Leadership Essentials Series - Keeping "Your"
Cool – Keeping "Them" Cool
 This article is for all of you leaders out there,
whether at work, at home, or play, those of you who find yourself
in a position where another human being is out of line and
you are the person that is responsible for reprimanding them.
I say reprimand, but I must add “be careful”
I am of the opinion that how we speak to others will effectively
build up their self-esteem or take down their self-esteem
Taking down another human being’s self esteem never
results in something favourable.
Of course people are themselves directly responsible for building
their own self-esteem, and no one can really take from you
(figuratively speaking) something you’re not willing
to give up. Yes it is your own thoughts that will actually
either lift you high or drop you down low, and of course it’s
not really what someone else says to us that can bring us
down, it’s actually our own thoughts about what someone
has said that does the damage (or the good)…BUT how
we talk to others still has an effect on them.
So when I say, “reprimand” I do expect
you do so with care.
Regardless of the specifics, dealing with difficult situations
is a challenge, an emotional challenge that is.
Anyone can simply just vomit out a whole bunch of words.
It’s actually quite easy for many to cut someone down
or find something to criticize in others, although doing it
to their face is often more challenging. Then again it seems
that some people quite like tearing down others (that’s
just because they dislike themselves so much and it is so
incredibly painful, cutting up someone else gives them temporary
relief from beating themselves up…this I’ll save
for another article).
Emotions will come up when dealing with difficult topics…
how we deal with our emotions, or which specific emotions
come up, vary from person to person. Another thing for absolutely
certain, is that if you're going to sit somebody down and
tell them what they've been doing wrong, regardless of how
you say it, they're going to get defensive.
Once in awhile I get the odd person that will try to tell
me otherwise, you know something like “ I really appreciate
some honest straight forward criticism” or “ I
really appreciate some strong constructive criticism…
it helps me grow”
Let’s clarify this once and for all...
“crit-i-cize" (kritesiz) 1. To judge severely
2. To pass judgement of the merits or faults of; examine critically
…syn see BLAME.
So, lets be completely honest (at the very least) with ourselves.
I can honestly say that any time somebody else wants to “judge
me severely” or “pass judgement on my faults or
merits” well let’s just say it’s doesn’t
work for me.
Brian Tracey in his highly successful audio learning program
the Psychology of Achievement, said (and I paraphrase) “
criticizing another human being is the verbal equivalent to
taking a brick and bashing it against their body”
With all of that said, sometimes people are out of line and
a reprimand is in order! Yes?
Hmmm are people out of line, or is it their behaviour
that is out of line?
The Key to successfully helping another to change their undesirable
behaviour to one that is more favourable is to quite simply
to focus on their behaviour not them.
Keeping your cool in a difficult situation often is much
easier when you can get the other person to keep their cool.
Telling them they’ve messed up in any way (even with
a big warm smile) ouches, separate them from their behaviour
and it’s much easier.
There isn’t a person on the planet that wants to here
“ You do this and you do that and it’s terrible”
but change it to “ When you behave like that…this
happens… and that is not the result we want”
You see it works like this...
I can’t change who I am but I can change how I behave.
My behaviour is not who I am it is something I do. I can change
what I do anytime I like. As soon as I hear the benefits of
change (keeping your job could be a benefit) then I will.
Here’s a good example of how effective separating a
person from their behaviour can be; a “smoker”
is not actually a “smoker”, they are in fact human
beings that choose to smoke. Smoking is behaviour that they
have chosen. As long as you or they continue to identify smoking
with who people are the challenge of changing their behaviour
becomes more and more difficult. As we all know changing who
we are is significantly more difficult (for some not even
possible) than changing something we do.
It is this ever so slight shift of perspective that provides
us with the key to successful dealing with any type of difficult
behaviour, difficult attitudes or habits. Separate the person
from the behaviour and you will keep them cool and calm, sometimes
they are even happy to hear that there is way for them to
change… because it’s not them after all it just
something they’ve been doing that’s been giving
them results they probably would prefer not to have in the
first place.
 Until
next time
For Your Success
Be Well,
Jackey Backman
“Best
Boss" Transformational Leadership Edmonton/Calgary
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