Some of you may have heard the expression, they just get my goat.
You ever heard that expression?
Well, it's also been said that they can't get your goat if you don't tell them where it's tied up.
You see, do some people set themselves up for failure?
Do some people set themselves up to be abused, set themselves up to be angry?
In this section we're going to talk about dealing with people that are angry
and how they try and hook you in with their behavior to get you angry.
Because some of their goals are to bring you down to their level.
It has a lot to do with their self-confidence, wouldn't you say?
Have you ever dealt with someone that has been difficult and you said to yourself,
boy, don't they feel insecure?
You ever thought that or said that?
Or you feel, why are they being so difficult?
Well, they're difficult for a number of reasons.
I want to introduce you to a concept, and it was introduced by one of the foremost authorities in the area of building self-esteem.
His name is Jack Canfield.
And it is called the poker chip theory.
The poker chip theory basically says this, that self-confidence is like poker chips.
Self-confidence is like poker chips.
And to the degree we have a high self-confidence or a high stack of chips, we'll take risk.
To the degree we have a high self-confidence, we'll make commitments.
To the degree we make commitments, we take appropriate action.
And as a result of taking the appropriate action, we get the results.
So you've got risk, commitments, action, and results.
But to the degree we have a low stack of chips, they won't take risk.
He quotes a study that was done out in California.
And the study interviewed 1,000 teachers of elementary school kids and 1,000 parents of elementary school kids.
And they asked them this question.
Whose responsibility is it for building a child's self-confidence?
72% of the parents said it was the teacher's responsibility.
78% of the teachers said it was the parent's responsibility.
Here's the question. Whose responsibility is it?
You say both? There's also one other person involved. Who is it?
The child.
Now do any of you happen to work with some 20, 30, 40, or 50-year-old children?
Or at least their responses are childlike?
Their behavior is childlike.
It undermines productivity. It undermines getting things done.
It undermines relationships.
Well, if you think about building a person's stack of chips,
let's understand that if we want people to take risks, make commitments,
take the appropriate action, which will get us the results we want or the results they want,
we've got to figure out a way to build our stack of chips.
But we can't give them chips unless what? We have chips.
So let's look in this section about how we can build our own stack of chips
and our own self-confidence when we're dealing with people, and at the same time build theirs.
What are some methods that people use to anger you? To anger you?
Some of them may holler and scream. Holler and scream.
And some of you have found that in letting them vent, letting them get it out is important.
Some of them exaggerate. Have you ever had this happen?
You finally got a call from someone and they said to you on the other end of the phone,
I must have called you a thousand times.
Now, the worst thing you want to do is also exaggerate.
Now, you don't want to be cynical either.
You say, well, I had six messages. I wonder what happened to the other 994.
You see, you don't want to match the exaggeration with exaggeration.
You want to ignore that and then move on to whatever you want to talk about.
Some of them try and hook you by maybe using profane language or language that is offensive to you.
Some of them will try to intimidate you or cut you down.
If you and I learn that if we want to get certain results,
we need to modify our attitude or our behavior to get different consequences, likewise, it works for them.
If we can show them how they can get different consequences by adjusting their attitude or their behavior,
then it would be worthwhile.
Here's another issue, though.
If you and I are going to deal with people that are angry,
we tend to take it personally sometimes.
Now, they may mean it personally, but most of the time, guess what?
They don't mean it personally. It's just that you're in the way.
You see, if someone wants to get the job done right and they need a lot of detail
and you're not giving them a lot of detail, it creates a problem.
They want more detail. If you're talking with someone that wants it done now,
they don't want to talk a long time.
And so you reach down into your toolbox and you pull out tools that will work with them.
Well, what happens when people are angry, there's nothing wrong with the anger.
It is how that anger is manifested when we're dealing with people, isn't that so?
It's how they're showing that anger. It's called aggression.
And aggression is that outward way of showing you it's attacking people.
It's verbally or physically attacking people in a way.
