Patience - Big 3

One of the most difficult challenges we face in our day to day work is difficult people. Difficult people can turn our great day into a terrible one; and fast at that. If you're wise like my Dad, you know the truth that, "No matter where you work, there will always be difficult people." So how do we one, keep our own spirits high, and two, subtly influence the difficult people to become great people when we are barely holding on?

I'm sure that there are a lot of fancy, technological theories to do this, but I'm going to give you the answer that they likely all boil down to; patience. Patience with their uncontrolled behaviors, patience with their snarky remarks, patience with their horrendous attitudes, patience in every action that makes them, in your eyes, a difficult person. When we are patient with people (difficult or not), it often shows them that we care about them, and that even in their worst moments, we love them enough to not react to their lack of self-control. While patience is easier said than done, I'm going to give you my Patience Big 3 that you can apply in most any situation.

Keep it calm.

Keep it quiet.

Keep it real.

Keep it calm: If you get fired up, it's going to show. You're going to react, creating a chain of reactions, blowing the whole situation out of proportion, and before long you'll both be sitting in HR. You've got to keep calm. It's tough, but necessary. The best way I can suggest you do this, and it sounds totally counterintuitive but it works, is to just have an 'I don't care' attitude. Not that we don't care about the person, what they may be going through, or their potential to improve, we do. However, we don't care what they have to say in their moment because life goes on, and we want to see them improve. Letting ourselves get fired up over their heat of the moment comments is starting us off in the wrong direction.

Keep it quiet: I know I talk about my Dad's wisdom a lot, but my Mom is full of it also. She refers to this as, "The Spirit of Shut-Up." I changed it for this blog to stick with the 'keep it...' theme. If you're like me, the first comment popping into your brain when someone kicks off an argument is probably anything but calm, so just shut-up; literally. Listen to what they have to say. They are likely blowing up because they either feel like they need to be heard or that you need to listen. Great news is that you listening achieves both of those, so you can't mess this one up. They get to ramble on and you get to listen - how cool is that?! When we keep it quiet, we are almost simultaneously screaming, "I HEAR YOU! DO YOU HEAR YOURSELF?!" Which is what we often feel needs to be said, so just be quiet.

Keep it real: Obviously you aren't keeping quiet the entire time. Either their rant will stop and you will have a chance to talk, or their rant will be full of questions keeping it conversation based. Regardless, the most important thing when it comes time to talk is to keep it real. To do this, we have to translate. Filter out all the insults, curse words, and bashful comments; what did they REALLY say? Speak to that. Pro Tip: The one I get a lot that I am becoming a professional at translating is, "Are you that f***ing stupid?!" If you ever run into this one, it usually means, "Why did you..."

People can be difficult, and difficult people can be even more so, but if we can be patient in our response to their difficulty, we can often see a big change of heart in a short amount of time. Post-conflict you will thank you and years down the road, that difficult person might be thanking you also. Be patient; keep it calm, keep it quiet, keep it real.