better and shut them up.
And the way to deal with that, of course, is to get that person who's manipulating
out in the open and get them away from the group out in the open where you can
(19:47):
talk with them directly and say, I feel like you're manipulating me here.
And they won't change their behavior right away, but the power over you will go away. way.
I feel like you're trying to manipulate me here and do that off to the side
because manipulative people like to do that in crowds and in groups most of the time.
So there's a bunch of other ones. There's complainers and exploders and all
(20:08):
kinds of other examples that are out there about difficult people.
But you got it now. You get the idea, right? The difficult person gets their
power from your reaction to their behavior.
So if you change your reaction, their power will will dissipate with you specifically.
It won't dissipate quickly, but it will do so slowly.
Remember, when you don't react the way you want to react and you don't behave
(20:34):
in a way that gives them an excuse to continue their behavior,
they will double down on their behavior because it's always worked before. So be patient.
You knew this would happen. Stand your ground.
Get clinical, talk about their behavior, very few words about their behavior,
and tell them they need to stop that behavior.
(20:56):
They will stop that behavior with this approach, with you.
They'll keep doing it with other people, and they'll keep doing it when you're
not around, but they'll stop it with you. Fun, right?
You got this. You've got some important work to do, and we need you to be pretty
pretty successful in that work.
So I hope you're having a great time at work and I hope that this helps you in a great deal.
(21:20):
What's going to help me is I'm about ready to open up this brand new bottle
of Macallan 12-year Scotch. This is the Double Cask Highland Single Malt Scotch
Whiskey. And I'm going to open it.
There we go right now. That's the first open of it. And it's It's been probably
up at two or three years since I've had any of the McAllen Highland Single Malt Scotch Whiskey.
(21:46):
It's 86 proof, as a lot of scotches are right around that proof, maybe slightly higher.
And it's 12 years old.
Music.
Thanks for joining me in today's School of Leadership. This podcast is part
of the Archimedes Experiment.
(22:08):
Leveraged wisdom from the world's most effective leaders. If you're interested
in more, go to my website, dhicks.com.
Remember, my first name has only one E.
Well, you'll find more short and helpful podcast books and blog posts.
If this was helpful, maybe even share it with some of your friends.
(22:29):
Music.
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