Articles

Stop Blaming People for Their Personalities

November 3, 2015 (Number 66) Just the other day, I was having yet another conversation with a client exasperated with several of her coworkers.  One colleague of hers in particular had the unpleasant habit of ridiculing her input in forums with many other executives present.

"Why is he such a jerk?," she asked, obviously fuming.

"His personality is not his fault," I responded.

"Of course it's his fault," she replied indignantly.  "He's responsible for his own behavior!"

But as I explained to my client, although we often want others to act more appropriately, most people are just too trapped inside their own personalities.

Consider that our personalities start developing quite early in life, when we are all extremely vulnerable.  Specifically, the personality forms primarily as patterns of desperate self-protection against intolerable frustrations.  The great majority of people just don't have the inclination, or the necessary determination, to look inside and pull themselves out of these habitual modes of reacting.

The exceptions are those of us who choose to engage in serious self-development — such as a rigorous coaching program.  But how are we to deal with everyone else?  These tips will help:

• Getting angry with your colleagues won't enhance your effectiveness with them.  So instead, get curious.  Ask yourself why they may be acting as they are.  For example, my client's attacking coworker likely has an immensity of anger brewing inside.  Otherwise, he wouldn't act so offensively.  And probably, as is typically the case, under the anger and driving it, he's felt hurt, mistreated and inadequate for a very long time.

• Bear in mind that if you truly understood your difficult colleague (or difficult spouse or difficult anyone else in your life), you couldn't help but feel great compassion.  But that doesn't mean you should submit to mistreatment.  It's necessary for your self-respect that you appropriately assert your boundaries.  See my prior article for the how-to details.

• Finally, treat each encounter with a challenging personality as a lesson.  Given the other person's limited self-awareness, ask yourself, "What might I not be seeing about my own actions?"

Success in work, and in life overall, depends on how people experience us, feel about us and therefore respond to us.  The path of success, therefore, necessarily requires ever-increasing self-awareness — and understanding of others.

Dean Herman, Ph.D.