Your boundaries define the ‘space’ you place between yourself and others – both physically and psychologically. Healthy boundaries help you make appropriate contact with others. Unhealthy boundaries can create a sense of detachment or over-dependence on others.
Psychological safety means that team members feel respected and believe they will be treated fairly by others. When teams have high levels of psychological safety, all team members feel comfortable taking risks, sharing information, challenging ideas and trying new things.
Here are three ways to build psychological safety in your team.
Now Scott was playing with his phone, rather than participating in a brainstorming session led by Chris. Here’s how we’d help Chris deal with Scott’s behaviour. You can use the same strategies to respond to passive aggressive people in your workplace.
This technique involves repeating your message until it is heard. The name ‘Broken Record’ refers to what happens when old fashioned vinyl records are scratched – the needle of a record player loops over the same section of the recording indefinitely. There are six steps involved in using Broken Record.
You don’t have to put up with verbal abuse. Whether it happens at work or at home, there is something you can do about it. Here are four steps to take when you’re the target of verbal abuse.
Dan asked Think Learn Succeed to help out. We watched his team in action. Their real problem was a lack of systems. Without proper standards and procedures, service was inconsistent. Service personnel were struggling with inefficient systems and excessive workloads. No-one had time to stand back and address the source of customer problems.
Here are the steps we used to solve Dan’s problem. You can use the same strategies to establish a robust service strategy in your business.
Be clear about your company’s policy
Your employer has a duty of care. You should be protected from being bullied or harassed. This means having a policy on how abusive customers are handled. A good policy should outline how you can respond to abuse, when you should transfer a caller to someone more senior and how to end a call if abuse is unreasonable. Make sure you’re familiar with your company’s policy. If they don’t have one, draft one and propose it to management.
Here are four tips that make talking to angry customers easier.
Remember that customers aren’t always right
No. The old saying isn’t true – customers aren’t always right. But they are always customers. Without them, you wouldn’t be in business. So treat all customers respectfully, even when they’re wrong. Never say “you’re wrong,” “that’s wrong” or “you’ve made a mistake.” Words like this trigger a shame reaction – which many customers deal with by becoming angry. Instead say “I’m sorry you got that impression,” “I’ll talk you through what happened” or “I’d like to clarify something.” Quickly move on to solving the problem, rather than dwelling on what caused it.
Brett is the youngest member of the team. To Chris and Ross, this means he wasn’t entitled to a promotion. Rather than expressing their anger openly, they resort to passive aggressive tactics. These include deliberately making mistakes, pretending to forget important deadlines and muttering ‘care factor zero’ when Brett talks to the team.
Psychologists recommend ‘calling out’ passive aggressive people on their tactics. How can you do this without creating conflict?
There are four steps involved in calling out poor behaviour assertively and calmly.
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