Today, tension and pressure are present in every role. Whether you work in the service industry, governmental or municipal organization, or business-driven structure, you feel stressed. And it comes in different forms – the tight deadline, lack of getting enough information to do your job, disbalance between personal and professional priorities, abusive colleagues, etc. All these cases generate stress and teach people how to grow and get to a new level of individual development.
While many of the cases and situations may arise as a result of different factors, one element is different – the abusive and aggressive behavior of the person you work for.
Many people will say that dealing with such people is the leader’s or manager’s job. On the other hand, waiting for a reaction from management or leadership bodies may lead to miserableness and discomfort for the individual.
With that perception, what may have risen as a minor, uncomfortable conflict turns into a dividing process that creates different war groups based on their beliefs and understandings, who demonstrate behavior that often triggers insecurity and creates tension across the team.
Aggression may have shown in different forms. Here are some of the most common of them.
Verbal aggression
Often, this form comes as a result of direct interaction. The abuser enters a conversation to show their strength. The other person or people in the conversation loop often have to deal with accouchement, loud tones, pushy words, etc. The intent is to show that the “I” has higher ground than everyone else. Direct verbal aggression also comes in other forms, like not giving the other participants time to respond, insisting on being heard first, and not letting others ask questions during the play, whether there is a set rule for this. Verbal aggression is based on the belief that no matter if I am right, the other person should not win even a single inch in the process.
Body aggression
This type of aggression is often misplaced with behavioral aggression. In many situations, its purpose is to scare the other person by posing in a threatening pose. While what looks threatening is individual perception, this type of aggression may impact some people while not being relevant to others at all.
Passive aggression
A complex way of showing aggression is the passive-aggressive framework. Within this frame, the aggressive person demonstrates indirect aggression by trying to harm the other person indirectly. It may come as not holding promises, “uncareful” behavior when dealing with sensitive information about the person, hiding or not sharing information when asked, indirect sharing of thoughts as in the way of making excuses, sarcastic talking as a way to mask abusive behavior, refusing to consider that they may be wrong also, etc. No matter the variety of forms and expressions, passive aggression remains an unknown territory.
Emotional aggression
This type of aggression often compensates for words people can’t say directly. It includes sarcasm, limited information sharing, or even a lack of getting the other person to speak as part of a process, discussion, or situation. The more the individual focuses on demonstrating his type of aggression, the more time he invests in creating tension.
Now, let’s be honest: talking about aggression is a good start, but if someone wants to succeed in dealing with it, more must be done instead of just watching. Dealing with an aggressive person is a strategy and a long run instead of a short-term reaction or sprint. To deal with an aggressive person at work, you will need a clear plan to help you overcome the struggle and build balanced results. Here are some of the basic steps that can help you:
Pull yourself back
Aggressive people drain energy from others’ reactions. The more active you are, the more aggressive your activity generates. Aggression is triggered by action, supported by action, and upgraded by action. With the loss of opportunity to react to something, the aggressive behavior gets in norms and stops at some time, or at least for a while, until there is another trigger to boost it again. Getting back and not reacting is a good first step to calm the situation, but it doesn’t work in the long run because it is a prerequisite of hidden aggression against the individual and their personality.
Stay quiet
What disarms the other side is when you stop responding. The quieter you become, the faster the tension will drop. Remember that interest is fuelled by activity. Suppose you inject fuel into the tense situation (answer and defend yourself with power and aggression). In that case, this will make the other side reactive to what you say and increase the tension and stress/aggression.
Give yourself time to analyze
We people often listen, not intending to resolve something but to respond. It is a natural reaction of self-defense, and no one is safe from it. Listening quietly to what is happening and looking at the response is a good time to collect information you can use for deep analysis and formulation of your counter-response. The more productive time you invest here, the better response you will create to react.
Structure your answer with a focus on the situation.
What drains the positivity from the answers we give is often the need to point to the other side and show that in this current situation, they, as a person, are guilty. But people do not take blame and guilt easily. For themselves, they have the right to do so. That is why you should focus on the situation.
It has affected the personality instead of accusing the other side of what you first see as a discrepancy. The more you exclude the personal element from the situation, the brighter the outcome for both sides.
Be ready to listen to feedback.
In most cases, we start with the intention to explain the tension in the situation but are not ready to listen to the feedback sent to us. The other side may be prepared to listen to you, but giving enough space for them to feel active in the conversation and share their view and experiences is crucial. The better this part is structured, the more straightforward it is to get to the other step of reconstructing the relationship and planning better for a future together for both sides.
Plan with balance
“Now let me tell you my plan; how are we going to proceed forward from here.” – This or a similar phrase often destroys what is already built as a brittle relationship. The more both sides understand that, and the deeper they go into the relationship-rebuilding process, the more successful outcome and next steps will be developed. Asking for input and building the following agenda with care and equal involvement from both sides builds trust and lowers tension and aggression. The most successful working plans from those built in such situations are the ones that include a balanced agenda, involving both sides and creating space for honest and non-biased reflection and feedback. Everything else is a compromise that you should better skip if you can.
Prepare yourself for the following chapters.
Aggression in the workplace is not easy to deal with, but what you should know is that there is no universal painkiller for all situations. Living with the understanding that different situations may need different outcomes can make the impact a little bit lower, but still, believing that doing one thing and hoping that it would have a lasting positive impact is naïve. Aggressive people are such because they demonstrate behavior that compensates for some biases and internal deficits. They don’t see this behavior as you see it and cannot understand it the way you know it. Preparing for what may eventually come and that it may have a similar form or expression makes it easier to accept it as an action and build on its reaction strategy. It also helps you grow as a person and professional.
IN CONCLUSION:
Emotional in nature, we often create tension with our behaviors, actions, understandings, and reactions. Some of us may not see these elements as threatening, while others may view them as a turning point in a relationship, interaction, and long-term environmental discrepancies. The more a person grows individually and learns from situations, the smaller the tension from aggression becomes. Learning how to deal with aggression lowers its impact on others and us and makes us better people and professionals. Now, the only two questions you have to ask yourself are: “How do others see me?”, “How do we change that into a more reasonable and winning perspective?”
The Human place - a path from you to yourself 