Early in my career, I was working for a government institution, and was assigned a new manager. We didn’t know each other except by reputation. We were as different as dirt and water. I had long hair and a beard; he was clean-shaven and sported a crew-cut. My politics were liberal; he was a Nixon Republican. I attended protests against the Vietnam War; he had completed two tours of duty there and was a decorated Marine Corp officer. I liked to wear Navajo shaman shirts and moccasins; he was never caught without a sport coat and tie.

You get the picture.

Shortly after he started, he questioned why I’d taken so long to go to another building to attend a meeting.

I was furious. Who was this “soldier boy” to question how I spent my time getting my job done. I was a professional with a masters degree, for gosh sakes. Of course, the logical thing for me to do was to ask Mike what he had wanted and clarify why I needed to take two hours. It also would have been a good time to discuss our mutual expectations about how I manage my time.

But did I do that? Nooooooo. I was much too immature at the time. So I sulked and stewed about it for weeks without saying a word to him. I was civil, but not friendly. I avoided him when I could and avoided eye contact when I couldn’t. I did the minimum required and became disagreeable to the point of belligerence whenever we discussed an issue. I also bad-mouthed him to others whenever I got the chance. I was well on the way to becoming an “Employee From Hell.”

A few weeks later, Mike walked into my office, closed the door. “I get the feeling you’re ticked off at me. Is that true?” he asked. I did my best to look puzzled and denied there was anything wrong. He looked me in the eye and said, “B—s—. I can tell when something’s wrong. I want you to level with me.” When I told him, he was dumbfounded. It turns out that he hadn’t meant to accuse me of slacking, which is how I had interpreted his asking about the time I’d taken. He then apologized and asked that we start off on a new foot.

From that day forward, Mike and I got along just fine. Looking back, I realize that I acted so childishly was because I was feeling a little paranoid because Mike was my total opposite. I had created such a negative image of him in my head before I ever met him that I was ready to jump on anything he did.

It makes me realize that as managers, our employees watch us closely. We have power over them. We can affect their careers and their lives. Consequently, they watch us closely and our actions can take on meaning for them that may get distorted or blown out of proportion. For example, in one of my management seminars, I made mention of the CEO of the company that was sponsoring the event. A woman in the front row, who worked for that company let out a disgusted gasp and rolled her eyes. I asked her later in private about her response and why she seemed to dislike the man. She replied that she thought he was stuck up. (Yeah, sounds like high school, right?) When I asked her why, she replied that the two times she had ever had any contact with him was in the hallway where she had said “good morning,” and he had not replied to her.

I happened to know the fellow and I found him to be a charming, kind and considerate person who would never intentionally blow someone off like that. He did happen to be an absent minded professor type, and my guess is that he hadn’t even heard her say “good morning” because he was preoccupied with another matter.

The scary part here is that as managers, if we don’t take action to intervene, like Mike did with me, the perceived insult can fester into a sore worker who can eventually become an Employee From Hell. So I suggest practicing some vigilance watching how people respond to you. If you sense trouble in the waters, don’t be afraid to have one of those difficult conversations where you bring the issue out in the open. The worse thing that can happen is that the person denies any problem, but at least he knows you’re interested.

I’m offering a tele-seminar on this topic on May 6, 2009. Click here for details:

http://www.larry-johnson.com/employees-from-hell-teleseminar.shtml

SUMMARY

Who takes up more of your time than any other employees?
Who keeps you awake at night, wondering what they’ll do next?
Who distracts you and your team from its mission?
Who do you wish would “get with the program?”
Who do you wish would just “go away?”

That’s right – difficult employees we call EMPLOYEES FROM HELL. Want to do something about them? Join us for a 60-minute audio conference where you and your managers will discover:

• A simple method for diagnosing aberrant employee behaviors
• Three positive actions you can take to turn these folks into great contributors
• Six key steps to confront unacceptable behaviors
• Follow-up tactics that ensure problems get solved for good

I’m an avid cyclist – not very good or very fast, but I like the exercise – and the fresh air you get from riding everyday is invigorating. Yesterday, after my standard 12-mile jaunt, I stopped for coffee at Starbucks. Sitting at one of the umbrella-covered tables was a group of men about my age. They were all dressed in the same funny-looking bike clothes that I was wearing, so I stopped to talk bikes.

After the usual pleasantries about where we had ridden that day, one of them noticed the seat on my bike, which is one of those skinny, Lance Armstrong types. He said, “At your age, you ought to change out your seat and get one like this,” pointing to his bike. His seat was one of those fat, cushy, gel-covered types with a split in the middle to relieve pressure on the rider’s groin. Real bikers sneer at those miniature Lazy-Boys® as being the mark of a beginning biker.

For me, it’s not just biker snobbery (although, I know I’m guilty of being one.) I’ve researched the subject and there are solid reasons why “real” cyclists ride a skinny saddle (the proper term for a bicycle seat.)

