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When forced to deal with someone else’s shortcomings, especially if that someone is a repeat offender, it’s easy to become like a cornered animal: senses on overload, ready to pounce on the next offense.
I was trying to think of an example of this with my wife yesterday, and I reminded her about when she packed up our car the previous Saturday after one of our kids’ football games and then couldn’t find her keys.
“They have to be here somewhere,” she said as she kept checking the same pockets over and over. My mom and stepdad were visiting that day, but their presence didn’t prevent me from being noticeably annoyed.
“Ugh, babe,” I growled while begrudgingly helping her search, “why don’t you put them in the same place so we don’t have to look for them?” To which I got a “Babe!” response right back. I clearly wasn’t helping the situation—or my marriage!
The key hunt seems to be a weekly occurrence, but I remember one time in particular that I ended up being the one to find her keys…in the pocket of one of my pants. Oops! Anyways, back to her issues.
Being ready to pounce doesn’t help your sanity, your perceived humility, or your ability to address the other person’s issues. It certainly doesn’t help the other person hear you when you are on edge, and isn’t one of our goals to be heard?
Think about someone you work with or live with that this could apply to, and own the fact that being ready to pounce isn’t helpful. Choose to lengthen your fuse.
This struggle reminds me of one of my leadership one-liners that I posted on Instagram (@drchrisjwhite):
“We get very annoyed with people who repeatedly offend in different ways than we do.”
Don’t let being ready to pounce add to the conflict in your life—there are enough challenges to deal with already!
*This is a sample of some of the content covered in the Teamalytics “Conflict Tools” workshops.
Team Leaders, try this with your team! Have everyone read the content above and discuss:
- What is one pet peeve that causes your emotions to escalate?
- Who could benefit from your choosing to lengthen your fuse?
Dr. Chris J White is the Chief Science Officer at Teamalytics. In each edition of Teamalytics Blog, he will leverage his coaching of over 15,000 leaders and his PhD in Statistics to bring you actionable insights to help with the people challenges in your workplace and life.
Bio Here
The post Conflict Danger Ahead! Are You Ready to Pounce? appeared first on Teamalytics.
