- Welcome to The Journey.
Today, we're gonna talk about how to reduce stress
when dealing with difficult people.
- What?
- Hey, I'm Emma.
This is my co-host, Sam,
and when it comes to dealing with difficult people,
- they don't have to be difficult to manage.
- All Right, Sam.
I know you deal with customers.
Tell me about a time or an experience
when you had to deal with a difficult customer.
What'd you do?
- Sometimes you have to properly reset expectations.
Some customers may not understand
exactly what their service entails,
so you have to first hear them out.
Let them vent, let them talk.
Don't interrupt.
And then once they're finally finished,
repeat back to them, summarizing.
"Hey, I've heard you."
"I understand, and you are totally valid in how you feel."
But then the next thing, which is more important,
you come up with a plan
that, within the scope of your service,
you mutually benefit from what you're about to offer.
Say how you're gonna partner together.
- Mm-hmm (affirmative).
- Give them a little bit of homework,
and then finally wrap it up by letting them know
you're gonna take care of it for them.
I remember a time when a customer of mine,
let's call him Joe.
He called in, and he was expecting us at GoDaddy Social
to post every day on social media.
That's not actually the case,
and that's not what we offer, so I made sure
that I was able to reset and align his expectations
that fit our service model.
- How did you keep Joe on board?
How'd you keep him cool?
Did you have to educate around this topic?
What'd you do?
- I had to first, of course, acknowledge the fact
that I understood where he was coming from
and I wanted to understand what did he want to accomplish.
In order to actually go through the steps
of how we're gonna fix this,
I wanna know what are you gonna accomplish.
And then as the subject matter expert,
we were able to, within the scope of our service offering,
give him the steps of how he's gonna still get
what he wanted, but not necessarily
in the way he wanted to do it.
Here are some steps that I use to be able
to keep myself together while receiving that call.
First, collect myself.
Take a deep breath, connect, center myself,
and make sure that I don't let it rattle me.
- Or he reaches out to me
for a little guided yoga meditation.
Let's now join together.
(ohms harmonizing)
Take a deep breath in.
Hold for 3 seconds.
And release.
(exhales loudly)
And one more time.
(laughs)
Take a deep breath in.
(ohms harmonizing)
Now for six seconds, don't pass out.
And release.
How do you feel?
- Lightheaded but nice.
- All right.
You mentioned listening and taking the time
to think about what Joe, in this example, is saying
versus "What am I, Sam, gonna say next?"
I imagine there's a ton of empathy involved here, right?
- Of course.
You wanna make sure that you know where they're coming from
because in order to actually
make some headway and connect with this person,
you have to take it all in,
really focus on them.
It's not about you.
It's about them.
The next thing is you wanna think outside of the box.
Figure out a way of coming up
with a mutually beneficial solution
and allow that person to partner with you.
Remember, it's not you against them,
but it's us working together to solve their problem,
which is really your problem, too.
- This reminds me of reframing.
This is something my mom taught me recently
on her visit out to California.
It's just like "Hey, instead of sweating this,"
"just reframe it."
"See how you could look at this differently."
I love that advice.
- The next thing is you wanna find a supportive community,
people that are like you
that are going through the same struggles,
that you know you can connect with,
and express yourself and let them know
"Hey, I'm struggling just like you,"
and you can get support that way, too.
Here at GoDaddy, we have a lot of different opportunities
and groups where we can all feel included.
We wanna hear from you.
Comment below and let us know how do you deal
with the difficult customers.
- Also, be sure to like this video
and subscribe to our channel.
Also, don't forget, ring that bell so you're the first
to know about our next video coming out.
- This is The Journey.
See you next time.