1. It’s lighter so there’s less weight for the rider to propel.

2. It’s designed for the rider to put his weight on the sit bones that lie under the gluteus maximums, so it forces you to ride in proper position. (If your feeling pressure on your groin, you aren’t seated properly.)

3.On rides longer than 10 miles, it doesn’t chafe the way those cushy seats do.

So I replied to the fellow, “Those seats are OK for leisurely riding, but they are killers if you’re going more than a ten miles.” At that point, he shrugged his shoulders, as if to say, “Suit yourself.” One of the other members of his group then said, “Charlie here ought to know what’s the best seat – he rides 50 miles per day. At 75, he looks like a man in his 50’s – don’t you think?”

It was true. Charlie did look young and fit. But he wasn’t looking at me. He was staring off in another direction in a way that told me that he’d disengaged from the conversation.

I made a few more comments, wished them a good day, and went on my way.

In retrospect, I realize that my quick response to Charlie’s comment had cost me the opportunity to get to know him – to maybe gain a new riding partner –all because I’d jumped in and offered my opinion without ever having given due respect and a fair hearing to his. At that point, instead of engaging in further discussion or debate with me, Charlie had simply written me off as a jerk.

It reminds me that difficult conversations are often difficult because we make them so. We expect others to give us a fair hearing when we are unwilling to do the same for them. If I could repeat the conversation with Charlie and his friends, I think I would do it differently. When Charlie told me that I should get a different saddle, I would ask him to tell me why he likes the wider saddle. I would inquire about its features. I’d ask him if there is anything about the seat that he doesn’t like. I’d also ask him about his riding habits, what his favorite routes are, and if he has tried any other kind of seat. I’d want to know what the pros and cons were for each of them. And throughout this inquiry, I would listen to his opinions and not argue, deny, or negate anything he said.

Then, once I was sure that Charlie felt like I had truly listened to and respected what he had to say, I would offer my opinions about the type of saddle I use and why it works for me. My guess is that even then, I probably wouldn’t change Charlie’s mind, but the odds that he would hear me out with a semi-open mind would have risen. And had I done so, maybe I’d have a new biking partner. I guess I’ll never know.

In his classic business book, “Up The Organization,” Avis CEO Robert Townsend described how he toured all the Avis offices where he asked employees what they thought he should do to turn around the company, which at the time was struggling. He noticed that no matter what the quality of their suggestions was, they were most appreciative when he made the effort to truly listen and acknowledge their points of view, even if he disagreed. He concluded that you don’t have to agree with someone to gain their respect, you simply need to “take them seriously, and show it.” According to Townsend, once they know that you have “taken them seriously,” you can “tell them to go to hell and it will be all right.”

This axiom has application for conducting difficult conversations of any sort, whether it’s discussing a performance issue with an employee, having a difference of opinion with a colleague, or arguing with your spouse about why the checking account is overdrawn. All human beings have a powerful need to save face and appear OK to others. If you don’t believe that, think about the last time you looked at a group photo in which you were pictured. To whose face did your eyes go first?

When you show that you’ve taken the other person seriously in a disagreement or heated discussion, you make an implicit statement that the other person is OK.

So how do you do it?

First: Never tell the other person he’s “wrong” or that you “disagree” with him. Those words instantly say that you aren’t taking him seriously and that he must be crazy for thinking as he does.

Second: Carefully listen to his point of view and then summarize it back to him so he knows you were listening. This simple act shows that you take him seriously. For example, “So you are saying that the reason your budget is over spent this month is because there were unexpected costs associated with the purchase of new equipment – and you had no choice but to spend the money?”

Third: Acknowledge how he felt or feels about the situation. Doing this communicates that you are able to feel his pain and are willing to put yourself in his shoes – a further sign that you take him seriously. For example, “It must have seemed that it was critical to make the investment at the time.”

NOTE: Tone of voice is everything here. If you say the words, but your tone of voice says, “Sure Buster, you’re such an idiot.” You’re probably not going to get the kind of reception to your suggestions that you’d like.

Fourth: Offer your point of view, taking responsibility for it by using “I” language. For example: “Here’s the way I see it Jim. I’m concerned that if we continue to run over budget, the costs of this project will get out of control, which can have dire consequences down the road.”

Fifth: Ask for help to solve the problem, focusing on the future, rather than the past. For example, “Jim, can you think of a procedure we could put in place so that when these issues come up in the future, they can get resolved with going outside budget guidelines.”

Difficult conversations can be daunting. Most of us want to be perceived by others as nice people, so we often avoid them or wait until we are so angry about the issue at hand that we allow the conversation to turn nasty. Taking the other person “seriously,” as Townsend suggests, raises the odds you’ll get a positive outcome, and it makes it easier to conduct the difficult conversation because the chance there will be hard feelings afterward declines.