Manage-Wise

The lens of understanding

This is about understanding … the kind of understanding that will help you communicate effectively, prevent future conflict, and resolve current conflict before it gets out of hand ... the kind of understanding that results when you place your difficult person’s behavior under a magnifying glass, look through the lens, and closely examine the difficult behaviour until you can see the motive behind it.

Did you ever wonder why some people are cautious and others carefree, some quiet and some loud, some timid and some overwhelming? Did you ever notice how one minute a person might be trying to intimate you, and the next minute they are nice, and even friendly? Have you ever been astonished at how quickly a person’s behaviour can change from one moment to the next?

As you focus your lens of understanding on human behaviour, first observe the level of assertiveness. Notice that there is a wide range from passive to aggressive, and most people find their own comfort zone within that range.

Then observe the extremes. Passive, or nonassertive, reactions to a given situation can be submissiveness, yielding, and even complete withdrawal.

Aggressive reactions to situations can range from bold determination to domination, belligerence, and attacks. Everybody responds to different situations with different levels of assertiveness. During times of challenge, difficulty, or stress, people tend to move out of their comfort zone, and become either more passive or more aggressive than their normal mode of operation. When challenged, a highly assertive individual might make his or her presence known by speaking louder or taking action faster.

An individual of low assertiveness might be increasingly reticent about the same activities. You can recognise a person’s assertiveness level by how they look (directing their energy outward or inward), how they sound (from shouting to mumbling to silence), and what they say (from demands to awkward suggestions).

When you look through your lens of understanding, you can also observe that there are patterns to what people focus their attention on in any given situation. For example, have you ever become so absorbed in what you were doing that you forgot there were any people around? When attention is focussed almost exclusively on the task at hand, we call that a task focus.

Have you ever been so caught up in what people were doing around you that you found it impossible to concentrate on anything else? When attention is focussed almost exclusively on relationships, we call that a people focus.

Within this range and depending on the situation, behaviour can quickly go from one extreme to another, from friendly and down-home, to getting down to the business at hand, or vice versa. During times of challenge, difficulty, or stress, most people tend to focus with greater exclusiveness on either the what (i.e. task) or the who (i.e. people) of the situation, rather than on their normal mode of operation. To discern a person’s focus of attention, listen closely. When someone is task focussed, their word choices reflect where their attention is. “Did you bring the report?” “Do you have those figures?” “How close is that project to completion?” When someone is people focussed, their word choices reflect that. “Hey, how was your weekend?” “How’s the family?” “How are you feeling today?” “Did you see what I did?”

Now put it all together. A person can focus on people aggressively (e.g. belligerence), assertively (e.g. involvement), or passively (e.g. submission). A person can focus on a task aggressively (e.g. bold determination), assertively (e.g. involvement), or passively (e.g. withdrawal). These behavioural characteristics can be observed through your lens of understanding, in others and in yourself. All people have the ability to engage in a wide range of behaviours observable thro-ugh this lens, sometimes dynamically, sometimes with a lot of static. Yet for each of us, there is a zone of normal—or best—behaviour, and exaggerated—or worst—behaviour.

What determines focus and assertiveness?

Every behaviour has a purpose, or an intent, that the behaviour is trying to fulfill. People engage in behaviours based on their intent, and do what they do based on what seems to be most important in any given moment. For our purposes, we have identified four general intents that determine how people will behave in any given situation. While these are obviously not the only intentions motivating behaviour, we believe that they represent a general frame of reference in which practically all other intents can be located. As an organisational framework for understanding and dealing with difficult behaviours, these four intents are:

• Get the task done
• Get the task right
• Get along with people
• Get appreciation from people

Just as people choose what to wear from a variety of clothing styles (e.g. formal-wear, office-wear, weekend-wear), so people choose from a variety of behaviours that are situationally dependent. You may have a favourite shirt or pair of pants, and you may also have a behavioural style that you prefer. But rather than having one behavioural style all the time, your behaviour changes as your priorities change. You may find it helpful to identify these four intents in yourself, and recognise their connection to your own behaviour in various types of situations. This will make them easier to observe and understand in others.

Get the task done

Have you ever needed to get something done, finished, and behind you? If you need to get it done, you focus on the task at hand. Any awareness of people is peripheral, or necessary to accomplishing the task. When you really need to get something done, you tend to speed up rather than slow down, to act rather than deliberate, to assert rather than withdraw. And when finishing a task is an urgent need, you may even become careless and aggressive, leaping before you look, and speaking without thinking first.

But it’s not only important to get it done. Sometimes it is more important to avoid making mistakes—to be certain every detail is accurate and in place.

Get the task right

Have you ever sought to avoid a mistake by doing everything possible to prevent it from happening? Getting it right is another task-focused intent that influences behaviour. When getting it right is your highest priority, you will likely slow things down enough to seek the details, thus becoming increasingly focussed on and absorbed in the task at hand. You will probably take a good, long look before leaping, if you ever leap at all.

Sometimes it’s a matter of time. Of course, it is important to find a balance between these two intents. We call that getting it done right, because if it’s not done right, then it’s really not done, is it? But any number of variables can shift this balance. For example, if you were given two weeks to complete a task, initially you might lean more toward getting it right, and go slowly and carefully.

As the deadline approached—and especially the night before—the balance could shift dramatically toward getting it done! You might suddenly be willing to make sacrifices in detail that before seemed unthinkable.

Excerpt from ‘Dealing with People You Can’t Stand’ by Dr Rick Brinkman and Dr Rick Kirschner. Price:Rs 275. Reproduced with permission © 2006, Tata McGraw-Hill Publishing Company Limited. E-mail: vishwanath_mum@tatamcgraw-hill.com