It's like people that are aggressive.
They tend to demean, they tend to degrade, and they tend to intimidate us, do they not?
Whereas other people can be angry by being passive.
And they may be withholding information, they won't interact, and this can make us mad.
There's also something called passive aggressiveness.
Now, what I want us to look at today is what we can do when we're faced with someone that is angry,
to diffuse the anger.
We're going to give you some tools and some steps to deal with this.
When a person is angry, first thing we need to do is listen.
We need to listen for a limited time, for a limited time, because some of them can go on forever.
Do you know those people that could talk forever?
Do you ever get people drop in your office and they want to visit?
And if they get in the chair, they homestead?
They stay there forever?
When they're talking, we need to know not to interrupt, not to interrupt.
So when step one is listen and we don't want to interrupt, step two is we acknowledge their complaint.
And we do this by paraphrasing, backtracking, which is saying back the same words.
We have to, we want to, they want to be validated.
But when someone is angry, we have to also ask ourselves, what are they wanting?
Because a lot of them know what they don't want, but they don't know what they want.
But it won't do us any good to talk to the people if they feel like we don't care.
Have you ever heard the adage?
People don't care what you know until they know that you care.
And so we have to be empathetic.
We have to show some empathy.
Empathy comes from a Greek word meaning from the eyes and from the heart.
And people like eye contact and sometimes we don't want to listen to them, so we get involved in other things.
So we want to create an atmosphere where it's safe for them to talk,
but at the same time we have to reach some point of agreement about what's going to be done.
Now agreement doesn't mean that you necessarily have to agree with them, but you have to agree on a course of action.
And when people are upset, they want certain things to occur, or they know what they don't want to occur.
And in looking at these people, we've got one other step we need to take.
We've got to help them generate a solution.
And when the people are angry, we need to let them vent,
but at the same time we have to get them to the point to where we find out what they want.
Not what they don't want, what they want.
And that means we have to take action.
For instance, you might have a person that says,
I have a defective product and I want my money back.
And you might say, well the only person that can authorize this is a manager and they're not here.
Well I want it done now.
Well you have a couple of recourses.
Does the person want to hear excuses?
Does the person want to hear that the boss isn't there?
That the supervisor isn't there?
You don't want to hear that when you have a problem.
You want to talk to someone to get some action.
So a couple of things you and I can do to get into action is it may not solve the problem,
but it gives the person the impression that we're taking some action that's going to resolve the problem.
And so you have to sell the benefit.
You have to get them to feel better about the interaction.
And one thing we can do about selling the benefit of why they might want to cooperate and listen to us
is we may say something like, well so that you won't have to repeat all this again to the manager
and have to give and he'll want or she'll want to get information from you.
Why don't I go ahead and get this information down now?
Now I can just get your name and your address and this and when it happened and everything.
And the actual point of you're taking down some of the action,
although it isn't solving the problem, the person feels like something's being done.
Isn't that true?
And that diffuses and what you've done, you've reached an agreement on agreeing to do something
that is going to resolve the action.
You've shown them, you've drawn a very clear picture on the canvas of their mind about how they could benefit.
Now in looking at dealing with these particular people, there's one more thing we have to consider.
We have to consider that some of these people know exactly how to get us mad.
Now can everyone think of someone that knows exactly how to get you mad?
Can everyone think about the time you were mad?
Can you remember about that time you were mad?
Everybody think about that time.
Now don't get too upset.
And you said, if I go in there now, someone's going to be sorry.
I better count to a thousand.
And you went on in.
You see not only do we have to help people handle their anger, we have to handle our own anger.
Now if we're going to handle our own anger, we've got to figure out some ways to diffuse it.
Now there are a number of ways to diffuse some of our own anger.
There's nothing wrong with anger.
It's the way that anger is manifested.
Because anger, it creates, whenever you're in a situation when you have anger
erupting whether it's on your part or the other person's part, there's tenseness.
And tenseness is something we don't have any control over.
