Category: Leadership

Toxic personalities create stress that spreads throughout an organization.  What are the skills that you can develop to survive and even change toxic people?

Know What You Can Control

If you have the authority to act on the people with toxic personalities, it is your responsibility to change the behavior of these people or remove them from the workplace.

If you do not have authority over these people, there are steps you can take to steel yourself and even change their behavior.

Additionally, if you can in no way change the conditions of working with toxic personalities, you might consider changing jobs. Dealing with the daily stress of working with difficult people is painful in ways that can affect your mental and physical health.

Anger

Acting out of anger can just make the problem worse. The person with the toxic personality can become offended and defensive. They see you (your actions or personality) as the problem in the relationship.

On the other hand, you must prepare to be firm. I have dealt successfully with toxic behavior by confronting a person with the facts and consequences of their actions. However, changing a person’s personality is difficult. The process takes more than showing the facts of their behavior. Personality change, especially with toxic personalities, takes a commitment from the person with the problem

Skills for Surviving or Even Growing around Toxic Personalities.

Toxic people: When you can’t fight them, don’t join them.  However, make yourself healthier.

When I can’t change the behavior of toxic people or avoid these people altogether, I focus on the changes I can make in myself to become a healthier person.

Here are some things that work for me.

1. I write about my feelings.

When I write about my feelings, I cut the sting of painful emotions.

In writing about my emotions, I name my feelings.  Fear, anger anxiety, insecurity, and resentment are common feelings that people have around toxic people. You may have other bad feelings. When I experience these feelings, I write about them.

2. I write about my actions.

In this step, I can see what things I can change in my own behavior to reduce the damage in a toxic relationship.  For example, if I act out of anger, I can change my actions.

3. I discuss what I am feeling with a mentor.

One of the problems with writing about my feelings is that I have trouble seeing solutions.  Instead I focus on how people have harmed me.

However, I have close friends I can trust.  These people keep what I tell them a secret.  These friends are mentors who show me how I can grow and improve my behavior.

4. Avoid the Poison: When I can’t change the behavior of toxic people, I avoid them. If there is no reason to have to deal with them, I don’t.

Habits: The things we don’t do are as important as the things we do to be a winner in the workplace. Here are eight things to avoid as you work to build a successful career and become a leader among your peers.

Often, it’s the things that we don’t do that count the most. ~ www.jaywren.com

The Pitfalls to Winning Behavior

Some of the pitfalls to winning behavior are habits that seem normal, but annoy others and detract from our accomplishments.  I have been guilty of some of the things I am going to discuss.  Seeing the harm of these habits has helped me become more engaged with other people and more mindful of their needs and interests. In ways that I can’t measure, avoiding these behaviors has help me build relationships and increase my professional network.

1. Using Long, Uncommon Words

Building your vocabulary is a good practice. However, using big words to try to sound intelligent and impress people is phony and annoying.  Furthermore, using long or uncommon words confuses people and detracts from your point.

It is narcissistic to throw around words that few people know or that people know as pretentious. You become like a person who poses in front of the mirror in a public restroom.

As a lesson about my own use of words that meant little but I used to impress others, my Mother once said to me, “You are so bombastic and I am so illiterate that you will have to elucidate for me to comprehend.” Lesson delivered; lesson learned.

2. Using Facilities and Parking for the Handicapped

People who need handicapped facilities have no choice.  They need them when they need them.

Abusing the use of handicapped parking is not only annoying, it is illegal.  Most states have stiff fines for using handicapped parking without legal authorization.  Furthermore, most people have no tolerance for people who abuse the use of handicapped parking.

Restroom facilities become more challenging, because some locations only have one or stalls.  I have been in a one-stall restroom when a person in a wheelchair was waiting in line. The situation was awkward even though I had no choice. The best practice is, whenever possible, to defer to people who might need the handicapped facility.

3. Yacking on Your Cell Phone

There is something odd about strangers carrying on a conversation on a cell phone when they are next to you.

They have entered your space and are holding a conversation that doesn’t involve you.

I have been guilty of using a cell phone in a supermarket.  As my wife gave me instructions on the things that she wanted me to buy, I passed one shopper three times.  The third time he suggested that I stop walking around talking on my phone and make a list.

This was an awakening to me just how easily cell conversations annoy the people around us.

Around the office, it is good to be aware when you are carrying on cell phone conversations around people who aren’t involved in the discussion.

4. In Meetings, Act Like You Belong

Texting and sending emails on a phone at the wrong time can be just as annoying.

At work, you can quickly annoy people, including people you need to impress.  Look at the situation.  You are in a meeting, and everyone is discussing the topic of the meeting.  Your mind wanders from the discussion, and you suddenly feel the urge to send a message or read your email.

You mind tells you that you must deal with your priorities. However, you are creating a distraction for everyone in the room.  People who are in a meeting are mentally like members in a marching band.  They are in coordination. When you start texting or sending emails, you break step and become a distraction.

