What if you're the difficult person?
Taking personal responsibility with difficult work relationships
I’m sure everyone has experienced a difficult work relationship. It can be difficult in many ways, you could feel: micromanaged, untrusted, that your input isn’t valuable, that you’re not asked for input, that someone isn’t engaging with you. Whatever it is, this individual is acting in a way that really gets to you.
In this situation, it can be easy to slip into thinking of ourselves as the “un-difficult” person in the relationship. We’re the rational, reasonable human and the other person is to blame.
But what if you’re the difficult person? Or even if you didn’t start off being difficult, you’re now contributing to the dynamic?
Here’s the uncomfortable truth. If you’re reacting to the so-called difficult person’s behaviour, there’s a good chance you’re being difficult yourself.
Here are some signs that you might be being difficult yourself:
You find yourself getting wound up and frustrated when interacting with this person
You can think of a 1000 things they’ve done wrong, but 0 for yourself
You act and behave differently with this person, than you do with others
You’ve found yourself being defensive or fixed in your approach with them
You start to work around this person and try to get things done without their input
They’ve asked for information & you’ve resisted because you don’t understand why they need it
You might not have “started it” but your behaviour is contributing to the dynamic of the relationship.
Accepting that you’re part of the dynamic is confronting. But it does allow you to do something proactive about the relationship. You can change your behaviour and “go first”.
I used to think that going first is giving in, and even today I can be pretty resistant to it. Maybe you’re feeling the same reading this.
It’s much more tempting to rant about this person to your partner / friend / work friend. But this never actually makes the relationship better. Try going first, however frustrated you feel. It’s hard mentally to make that switch, but it’s way more effective than the alternatives.
Quick note: What I mean when I say “difficult to work with”
This post is focused on behaviour that you find difficult. I’m not referring to knowingly manipulative behaviour. If you’re working with someone like this, then it’s not on you to try and navigate. I’d recommend speaking with your people team, your manager, or getting some external support.
The rest of this post dives into how to go first, by taking three steps:
#1 - Ask yourself the tough questions
#2 - Reframe your narrative
#3 - Take proactive action
#1 - Ask yourself the tough questions
This can feel like a very confronting task - listing your part - when it feels easier to list the things that the other person has done wrong. You’re not negating their behaviour, you can take personal responsibility without absolving theirs.
You can write down your own answers to these questions, you can think through them in your head, or best of all talk them through with that friend/peer/partner that you were planning to rant to.
My favourite questions:
What am I doing to trigger the “difficult” behaviour in this person?
How do I react to their behaviour? How is that different to how I’d respond to a different person or behaviour?
How am I getting fixed in my approach or mindset?
Example
Example situation: You (as CPO/VP product) feel that your new CTO is delaying and stalling your ability to make decisions quickly. They’re being difficult and inflexible.
Here’s how you might answer the questions 👇
Q: What am I doing to trigger the “difficult” behaviour in this person?
A: I probably moved a bit quickly on those product decisions. I enjoy working quickly and it works when I’ve built a tonne of trust. But maybe pushing to make a decision that week left my new CTO a bit thrown and stressed.
Q: How do I react to their behaviour? How is that different to how I’d respond to a different person or behaviour?
A: When they tried to slow things down and add in extra meetings, I was quite short and abrupt in saying I couldn’t attend those meetings that week. I’m usually quite good at trying to make time for people. But in this situation I felt they were being obstructive and it frustrated me.
Q: How am I getting fixed in my approach or mindset?
A: I’m getting fixed in a few things: we need to make a decision this week, everyone should be comfortable moving at this pace, I should be able to make decisions independently, extra meetings feel unproductive.
#2 - Reframe your narrative
It’s easy to create a narrative that certain behaviours are personal. That someone is out to get you, or make your life difficult. I’ve found that it’s very rarely the case. Most people are trying to do a good job, but sometimes they don’t get it right in how they do that.
It’s incredibly helpful (and again difficult) to reframe someone’s motivations and approach. You can get so stuck with one narrative, that you genuinely convince yourself that there is only one narrative about what’s happening. Think about this exercise as loosening the hold of your narrative. It’s getting perspective on what else might be going on.
