No, probably you don't have anyone difficult to work with. How do you handle
a difficult colleague at work? I've had about 24 years of experiences as
psychologist. And I'm still really bad at changing people. Because it's not me.
I can influence, I can teach principle, yes. But in terms of actually changing
somebody else, you've probably heard the joke, haven't you, about how many
psychologists does it take to change a lightbulb? Well, only one but it takes a
really long time. It's really expensive and the lightbulb has to want to change.
That's the dilemma right there. People don't have the power to change other
people. I can't tell you how many times I've sat here in my office and had a
couple and she wants to change him or he wants to change her. The same thing
happens at work. So, as we deal with this topic, "How to handle a difficult
colleague at work?" Let's just start with that disclaimer. We're not going to change
them. So, everything that changes has to be here. It has to be internal. Inside of
us. Something that we can actually control. We'll shift our focus there and
we're likely to have a whole lot less frustration as we get into this. 3
tips for you on what you can do. And the first of these 3 tips is, change your
goal. It's tempting to get into that trap of thinking. You know, what if they would
just do something differently? Then things would be better for me. Yeah.
Tempting and it's probably even true and accurate. If they would change that thing
in shape up, things would be better for you. That's true but it's not helpful. And
it puts you in a position where you're more likely to come across this critical
or demeaning or judgmental or demanding. So, change your goal means what else
could you accomplish as a goal with your colleague? So for example, my goal today
is to learn something from that person. Think of your colleague, that one that's
driving you nuts. "What can I learn today from them?" And I
guarantee, you can learn something from every citizen of this planet. So, turning
your mind on to that helps to change the energy. Another example of changing your
goal is to enjoy them. Wait, what? Is that even possible? I think it is. I remember
someone back in high school who just irritated and annoyed most of my class. I
kind of enjoyed this person. And somebody approached me about that once. What is it?
Why? Why do you seem to not be annoyed by him? I enjoy him. I think it's fascinating
to watch some of the little antics that he does. See? So, it's it's a changing of
goal and focus. Another goal you might have along those same lines is simply to
observe for them. You don't have to get along, you don't have to even enjoy them.
But what if your goal were to observe them and be curious. That's a whole
different goal. And it changes your energy. That's the whole point.
What do you control? You might even make it an experiment. The pressure's off. You
are simply conducting a study. An experiment to see what happens. That
takes the pressure off. So, changing your goal then just becomes part of the
experiment. Alright that leads me right into tip number 2. Change your focus. I
have a friend who puts it this way, "What you focus on, you feel." I think that is so
true. What is your focus with this person? So
it ties in to changing your goal. But more specifically, how am I seeing this?
What is it that I'm seeing or looking for? Changing your focus might be that
you simply find the funny. As a professional speaker, I am always on the
lookout for funny stuff. You know, the idiotic sometimes routine
or occasionally annoying things that people do. Well that becomes pretty good
content for comedy. Find the funny. You can do
that if you change your focus. Here's another example of a focus change. Find
the superpower. Wait, this is someone who annoys you? Or someone who's difficult or
challenging? A colleague at work? Do they have a superpower? What if we just assume
that everyone does and your focus is to try to find that superpower.
If you can't do anything else, maybe their superpower is annoying you. Okay.
But let's not stop there. Let's look farther and beyond that. To
dig inside of it a little bit and see if we can find that person's superpower.
What are they really good at? Here's another one and this will increase your
empathy. As we talk about changing your focus. Most people show up with
irritating or annoying behaviors because of pain.--
Their pain. And you do this too when you're in significant pain, you probably
show up a little bit differently. And maybe you're annoying some people, too.
Let's stay open to that. Find the pain. What's that person's pain point? What is
it that has them showing up this way? What changes you? Your empathy increases,
your sensitivity, your kindness, your compassion. I'll come to the surface more
when you change your focus. Find the pain. Now, I've got one more tip for you. Number
3, change your tactics. This has to do with your behavior. What is it that
you're doing? How are you showing up? Add this to the experiment. This is kind of
fun actually. What if your experiment were to simply smile at that person. At
least 5 times today. Smile at least 5 times. They're going to
wonder what the heck you're up to, right? Probably.
But don't worry about that. Let's just see what that changes in the interaction
and how you feel and how you're able to deal with this challenging colleague at
work. Another example of changing the tactics? Say, yes. Yes has some magical
power and you can use it even if you don't agree. Yes might mean, "I'm listening."
Yes might be a greeting. Yes can be used almost in any response even if you don't
agree. Meaning, "Yes ,I'm listening to you." Okay?
Lead with yes. Throw that into the experiment and see what happens. We don't
control other people. But dealing with a challenging colleague at work. It's
totally doable when we change our goal, change our focus and change our tactics.
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