Dealing with difficult colleagues requires personal behavior changes such as understanding their perspective, setting clear boundaries, and learning when to decline. It’s important to gain perspective and recognize one’s own contribution to bad relationships. Refusing confidently can lessen the power of a difficult peer, but if a colleague acts illegally or harasses, management should be involved.
Dealing with a difficult colleague can be truly miserable, and there are many ways in which colleagues can behave that can pose challenges. In almost all scenarios where a colleague is difficult, it is not really possible to change the behavior of the colleague, but it may be possible to diffuse it through personal behavior changes. This includes trying to understand the colleague’s perspective, clarifying boundaries, learning when to decline, and, if necessary, getting administrative help to stop unethical or illegal behavior.
People can be so overwhelmed by the annoyance they feel for a difficult colleague that they may not see their part in the equation of a bad working relationship. They may want to “talk” to their colleague so much that they forget to “listen” to them. It’s easy to demonize another person and fail to recognize that they can have good points or be right sometimes. That’s why it’s important to try to get some perspective by understanding your colleague, practicing a non-judgmental listening attitude.
With curiosity and judgment aside, people might ask themselves, “What does this person need and how do they think?” Occasionally, the answers to these questions point the way to working with the person in the future. It’s not necessary to adopt this stance if a colleague is threatening, discriminatory, or abusive, but if he’s just annoying, it’s worth considering what it says about the colleague and yourself.
Once some perspective is gained and a better understanding of the difficult colleague is achieved, people also need to look at how they themselves contribute to bad relationships. Relationships often deteriorate because people don’t know how to set clear boundaries on how they allow other people to treat them. Boundary setting is not about yelling at people who violate boundaries. Rather, it’s about setting clear personal boundaries and consequences if boundaries are violated.
Setting boundaries is related to the ability to refuse, and many people feel that if they say no to things, they are immediately acting negatively. Several books have been written on this topic, but perhaps one of the best is William Ury’s book, The Power of a Positive Number. Other books by Ury and others can help people learn to confidently refuse, thus lessening the power of the difficult peer.
There is a difference between a difficult colleague and one who acts in an illegal, harassing, or threatening manner. This second group of peers will likely not respond to boundary setting, saying no and greater understanding. When a coworker acts this way, it’s always important to involve management. All workers have the right to freedom to work with anyone who threatens or harasses them, and management must take all steps to correct such behavior or terminate the employee.
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