How People Tick

A Guide to Over 50 Types of Difficult People and How to Handle Them

Mike Leibling

• Publisher: Kogan Page
• Year: 2009
• ISBN:
  9780749457334
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Management
• Index: Business

This new edition of How People Tick is a practical guide to over 50 types of difficult people such as Angry People, Blamers, Impatient People, Workaholics and Gossips. Each difficult situation is described, how it happens is analysed, and then strategies to help you deal with the problem are suggested. Disruptive behaviour patterns can be addressed once and for all, instead of having to handle one-off 'difficult' events, time and time again.Absolutely invaluable to everybody, How People Tick is full of tried and tested tips for handling 'difficult' people in 'difficult' situations, based on a real understanding of their behaviour. It is an essential read if you find people bewildering or just plain difficult, and yet still want to understand them, work with them and live with them.

1

Angry people

who may also be Aggressive, Antagonistic, Argumentative, Confrontational, Destructive, Explosive, Hostile, Intimidating, Threatening, Vicious or even Violent

What ticks us off

All of us feel angry at times, but people ‘do’ angry in different ways. Sometimes anger is directed very precisely at us, or at what we’ve said or done. At other times it seems as though it has nothing to do with us, and we’re receiving the full force of what might have been meant for someone else. It can also come in three temperatures: hot, cold and neutral.

How it can happen

Anger is felt by everyone. It’s a chemical thing, with all sorts of exciting chemicals being triggered off – to aid our survival. When people explode with anger, they are responding externally in the same way as the chemicals are reacting internally – ie wildly!

But – and this might be hard to believe at first – anger only lasts about 20 seconds maximum. The chemicals, after 20 seconds or so, start to subside. So how come some people seem angry for hours or days or for ever? That’s because they follow the chemicals with thoughts. Typically, they start thinking of what the consequences might have been. Or they remember other people and occasions that have ‘made them feel like this’. Or, very commonly, they start plotting revenge! And – not surprisingly – all these thought patterns start producing their own chemicals, and the vicious (= angry) circle goes round and round all by itself.

Sometimes anger is directed appropriately at us, for what we said or did, whether or not we meant to. At other times it can seem directed at us, or indeed at the whole world, for no apparent reason. It’s almost as though the person has no internal compartments for containing it, and it has spread within him or her, and comes whooshing out at any opportunity. (Or, with some people, it seems like every opportunity.)

Let’s now examine the different temperatures.

Hot anger happens almost instantly, often without warning, and can be really threatening. Some people seem literally to explode, and come over as physically threatening and in-your-face. As they are so incensed, they can seem wildly out of control. They often get really personal with their insults, and it’s sometimes hard to hear what they are actually saying through their heated activity.

Cold anger is very, very calculated. The chemicals have subsided, and in the ensuing calm, the brain plots its next steps: what it is going to do, and how it can make itself felt. It can, therefore, be genuinely chilling. The message is clear. Every single word is clear. And the intention to have the message heard is chillingly clear and deliberate, in a controlled, almost clinically cutting way. And – unlike hot anger, which is pretty instantaneous – cold anger can sometimes be plotted and prepared and lie dormant for a very, very long time indeed.

‘Inactions speak louder than words’

I have a friend who always expresses her feelings and thoughts out loud, all the time. Her boss was the opposite – he sulked in silence. One day we were chatting about how she’d never been able to persuade her boss that she was upset, no matter how much she expressed her feelings. I suggested to her that instead of emoting her way (ie loudly), she tried emoting her boss’s way (ie coolly). The next evening she rang me, excitedly of course. ‘It worked brilliantly. My boss asked me first thing if I’d had a good weekend. Instead of telling him all about my problems, as I used to do (to which my boss used to say automatically “Good”), I just sort of grunted and mumbled “OK”, avoiding eye contact. Five minutes later he came back with a silly query – obviously made up. I just grunted a short answer back. Another five minutes later he rushed back shouting, “What on earth is wrong – I’ve never seen you like this before?” It worked: I got through by using his language (cool), not mine (hot).’

Neutral anger may sound like a contradiction in terms; how can ‘anger’ come over as ‘neutral’? Surely it needs energy – either searingly hot, or deliberately held back and cold? Well, neutral anger is also calculated, but it states the obvious so that the message is simple and clear – rather than reinforced with hot dramatics, or chilling effect.

People from the United States can be especially brilliant at this, and can ‘do’ angry in a very neutral way, eg by saying calmly and factually ‘What you did made me feel very, very angry.’ (And then they leave a potentially endless pause, having said and done all that they chose to do, thus handing the baton over to the other person to accept the responsibility to respond.)

TIP

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Tips for handling angry people

Hot anger can seem to consume the person who’s ‘doing’ it, and there’s usually little point in saying anything until there’s less heat. A key tip is not to take it personally, as you’ll be so mortified inside that you’ll withdraw into yourself and the person will think you’re ignoring them! So, the main things that a hot-anger person needs are:

not to be ignored, as they’d feel they’re not getting through to you, and so they’d have to increase their signals;

not to be patronized, such as being told to Calm Down; it doesn’t work when you’re Angered Up!

not to be outdone; if you start telling them how angry or upset you are about their approach, or anything else, it denies them their agenda and voice;

to be noticed; good eye contact is important, but soften your gaze and don’t stare!

to be acknowledged as ‘angry’ on a personal level, then to have some help to move the situation forward, on an impersonal ‘what exactly needs to happen next’ level.

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A good way of acknowledging someone who is angry is to respect their position by saying, for instance, ‘You’re right.’ And then leave a jolly good long pause in place for them to consider this. If they don’t hear you (and ‘being’ angry seems to divert all the energy away from the ears), simply repeat it: ‘You’re right.’

And whenever I’ve said this, it has pretty much always taken the wind out of their sails. Or, as one client said, ‘It really took my sails out of the wind, thank you.’ When I asked how, he said that he knew he was right, and now that I knew he was right, he couldn’t ‘do’ angry any more.

Is this being untrue to myself, saying that the other person is right? Not at all – because I truly believe that they are right to feel whatever they feel. (I am not, however, saying that I would feel the same if I were in their shoes.)

‘No, Mr Nicholls’

I was working in a shoe shop in Brighton, between leaving school and starting college. One Saturday, the tallest and second-angriest man I have ever seen came thu...