The tenseness is there.
What you do have control over is the tension that you feel.
When I was young, I was in the middle of three boys and my parents and I,
every time we went out picnicking a lot, we'd buy kites.
Now if you're out here flying a kite and all of a sudden the wind dies down
and you don't want the kite to, you don't want to lose the kite,
what do you do in order so that you won't lose the kite over the power lines?
What do you do?
Yeah, you either reel it in or you start running.
So you take up the slack.
You create more tension.
But what if the wind picks up and you're afraid that if you don't let out slack,
you're going to lose the kite?
Yeah, you let some of the string out.
So you have control over the tension.
But one of the things that we have to understand is that all of us have a choice
of either responding or reacting.
Responding or reacting, and there's a difference.
A story that might help you identify with this.
A friend of ours' child took an overdose of prescription drugs.
Actually it wasn't an overdose, they just forgot they took some medication.
You know people that forget they took something and they take it again?
Well, they had a reaction and they went to the hospital
and what happened was that they were fine.
They put them on something to counter this medication,
this over-the-counter medication, and what had happened is that they went in to see the doctor
a couple of days later and the doctor said to the person, to the child and to the mother,
especially to the child, they said, you're responding well to the medication.
Now that's good.
What if the doctor would have said you're having a reaction to the medication,
would that have been good or bad?
It wouldn't have been so good, it would have been bad.
You see reactive behavior, and this is what you'll want to remember
when you're interacting with people,
reactive behavior reflects behavior out of control.
When you react, you just react.
When you respond, respond well to the medication,
when you respond it refers to behavior in balance.
Now, when people interact with us and they cause us to feel angry
or they bring out these angry feelings,
it isn't so much the angry feelings, angry feelings whether we're crying,
whether we're emotional, however we manage these,
there's nothing wrong with the anger, it's how we manifest this.
Now, if we're going to condition ourself to handle the anger
so that we don't sink down to their level or maybe jeopardize something,
jeopardize a promotion, jeopardize a sale,
jeopardize the loyalty, the credibility,
maybe it's with your boss, maybe it's with an employee,
maybe it's with a spouse, it could be with anyone.
We've got to figure out what we can do to resolve some of this frustration, this anger.
Well, there's several ways to do it, but it all starts up here.
It all starts up here.
You see, I live down near the Johnson Space Center
and when there's a contract loss at NASA,
people are freed up for new opportunities.
That's what we call firing.
I don't know what you call it.
They're freed up for new opportunities.
Now, how many of you have known someone that's ever been laid off?
Fired.
You know, it's devastating and we get angry about it and it's not fair.
I have two good friends.
One of them's name is Tom, one of them's name is Bob.
Tom was a NASA engineer.
Fourteen years, freed up for new opportunities.
Bob was a petrochemical engineer, electrical and chemical engineer.
Both of these gentlemen were freed up for new opportunities.
They did not want to leave their companies, but they left.
Now, what happened is that they had to deal with the anger
and what they saw this was an opportunity to do other things.
They didn't see it as being fired or terminated.
They literally saw it as being freed up for new opportunities.
Tom opened up a business with another individual.
They started their own business and they deal and repair
and calibrate fine-tuned instruments.
But the other gentleman, he started cutting lawns, cutting grass,
engineering degree, cutting grass.
There's nothing wrong with cutting grass,
but he was making a lot more money doing something else.
He now has one of the third largest landscaping businesses in town.
Now, I want to venture a guess that neither one of these gentlemen
would have pursued those careers had they not been freed up
for new opportunities.
But do you know people that handle these kind of challenges in life
a lot better than others?
Any of you old enough to remember when they used to have promotions?
Remember when they used to have promotions?
Any of you remember when people said,
hey, get a good job, get with a good company, they'll take care of you?
Is that necessarily true anymore?
You see, our security, both our security and ourselves,
doesn't necessarily last with our people, with our companies.
It doesn't necessarily last with our companies.
It rests with our transferable skills.