5. Habits of Blocking the Exits

Blocking the exits or any other passageway is annoying.  Some people do not know how to navigate blocked hallways or aisles.  Other people feel awkward asking to get past.

People often gather at the entrance to meetings or at the door when leaving.  If this is a problem in your office, I recommend that the senior person in the room ask people not to block the door when they are leaving.

On the other hand, if you do need to get past people in a blocked passageway, simply say, “Pardon me.

6. Constant Complaining

Negative information creates bad moods.  A constant flow of negative information destroys morale and increases turnover.

Everyone has problems.  Solving those problems makes you look like a leader.  Whining about those problems not only is annoying.  It soon makes you look incompetent.

Instead of complaining, especially constant complaining, focus on solutions.

7. Self-Reference

Receiving credit for your work is a crucial step in the path to success.  However, constantly talking about yourself is annoying and makes people see you as shallow.

If you are not receiving credit for the work you are doing. talk with your managers.  Having them reference your accomplishments is far more effective than when you are doing it.  Furthermore, avoiding this behavior has helped me build a strong network.

Additionally, give credit to other people for their accomplishments.  People not only enjoy receiving credit.  They often remember the people who helped them receive credit.  This type of winning behavior will help you build a powerful network.

8. Habits – Trying to Be Funny

I remember an article that helped me know that not everyone understands the impact of their failed attempts at humor.  The author started his article with religious jokes.  These jokes were off topic.

The jokes weren’t clever.  They were flippant.  Furthermore, they distracted from the point of the article.

The author was undermining his own work, by not practicing winning behavior.

Leadership Skills: 7 Steps to Creating Powerful Teams.  Ways to interact with teams to create engagement and understanding.

Smart Leaders Share Their Ideas with Others

It takes time and patience to share ideas and train team members. Leaders who invest this time to show team members shortcuts and special skills increase the success of the individual members of the team and the success of the entire team. Moreover, these members become more engaged as they implement the new ideas that smart leaders have taught them. Working on these leadership skills empower leaders to connect with their teams in meaningful ways.

Leadership Skills to Delegate Responsibility

Caught in the daily cycle of handling routine responsibilities, managers can procrastinate working with team members to take on additional responsibility. However, as team members take on new responsibility, they increase their abilities to take on greater roles. Delegating authority is the first step in succession planning and in increasing employee value. Not just having responsibility, but taking responsibility for the success of a project creates instant engagement.

To delegate responsibility requires the leadership skills for working with and trusting employees.

Develop Leadership Skills to Become a Big Picture Person

Good leaders know that a minor slight or small loss today often has no significance in the big picture. These leaders can respond from a point of view that their employees are assets.  Keeping perspective with a view of the long-term, leaders can see employee mistakes as opportunities to teach the people who work for them.

A case in point, I once became impatient with a secretary who was hesitant about helping me schedule a flight. When I pressed her on the matter, she confessed that she had never scheduled a flight. She had never been on an airplane. The fact was awkward for her. She was so bright and capable in so many ways. I apologized for my impatience. I explained the simple process to her. She booked the flights. A little bit of patience from me helped us both move on to the important things we needed to do that day and to helping her develop a new skill.

Each new skill enables employees to do more and opens the door to engagement. Using leadership skills, for me, was not always automatic.

Leaders Can Improve Their Communication Skills

Everyone can work on this basic skill every day. For me, the single best way to improve this skill is to become a sponge and not a waterspout. I can read more than I write. I can listen more than I speak. When I read and listen to effective communicators, I reinforce good habits that make me a more effective communicator.

Additionally, I can add to my vocabulary by finding the definition of words that are new to me. Expanding my vocabulary is especially important today.  New technologies require new words as well as a better understanding of words that writers use in a different way in different context.

For example, writers have used the word “protocol” about procedures governing state or diplomatic matters. With the emergence of computer networking, tech writers use the word to refer to rules regarding transferring data across an Intranet and the Internet.

The leadership skills for effective communications is the framework for being a successful leader.

Leadership Skills to Know How to Allow Others to Take Center Stage

Smart leaders can encourage others to take the lead.  By increasing how often team members take center stage, these leaders can increase the confidence and skills of team members to take on greater responsibility and increase their value to the team.

Show concern for people who are struggling to move to center stage.  Many wallflowers are quietly waiting to receive recognition. Giving them opportunities to take small steps to greater roles can turn wallflowers into leaders.

Giving Credit to other People is a Leadership Skill

Saying, “Thank you” is easy to do. People appreciate it when leaders say, “You did a good job.”

Additionally, it is important to recognize the correct person. When leaders give credit to team members for the work of others, the team suffers.

Leadership Skills: Walk the Talk

It is very easy for leaders to criticize people for their shortcomings. Likewise, it is easy for leaders to take the easy path of not rising to the standards they demand of their employees.  and ignore my own. For the people around me to respect me, I can’t say one thing and do another. I must walk the talk.

