Have you ever heard of “tell, tell, silence, yell”? This happens when we repeatedly ask a coworker to correct something, and then if they don’t, we give up until we can’t take it anymore. This may even cause us to accidentally yell or do something else drastic we’d eventually have to apologize for. No matter how resourceful, practiced, or trained you are, there will always be situations where you run out of ideas, skills, time, and/or energy. To avoid this trap, you can be more strategic (and professional!) in how you talk to your coworkers about performance issues.
Learn how to be more strategic (and professional!) in how you talk to your coworkers about performance issues.
Scenario: The Lazy Coworker
Let’s imagine there’s someone on your team that you view as lazy. They don’t get their paperwork to you on time, and it often leaves you scrambling. What follows is a list of steps that will help you address these types of performance issues:
Step 1: Talk to them. Of course, the first thing you should do is talk to the person about what’s happening. They may agree to get their work in earlier next time, but if they don’t, move to step 3. If they agree and follow through, great. If they agree, but don’t follow through, go to Step 2.
Step 2: Talk to them again and refer to your previous conversation: Outline the differences between what they agreed to do and what they actually did. Then ask them what happened. Provided you don’t come across as punishing, you may be able to get a good problem-solving conversation going to get to the root of the issue.
Now imagine the conversation ends with them saying they’ll change, but they don’t – move on to Step 3.
Step 3: Talk to them again, but this time add tone. “Tone” is not yelling, and, in all honesty, it’s difficult to define. It’s facing the person full-on, looking them in the eye, and explaining how their behaviour is impacting the team. Let your voice go to the place where you can show that what you’re talking about really matters – maybe you’ll speak quieter or a little slower than normal.
For some people, a change in tone is what they need to hear. However, if your coworker still doesn’t make a change, try Step 4.
Step 4: Tell them about the consequences. Explain that you will have to do one or more of the following if they are unable to change:
Go to the supervisor: Make it clear that you’d be forced to bring their performance issue up with your mutual supervisor. Emphasize that you’d rather work things out between the two of you (it really does make things a lot simpler), but you will do this if they’re unable to change.
A workaround: If your coworker is already getting paperwork in late, you already have to work around them. Maybe you’re forced to do the work for them, get someone else to do it, or, when they finally do get the paperwork in, you have to stay after hours to catch up. Maybe this makes it difficult for you to trust them in other situations, but whatever you have to do because your coworker isn’t cooperating is a workaround.
If you’re someone who will silently do the workaround, try to turn your resentment into a negotiation tactic. Instead of silently seething, tell the person that you’re starting to resent them so they can better understand how they’re impacting you. Be sure to add that you don’t want to resent them, which is why you’re asking for the change.
Even if you’re not going to talk to the supervisor, explain that you’d be forced to say why you’re doing the workaround if anyone asked – you don’t want to make them look bad, but you also don’t want to lie.
Step 5: Follow-through on the consequences: If their behaviour continues, they’ve actually communicated that they want you to follow through on the consequences – so go ahead and do what you said you would do.
When handling performance issues in this way, you avoid overreacting and giving in to “tell, tell, silence, yell.” While it doesn’t feel great if you end up having to do a workaround, at the very least these steps make your intentions and feelings about the situation clear, and allow you to take action with a clear conscience.
Do you find your work meaningful? There are undoubtedly many factors that influence whether you find meaning in your work – the balance between time spent alone vs. time spent with people, your stress level, and even the degree of novelty, creativity, and physical activity all seem to play a role. It’s important that the job fits with who you are.
Nevertheless, according to glassdoor.com, the career that is most satisfying to the greatest number of people is this: corporate recruiter. [1]
The good news is that while we have other tasks, all leaders are, in a way, recruiters. Whether we scroll through LinkedIn looking for new blood to hire, do interviews, or observe our present reports to select a successor, we recruit people for jobs. Even delegating is a kind of recruiting.
Leaders should take the recruiting and hiring aspect of their job seriously. In their book, How Google Works, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, and former Google Senior Vice President Jonathan Rosenberg declare that hiring is the most important thing a leader does. [2]
That’s quite a claim, but it makes sense given the fact that, when you hire, you determine who will be in the organization (and who won’t be). Given the importance of recruiting, and the level of satisfaction it gives leaders, we have a right to spend energy on this.
Early in our organization’s history, we interviewed in the same way that many organizations do – with the goal of finding the most skilled, educated, and experienced candidate. Using this approach worked for us some of the time, but the results were unpredictable. We learned that this type of hiring process sometimes gave us employees who were technically capable of doing their jobs, but who found their work unsatisfying or did not resonate with the mission of our company.
As a result, we began to tailor our interviews with the goal of discovering each candidate’s innate talent or aptitude, while discerning their fit for our culture…
After shifting the approach of our interviews to assess for innate talent and aptitude, we found that we were much more likely to establish mutually satisfying employment relationships.
As leaders, our most important job is to get the right people in the right places. That means knowing our people’s talents and aptitudes, and matching them to right work. When we do this, our people are themselves more satisfied – and we are too.