Not only our skills in dealing with the technical jobs that we have,
but the skills we have in dealing with some of the frustrations.
Because as I travel and I do consulting with companies,
one thing is always common, change and resistance to change.
And every one of us is probably having to do more with less.
Is that not true?
And in doing this, this causes a lot of stress, it causes a lot of anger.
Well, you and I can react to this anger in a lot of different ways.
Now, for instance, have you ever been caught in traffic
and you knew you were going to be late for an appointment, a meeting, or an interview?
You ever had that happen to you?
Now, do you notice that some people handle it a lot better than others?
How do you handle it?
I used to be, get so frustrated, driving down into the Houston area with traffic.
Now I'm just fascinated.
You see, at the end of the day, I may have one of those days.
You ever have one of those days?
How many of you have had a stressful week?
Month?
Year?
Ten years?
Any of you lifers?
You see, how we handle some of the stress in our lives
has a lot to do with our emotional control.
Daniel Goleman refers to it as emotional intelligence.
He says our IQ, our intelligence quotient gets us hired,
what we can do, the skills we have, but our emotional quotient,
our ability to deal with some of these challenges is what helps us.
Many of you, when you're faced with these challenges,
you deal with them in a wide variety of ways.
For instance, if someone comes in and keeps interrupting you in your office
and you just want to tell them, I don't have time, I've got deadlines,
get out of my office, they may take offense to that.
Now what if it's your boss?
Does that create a problem?
Well, there's different ways to communicate that same information.
There was a study done about how this works.
See, sometimes it isn't what people tell you, and it's how they tell you.
Isn't that true?
It's how you interact when you're under pressure.
A study done pointed out that when we communicate,
it was done in the late 60s by Dr. Albert Moravian,
that when you and I communicate to people,
55% of our communication that people read has to do with the visual,
the visual, how people look, their eye contact, their lack of eye contact,
their body posture, their facial expressions.
Do these things turn you off?
Can these things make you angry?
You ever have someone violate your space?
Can you hear a word they're saying?
No.
So if we're going to handle some of these, our own stress,
we also have to consider what we're doing.
Not only do 55% have to do with the visual, 38% have to do with the tone of their voice.
Anyone ever turn you off with the sound of their voice, tone of their voice?
Too loud?
Too slow?
Too fast?
Too whiny?
You see, when we're dealing with people, when we're dealing with ourselves,
we have to understand how are we coming across those people.
Seven percent had to do with the words, the words.
See, words are important because words can shut you down.
Have you ever been in a performance appraisal and someone,
you heard the word constructive criticism?
Which word is a recipient here?
Criticism.
And they shut down.
Well, understand that sometimes people, when they're interacting with us,
they want to communicate in a certain way,
but it causes us to get frustrated when they don't communicate in a way we like.
And we get uncomfortable with that.
You see, we like to be around people that are like us.
We don't like to be around people that are not like us.
People get angry for some other reasons.
One of the things that might make you angry is when things don't go your way.
When you've told someone something and you've told them one thing
and it goes in one ear and then you don't know where it goes.
You ever have these people?
The people that just don't get it?
I call them unconscious people.
The people that just don't get it.
Well, sometimes we're not speaking in the same language,
but we get frustrated with them.
Now, how do we handle that frustration?
A couple of tips when you're interacting with someone that might reduce their anger
and also give people feedback about what affects you,
how it might affect your anger.
When you're dealing with your anger,
first of all, make sure you tell the person what you want
and redirect the conversation,
because many times we're ventilating about what we don't want.
How do some other people handle that stress?
If someone's being stressed out with the same type person
or the same type behavioral style that you are being faced with,
go to that person and find out what are they doing?
Observe them.
Become a student of people,
because if you and I want to reduce some of the stress,
we've got to figure out what works for some other people.