Leadership Qualities: Some teams have a manager but still suffer from a lack of leadership.  What qualities help leaders raise the team standards and increase team success?

Four Leadership Qualities that Create Great Teams

Leaders have many qualities that make them more effective.  For example, a leader with charisma easily draws people to them and creates focus on what these leaders do and say. Leaders who are more intelligent and have greater experience help the team make better decisions.

Here are leadership qualities that you can claim today.

Self-honesty

Not just honesty, but self-honesty.

Self-honesty is about you recognizing and correcting your mistakes.  It’s the honesty to recognize your weaknesses.

It is burying your ego so that you can accept the truths that stand between you and success.

To be successful takes more than overcoming lying, cheating, and stealing.  For that matter, there are successful liars, cheaters, and thieves.

But even successful thieves benefit from honesty about their mistakes and their weaknesses.  Otherwise, they will never become more effective, successful thieves.

Open-mindedness

A closed mind is the wall between ignorance and learning.  It is also a wall between the shared intelligence of the team and the mind of a boss.

Of all the leadership qualities, open-mindedness might be the most important quality for creative, responsive teams.

Emotional Intelligence

First, learn to understand ourselves. Then we can begin to understand others.

Emotional Intelligence (sometimes abbreviated “EI” or referred to as Emotional Quotient “EQ”) is the ability to understand our own emotions as well as the emotions of other people.

People who have emotional intelligence know how to read people.  They have an intuitive sense of why people do things and how to motivate people to do things. With a combined understanding of themselves as well as an understanding of others, these leaders can make decisions and take action with greater intelligence.

Ability to Grow

A final quality in this discussion is the ability to grow.

Leaders who continue to grow become a source of continuous growth for the team.  Developing knowledge and skills, these leaders bring greater value to teams and increase the value of these teams to the organization. Effective new as well as tried methods, when introduced to the team, create both a greater understanding as well as more efficient ways of using new methods.

Leaders who develop the quality of continued growth can clear the clutter of methods that reduce the effectiveness of a team. Just knowing to evaluate procedures as time passes makes for greater effectiveness.

Teams that grow make the leap from short-term survival to long-term success.

Meeting Agendas can empower you to set and control the purpose of a meeting as well as the agreements reached during the meeting.

Are you tired of meetings that accomplish nothing? These lessons from sales training might help.

Case Study

During lunch, a field sales manager of a major consumer goods company told me about an experience he had had during a day in the field with his company’s chief executive officer. He said that he went through the day will a well-planned series of meetings. Each meeting was important to the success of the company’s brands. And he felt that his day was a success.

However, the CEO showed him how he could have made each meeting more successful by entering the meeting with a prepared agenda.  He pointed to instances of the meetings getting off track and failing to obtain commitments that were there for the asking.

Preparation for a Sales Call

In my training at a major consumer products company, I learned how to plan a sales call. The night before, I would create a presentation for each call. The presentation included the objective of the call, the benefits to the buyer, and the quantities of products I planned to sell. Interwoven into the agenda were possible objections I might anticipate from the buyer and how I would handle them.

A Status Board as a Meeting Agenda

When I entered the recruiting industry, I first worked for a search firm that had a former pharmaceutical industry executive as CEO.  The only thing that he asked of us recruiters is that we sit down at the beginning of every day and go over a single sheet that contained a list of search assignments and prospects, code the status of the assignments, and update that sheet every day. From there he asked to see a copy of the sheet at the end of every week.

Each morning, we recruiters met to review our “Status Boards,” which were the agenda for the meeting.

In having us create this simple “Status Board,” the CEO established more than a plan. He created an agenda for our daily activity. We not only had to present the names of the hiring companies and the name of the applicants; we had to state our progress in the process. For potential candidates, we put no number after their name. If a candidate agreed to an interview with a company, we put a “1” beside the name of that candidate. When we had a candidate scheduled for an interview, we put a “2” beside the applicant’s name. A “3” meant that the candidate had an offer.  A “4” meant the candidate had accepted the offer.

What this CEO accomplished was to require each recruiter to know the details and progress of each search assignment. He called this sheet a “Status Board.” Implicit in this activity is that this CEO laid out the details of an agenda that kept us recruiters on track and kept him informed.

Meeting Agendas Across all Industries.

So began my practice of having an agenda for my daily activities.  I add to my agenda as new events arise. Again, this agenda is more detailed than scheduling a task. The agenda contains the objective, progress, and completion of the task.

A second example, is how I manage visit to the doctor’s office.  I state the purpose of the visit. Then I add a list of questions I plan to ask. I include a section for next steps. This simple method makes my appointments more meaningful, and I don’t leave the meeting with regrets for not asking the right questions or frustration on over not understanding the next steps.  Therefore, I can then take the steps for more successful action for my health.