How do you react when someone is disrespectful towards you at work? It’s easy to get caught in a cycle of disrespect because our natural inclination is to respond aggressively or defensively.
This is because human beings tend to mirror each other. But with negative behaviours like disrespect, we often go a step further and escalate the situation. For example:
When a coworker is disrespectful towards me, I respond in kind and I add a little. This is just to make sure they get the message to stop.
Then they respond in kind, adding a little.
I respond in kind, adding a little more.
And so on…
As a communication facilitator, I teach people to avoid giving in to the cycle of disrespect by responding in respectful and assertive ways. And yet, there are times when I don’t practice what I teach. Instead, I retaliate by showing the other person my own disrespectful behaviour. For example, there was a time when a coworker yelled at me, saying something extremely vague and negative about my work. And for the next six months, I only communicated with her when necessary.
What do you think? Was my response justified? Did I react too strongly? Too timidly?
My point is that, justified or not, my response gave me more of what I didn’t want.
The most direct way to stop the cycle of disrespect is to refuse to copy disrespectful behaviour.
Although it’s natural to want to retaliate when we’ve been wronged, the best way to counter disrespectful behaviour is to respond with respect. Only then can we break the unhealthy cycle of disrespect.
Five Steps to End the Cycle of Disrespect:
DETERMINE THAT THE DISRESPECTFUL BEHAVIOUR WILL END WITH YOU. It often helps to recognize that if you’re not able to resolve things, you’ll need the outside help of someone like a supervisor. If you retaliate, any investigating authority might end up confused as to who’s in the wrong. Some will punish you both – some will feel so mystified that they will do nothing.
TAKE SOME TIME AWAYBEFORE YOU RESPOND.Allow yourself enough time for the retaliation impulse to subside. Breathe deeply, tell the other person that you’re going to think about what they’ve brought up, and excuse yourself.
FACE THE FACT THAT YOU HAVE NEEDS TO MEET:When you find yourself wanting to reflect disrespectful behaviour back to the person, it’s a sign that you’ve been hurt – either professionally, logistically, or emotionally. The retaliation you’re fantasizing about is your brain’s attempt to design a future where you won’t get hurt again. Avoid giving in to the cycle of disrespect by meeting your needs in more productive ways: practice self-care, redefine your relationship with the other person (see point four), and/or set boundaries (see point five).
USE MIRRORING TO YOUR ADVANTAGE: People don’t just mirror disrespectful behaviours – they mirror positive ones as well. So be a leader and redefine your relationship with the person by acting professionally and respectfully. Nothing sends a more powerful message about what you believe is acceptable than when you refuse to stoop to their level.Note: If you’re experiencing disrespect from a supervisor, they may assume your lack of retaliation is because you’re intimidated by them. You may have to indicate what you’re doing by saying things like, “Because I always want to be respected and I know you do too, I’m going to respond in this way,” or “I can tell this is upsetting and I understand why you’re angry, but I want to respond calmly so we can talk it out.” Even a simple, “Hey, let’s talk about this,” can signal that you’re making an intentional shift in the conversation.
PREPARE AN ASSERTIVE, BOUNDARY-SETTING RESPONSE: Another way to use mirroring to your advantage is to set boundaries. It’s likely that the other person’s disrespectful behaviour is their attempt to get their needs met, albeit in an unprofessional way. Demonstrate how professionals can get what they need from each other by setting clear, assertive boundaries. If you don’t have much experience doing this, write out what you want to say or talk it over with a trusted friend.
The most direct way to stop the cycle of disrespect is to refuse to copy disrespectful behaviour. We need to resist the impulse to retaliate by taking the time to calm down, modeling respectful behaviour, setting clear boundaries, and, occasionally, explaining what we’re doing. While there’s no way to guarantee that your coworker will become respectful, at the very least you can feel good about how you’ve responded. This will make it easier for management to see that it’s you that deserves to be protected if they need to intervene.
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“Leaders are human beings, just like the rest of us,” is what people often say. Indeed, it’s true that our tendency to see our leaders with halos around their heads is part of the trouble, but that doesn’t explain all of it. What follows are some dangers leaders face that can lead to poor decisions… more
How to Stop the Cycle of Disrespect
How do you react when someone is disrespectful towards you at work? It’s easy to get caught in a cycle of disrespect because our natural inclination is to respond aggressively or defensively.
This is because human beings tend to mirror each other. But with negative behaviours like disrespect, we often go a step further and escalate the situation. For example… more
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Do you find your work meaningful? There are undoubtedly many factors that influence whether you find meaning in your work – the balance between time spent alone vs. time spent with people, your stress level, and even the degree of novelty, creativity, and physical activity all seem to play a role. It’s important that the job fits with who you are.
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Sometimes leaders make poor decisions. Human history is littered with stories of decisions that make you wonder, Why did they think that would be a good idea?
“Leaders are human beings, just like the rest of us,” is what people often say. Indeed, it’s true that our tendency to see our leaders with halos around their heads is part of the trouble, but that doesn’t explain all of it. What follows are some dangers leaders face that can lead to poor decisions.
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