One of the things that always amazed me
as my background was in the behavioral sciences,
both my graduate and undergraduate work,
and as I worked with troubled youth for some 22 years,
besides my own two boys,
and I do have two sons,
I have the 18-year-old and I have a 21-year-old musician
that likes to get up at the crack of noon,
and one of the things that I've found in dealing with these two kids
is they both handle anger in a different way.
Now, those of you that have kids or those of you that work with people,
do you know when to back off with certain people?
Have you noticed, have you learned the hard way sometimes,
when to back off?
Sometimes we don't, though.
We just want to bulldoze our way through
when we know what we should do.
You see, there's always this voice up in our heads
saying, this is what you need to do,
what you don't need to do.
Now, if we're going to get,
if we're going to reduce some of the stress,
we've got to learn by building our stack of chips,
the chips, folks, in our life,
or the ideas, the techniques, the verbids, the terminology.
And many times you can create situations that create stress.
You can develop skills that can defuse it.
But sometimes we don't want to do what we want to do,
what we know we should do.
We do what we want to do.
John Gray, Deborah Tannen talk a lot about
men-women relationships in stress.
So you see people deal with it.
John Gray talks about in one of his books
that a woman looks at the man and says,
honey, my coat's in the front closet.
And he goes, mine is, too.
Now, what does she say to him?
Go get my coat.
A couple of you guys are going, oh, yeah?
Whew!
You see, we know what works.
I've been married to a very beautiful woman,
or loving person, for 23 years.
I know what works.
Diana will pick me up at the airport,
and she'll say, do you have any gum?
And I'll go, yeah.
Well, can I have some?
You see, I knew what she was saying,
but I wanted her to communicate in a different way.
And do you ever want people to communicate
in a different way?
Can we agree we're not going to get them
to change their behavior unless they see
there's a cost-benefit relationship?
You see, in dealing with some of the,
getting some of the responses,
some of the behavior, there's a formula.
It's real simple.
The formula is A plus B equals C.
Your attitude plus your behavior
equals the consequences.
Now, if you want, since our attitude
starts with our thoughts,
we have to ask ourself,
what are we putting in our mind
when we see this person coming down the hall?
What's the first thing that enters our mind
when we see this person?
When we have an event that triggers an emotion in us,
what do we say to ourselves?
For instance, can any of you remember
the first time you bought that new vehicle
and you went out and you saw your first ding
or dent in it?
Remember that?
What positively could we say to ourselves?
What do you think we could positively say to ourselves?
Could have been worse.
Now I don't have to take up two parking places.
At least I have insurance.
It's a good thing I wasn't there.
Good thing my wife didn't do this.
Good thing the kids weren't, didn't do this.
At least I have insurance.
What you did is you took that event
and it caused this emotional trigger.
And whenever we want to look at why we're getting upset,
we need to start by looking at what thought process
is going on because the thoughts develop our attitude.
Our attitude is manifested in the behavior
and the behavior results in experiences
and the experiences can lead to either conflict
or cooperation, correct?
If the same elements lead to either conflict
or cooperation, what we need to ask ourselves
since it's thoughts, attitude, behavior, experiences,
what happens is the thoughts create this perception
in our mind.
You see, positive thoughts inspire and energize.
Negative thoughts destroy and tire.
And if you and I want to create situations
where we're not so angry, we have to ask ourselves,
what does our self talk?
What could happen?
What is the emotional trigger?
What good can come out of this?
What can I learn?
You see, folks, every day you and I take our chips
and we either deposit them in people's emotional bank accounts
or we withdraw those chips.
We can either build people's chips or we can tear them down.
But we can't build chips unless we have chips.
Our goal in this session has been to have you take a step back
and look and see if you're a chip builder
or if you're taking them away.
My goal has been to give you some chips
so that tomorrow you can go into the workplace
and make some deposits and build other people's stack of chips
so that they can have a better tomorrow.
That way they'll take risk.
They'll make commitments you want them to make.
You get the results because you've taken the appropriate action.
When you leave here, be a chip builder, not a taker away.
Thank you.
Applause
Music
Silence