Dealing with Difficult People

Today I attended a one day seminar, Dealing with Difficult People. Although having investigated "difficult" personalities in the past, especially "tanks," I thought it was time to have a refresher. I was expecting

• some strategies to help diffuse upset/irate library users
• remain calm: distance myself and keep my emotion in check
• return with a list of what to do and what not to do when dealing with a difficult patron

Instead, the seminar focused on the subtitle, How to communicate with tact and skill. The majority of the day was spent discussing the need to listen with your ears and eyes, and how to communicate to the different behavior styles.

The personality that can push my buttons: "get it right" behavior. These people seek perfection but nothing measures up. If they feel threatened, they will shut down. They are negative and complain using such statements as, "I have a bad feeling about this." They seem to forfeit any ability to think with agility and creativity and like rules. Very black and white thinkers.

I'm typically fine with the "get it done" people. Goodness knows, I like to achieve and get things done. Extreme get it done people can be problematic including the following:
Tanks -- one needs to stand your ground, and focus on the bottom line and look at the underlying problem
Snipers -- one needs to stop, look and rewind. How? Ask clarifying questions about their intent
Know-it-alls -- highly competent and knowledgeable people, but tend to be extremely controlling and have minimal tolerance for correction and differences in opinions. Their way is the right way -- the end. How to deal with them: know your stuff and be prepared.
Coping with excuse-makers and blamers: go over actions plans, document, document, document, and confront them when they don't do something.

We also discussed the people who need to get appreciation aka the entertainers. Typical behaviour with these people include the fact that they are focused on people, display creativity, warmth, charisma, and energy. They need to be recognized and applauded. They can communicate directly and elaborately. Their strengths include their fun loving attitude, caring about other people, persuasive, able to get their point across and are optimistic.

The fourth group, the Get Along People. They focus on people and want to get along. The need to be liked, get along, communicate indirectly and considerately. BUT they don't like making decisions, they tend to waste time, seem illogical and can be overly emotional.

Towards the end of the day, we discussed some conflict resolution using "I statements" instead of "You" e.g. don't say, "You made me feel..."

An excellent reminder: Know what you want when you deal with difficult people and to confront them (Stephen Covey)

This seminar also reminded me of other titles relating to today:
Now, find your strengths, by Buckingham
The instructor also suggested the author, Brian Tracy -- a guru for goal setting, personal success and he's Canadian!

In essence, the day stressed the need to know yourself, know your strengths, weaknesses, including your hot buttons, and modify your communication to meet the behaviour needs of others.

Death by Meeting, by Patrick Lencioni

I'm planning my first staff meeting for the year, and I want to ensure that it is effective. I've sat through a number of staff meetings in my day. Typically, individuals drone on about a variety of topics, but as discussed in the book, Death by Meeting, there is no drama, and little to no engagement. The chair's main goal is to get through a huge number of agenda items with as little conflict as possible.

I don't want to run my meetings like this. According to this book, the key to starting off a good meeting is to start with a bit of drama -- a hook -- within the first 10 minutes of the meeting, so that staff become engaged. In other words, give people a reason to care.

I already know that I want to review key issues coming up for the department and make sure people are well informed. I plan to issue the month end report the week before the meeting and ask staff if they would any clarification on the different topics.

I want to make sure we discuss effective Reader's Advisory tactics and ensure people know their expectations at the information desk. I need to challenge the group -- they're intelligent and opinionated, so I need to channel this.

Thirdly, we need to discuss 2010 goals and set the stage so that people know they will get setting personal goals for the department this year.

So, I need to give more thought to the structure of the meeting, and how I want to approach the RA portion of the meeting and how to set the stage for one-on-on goal setting for individuals.

Here is a link to an executive summary of this book by Lencioni: http://www.cmibusinessplanning.com/Death%20By%20Meeting%20Summary.pdf

Topics to date:

• Clarify and expand upon upcoming issues e.g. projects in the works, and how it will affect them


• Reinforce our mission and customer service


• provide reader's advisory coaching and provide break-out sessions for staff


• Set expectations by reviewing 2010 goals

Happy New Year!

So far I'm not doing that well with my goals -- I missed my 6:55 a.m. outdoor workout this morning. Considering it was -13 C, perhaps it was a good thing that I slept in. I do want to get more attuned to my body, so perhaps I'm doing that today.

I'm toying with the idea of starting a new blog:

• personal MBA Southern style
• my personal MBA southern style

I'll have to mull that one over a bit more...