Again you can answer these questions on your own, or ask someone to help you think about some alternative narratives and ideas.
My favourite questions:
If I thought about the benefit of this person's approach, what would that be? It might be that they’ve taken it too far, so you can always think about a “scaled back” version of their approach.
If I assume that they have a positive intent, what would they be optimising for? What would be driving their actions and behaviour?
Example
Example situation: You (as CPO/VP product) have a peer (in your exec team) that you need to collaborate with on a project to define company wide ways of working. They’ve been in the business for a long time and you’re fairly new. You feel like they’re shutting down your ideas about how to run this process and have said “That’s not very us”. They’ve got strongly held opinions.
Here’s how you might answer the questions 👇
Q: If I thought about the benefit of this person's approach, what would that be?
A: The benefit of their approach is that they have conviction in their ideas. As a leader, that allows them to get teams motivated and excited. They’re also very clear and focused, which is definitely a strength.
Q: If I assume that they have a positive intent, what would they be optimising for?
A: When I really try to think it through I think they’re optimising for impact and speed. They know the company well & have probably seen countless ideas be implemented and fail in the past.
#3 - Take proactive action
Based on the first few sections you’ll have probably got some ideas of how to go first, but to help clarify those steps I’ve got a few focused questions.
The question “why should I go first?” might pop up again. You might be tempted to go for an alternative - have a good rant, think about how to avoid that person, hope that the person stops behaving in a certain way, think about a good rebuke. When was the last time that approach worked? You’re waiting for the other person to do the hard work laid out in this blog post, and you could be waiting a long time.
My favourite questions:
How can I flex my approach to fit better to this person?
How can I give them some grace to play to their strengths?
When something pushes my buttons, how can I create a gap between reaction and response? What’s my responsibility here?
Example
Example situation: You (as CPO/VP product) have a CEO that’s asking for a lot of detail on what your product teams are working on. You’re feeling micromanaged. Every time you get a slack message you feel yourself tense up and think “why won’t she just let me get on with doing my work?”
How you might answer the questions 👇
Q: How can I flex my approach to fit better to this person?
A: My default is to just want the space to execute without too much oversight, and feel very trusted. A first step could be to ask the detail that the CEO would find helpful and send a proactive, structured weekly update.
Q: How can I give them some grace to play to their strengths?
A: She does have an incredible ability to join dots, and she does spot risks that I don’t always spot. I could specifically ask her what risks she sees that I haven’t mentioned. I think she’d really value me bringing her in for that. When I don’t bring her in, it probably makes her worry and dive even further into the details.
Q: When something pushes my buttons, how can I create a gap between reaction and response?
A: When she does slack me for details, my response can be to tense up. I’m either defensive in my reply, or sometimes ignore it. If I feel that tensing up, I need to get away from my desk for at least a minute. If I have time, share the detail that’s being asked for. Or respond to say when I have time to reply. I can then follow up a few days later if I have feedback / ideas on how to share these details more proactively.
“Going first” is a sign of strength as a leader
Being adaptable and “going first” when working with others is a sign of strength. All the best leaders I can think of have shown me grace when I’ve overplayed a strength, assumed best intent when I’ve messed up, been flexible with how we collaborate and not taken it personally if I’ve come to a meeting distracted.
They’ve done all of this and given me direct and honest feedback. That feedback has landed so much better for the role modelling they show for going first and being adaptable. Taking personal responsibility and ‘going first’ doesn’t replace other approaches like giving feedback. But most feedback lands better when the relationship is in a trusting and solid place first.
The final thing I’ll leave you with is a quote I absolutely love:
“Generally speaking, we respond to others’ way of being toward us rather than to their behaviour. Which is to say that people respond more to how we’re regarding them than they do to our particular words or actions.”
― The Arbinger Institute, The Anatomy of Peace: Resolving the Heart of Conflict
Going first isn’t just about what you say and do, it’s the spirit in which you do it too. Keep that positive intent in mind as you take these first steps.
As always, thanks for being here!
Flora
I’m a coach for ambitious product leaders. You can read more about how I work and get in touch here.
Another great article. Insightful and practical. Top notch