Maintain Your Cool

No matter what your position is or your level of responsibility you will at one time or another deal with someone who will test your patience. I once had a colleague who looked for any opportunity to self-promote, belittle others or act in ways that made the working environment more difficult for others. His conduct was absolutely infuriating. In those days, before I learned a few tips and tricks, I would respond to every comment, internalize every slight and meet him at his level. Essentially fighting fire with fire. The result? I fanned the flames and made things worse for colleagues, my friends and worse of all, I contributed to making life miserable for myself. Your story may not be the same as mine and hopefully you did not respond to your antagonist the way I did but if you find yourself in this position I want to share with you a few tips you can use to expertly handle these bad actors.

Expect it to happen. Don’t be surprised or taken aback by overwhelmed or hyper fervent colleagues or clients. Wrap your mind around the idea that difficult situations will happen and you will sometimes be the target of frustrated people or you will be caught up in a typhoon of unsavory behavior. Here is the deal, if you expect frustrated people to walk in the door and can accept whatever it is as it comes, you will be better prepared to deal with it.  “Expect nothing and accept everything.”

I am going to update a parable from the ancient Taoist teacher, Chuang-Tzu: Imagine that you are picnicking in a canoe on a lazy river with your favorite person. Suddenly you feel a thump and the canoe rolls over. You come up, everything is ruined, you look around and see that someone flipped your canoe and is standing there pointing and laughing. How do you feel?

Now imagine the same situation, picnicking with your favorite person on a lazy river in a canoe. You feel the thump, the canoe rolls and everything is ruined. You come up and see a log has drifted into your canoe and caused the catastrophe.

In both cases the outcome was the same, but when you feel targeted by someone it all feels much worse. For this reason you must remember to never personalize their behavior.

Prepare, write down your plan. Once you have completely wrapped your head around the idea that frustrating things will happen and at times you will be left to deal with it, create a plan. What would I do if someone walks into my office shouting insults at me or how would I respond if a client walked into my office frustrated about an unprofessional interaction they had with a member of my team.

This practice is referred to by professional athletes as visualization. Pro athletes walk through a number of scenarios and how they need to respond to each. They do this over and over until when the situation presents itself they don’t have to think about it, instead they can just respond. This practice of mentally ‘going through the motions’ was used by Tennis Star Billie Jean King in the 60’s and Michael Phelps among today’s athletes. In an interview with the New York Times, aerialist Emily Cook describes it this way, “Visualization, for me, doesn’t take in all the senses. You have to smell it, you have to hear it, you have to feel it, everything... It’s ridiculous; we’re all up there flapping our arms, it looks insane but it works”. The same practice works in your life or workplace.

Commit to your plan and execute it. Once you are at peace with the fact that these types of situations will happen and that you will be the target or swept up into them, once you have visualized and practiced your responses, and then it is time to apply it. At first you will not find this easy, at least half of the time you will forget about your plan altogether but in time you will get better at it. Ask better questions, the ‘What What Why?’ or the ‘5 Why’ Interrogation techniques for supervisors are good places to start.

The 5 Whys helps leaders explore the cause and effect relationships underlying a particular problem by repeating the question “Why?” Researchers have determined that you will need to ask why at least five times to get to the core of the problem. Louis C.K. has a hysterical sketch with his child, who wants to go outside. She responds to his every response with ‘why?’ The result? He has to explain that he didn’t do well in school, he smoked too much pot and god is no longer with us. Similar clarity should be sought when you engage someone who you come in contact with. It requires that you do not take ownership of their problem or their issue. I tell people I mentor to “focus on the need, not the deed”. If you can focus on the need and ask good questions you will masterfully handle the predictable as well as the unpredictable.

In 2006 Budweiser released its ‘Referee Training’ commercial that opens with a referee standing on the sidelines while a football coach berates him. The commentator says, “The ref’s just tuning him out… where do you train to take a beating like that?” Then the commercial flips to that same referee at home taking a verbal beating from his wife while sitting calmly. You will need to hone your inner referee at times, serenely sitting through these types of happenings at work but if you can successfully master this skill you will efficiently resolve more problems. Further, you will make fewer enemies, develop trust with your people and reveal yourself to your team as a reliable leader. I tell everyone who I coach that the most valuable thing you have is your cool… Hang on to it and SOAR!

Resources:

https://www.rickhanson.net/dont-take-it-personally/

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=coach+berating+the+referee+commercial&view=detail&mid=636A84EC74DD10F1E461636A84EC74DD10F1E461&FORM=VIRE

William A. Brown 

December 16, 2018

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