It’s a basic fact of life that, unless you’re Will Rogers, you can’t get along with everyone. Unfortunately, it’s also a fact that throughout your life, you’ll be in situations where you simply have to communicate with some of those people you just can’t stand. This may be an annoying boss, an ingratiating fan, a spineless co-worker, a difficult client, an abrasive in-law, and any number of people with any number of faults.
As much as you might like to run away and hide when you see these people coming, you’ll often need to work with them, sometimes (too) closely, in order to achieve your goals. You don’t always have to be nice – professional and to-the-point will often get the job done just as well – but you do need to make yourself understood clearly or risk letting your dislike translate into inefficient communication that hinders or even undermined entirely whatever projects you’re working on.
Fortunately, all it really takes is patience — with yourself as much as with the other person — and a little discipline to make sure you stay on the same page – and that you don’t get caught up in whatever makes them so hard to get along with in the first place.
1. Listen.
A lot of conflicts are based in misunderstandings, so always make sure you’re getting everything, It can be easy enough to tune someone out when they annoy you; the trick is to use careful questioning to focus the other person on the topic at hand so they give you what you need and avoid straying too far. Poor listening leads to misunderstandings that need clarification – which means more time spent with someone you’d really rather not be around.
2. Repeat everything.
Besides the tendency to tune out people you’d rather avoid, our feelings about another person can color our perception of what they’re saying. To avoid this, repeat back any instructions, questions, or other problems they pose to you to make sure you absolutely understand what they’re saying. Give them a chance to correct you before you go off half-cocked, sure you know what “that kind of person” wants.
3. Keep your cool.
It’s tempting to want to argue with people who rub you the wrong way, or to lose it and start pointing out their faults. Don’t do that! Unless they’re wrong about something that directly and materially affects you, don’t bother – starting a debate or, worse, an argument will only prolong your agony – and neither of you is likely to change your mind. Save the debates for when you’re with friends whose opinions matter to you.
4. Be clear about boundaries.
You don’t have to be friends with everyone. Which means you don’t have to do favors for everyone who asks. If someone’s encroaching on your time, simply tell them, “I’m sure this is important to you but it simply isn’t a priority for me right now. I really need to work on x and not y.” Again, there’s no need to be mean, just redirect the conversations whenever conversation drifts into areas that aren’t relevant and where you know you’ll be annoyed.
5. Fight fire with ice.
The worst thing you can do with an angry or irrational person is engage him or her. In the heat of aggression, any word or action interpreted as aggressive in response will only trigger more aggression – and most of the item, if someone is upset and railing about it, every word and action will be read as aggression. As hard as it might seem to do, the best thing is to sit quietly and let them spend themselves ranting and raving, and then ask if they’d like to schedule a time to discuss the matter more calmly and return to whatever you were doing. If this sets off another round of yelling, simply wait it out and repeat.
It sucks, but the bottom line is you have nothing to gain by engaging with an irate person in the heat of the moment. And while it may seem that you’re giving up control of the situation – after all, you’re sitting there passively taking it all in, even abuse – most people feel ashamed and contrite after an outburst, especially one in which their target clearly was not responding to or inciting them, which puts you back in charge when there’s actually something you can do about the situation.
6. Close the door.
While you may have to interact with people you don’t care for in any number of situations, remember that your time is your own and don’t let other people, especially ones you’d rather not interact with, take control of your time.
Communication outside of the narrow band needed to fulfill both of your objectives should be minimized – which often means forcefully limiting such talk. Make it clear when you are unavailable, and make yourself unavailable as often as possible. If you have the power, require that your partner make an appointment, and gently reject any effort to discuss your work or projects outside of that scheduled time. People – even annoying people – tend to respect the time of people who make a clear showing that they take their own time very seriously.
7. You’re valuable. Remember it.
If you’ve found yourself in a position where you are obligated for some reason to spend time with someone you dislike, remember that most likely, they are in the same position – and it’s you they dislike. But you wouldn’t be in that situation if you didn’t provide something of value – whether that’s a work skill or talent, specialized knowledge, even things as abstract as emotional support or solidarity. You have a mission, so to speak, and everything that distracts you from that mission reduces your value.
Remember that, and don’t be afraid to remind others of that. You are valuable, which means they need you as much as you need them. If you’re spending your working time listening to someone on your team going on and on about the sandwich she made the night before for her lunch today, it’s ok to remind her that she’s not making the best use of the value you bring.
People that are annoying, difficult, selfish, boring, or otherwise a chore to deal with are that way for reasons that have nothing to do with you – it’s not your job to fix, engage with, or indulge those tendencies. Don’t worry abut figuring them out or correcting them, worry instead about how you’re going to manage their annoyances without letting it hinder your ability to achieve your own goals. What is your place is to take the control the other person has clearly relinquished, and making sure you get out of the contact what you need. The tips above will help.
Dustin M. Wax is the project manager at Stepcase Lifehack. He is also the creator of The Writer's Technology Companion, a site devoted to the tools of the writing trade. When he's not writing, he teaches anthropology and gender studies in Las Vegas, NV. He is the author of Don't Be Stupid: A Guide to Learning, Studying, and Succeeding at College.
生活就是這樣，你不可能取悅於每個人，除非你是羅傑斯。不幸的是，在一些場合中，我們不可避免的需要和那些不喜歡的看不慣的人打交道，這也是生活的一部分。他們可能是令人討厭的老闆，瘋狂的追星族，懦弱無能的同事，難纏的當事人，傷感情的姻親。他們可能是任何人，犯著各種各樣的錯誤。
儘管你看到他們的時候，你就想立刻逃走，對他們進而遠之，但很多時候，卻又必須和他們合作。有時為了達到目標，你和他們的關係甚至會顯得親密。你並需要時時刻刻都很唯諾，專業技術和恰到好處的熱情也同樣可以幫助你完成這項工作。但有一點你需要記住的是，不要將你的不滿演繹成為彼此之間的物理溝通，進而阻礙工作的發展。
1. 傾聽
誤解是很多紛爭產生的原因，所以你要時刻確保你獲取了對方說話的全部資訊。對於那些看不慣的人，你很容易對他們產生一種排斥。這其中的小訣竅是，你要用一些小的暗示提醒自己集中在別人對這個問題的看法上，從而獲取他們給你的資訊，也避免心偏離的更遠。需要澄清一下的是，如果誤解是由於聽力不好而導致的，那麼這意味著你需要花更多的時間和他解釋，儘管你是多麼希望這個人趕快滾出去。
2.重複
除了容易排斥那些看不慣的人之外，我們對一個人的感覺常常使我們對他們所說的內容產生一種帶有感情色彩的認知。為了避免這種情況，將他們向你提出的建議，問題和困難都一一進行重複，確保你是真正明白了他們的意思。在你要發怒之前，給他們一個糾正的機會，這樣你就會“這類人”想要的究竟是什麼。
3.保持冷靜
人都有這樣一種本能，當你被別人以一種不恰當的方式打斷你惹怒了你，你總會不由的停下來然後指出他們的錯誤。千萬別這樣做。除非他們犯了很嚴重的錯誤，直接或者從根本上影響到了你，否則，千萬不要發怒不耐煩，因此產生的辯論甚至是爭論只會使你更不滿，而且你們當中的任何一個人都不會改變自己的看法。留著這些精力去和那些對你會產生影響的朋友去辯論吧。
4.分清界限
你不必和每個人都成為朋友，這就意味著當別人要求你幫助的時候你不必每個都答應。如果有人侵犯了你的時間，就直接告訴他們說，“我知道這個對你很重要，但對我來說，這個目前不是最首要的。我必須先做X而不是Y。”同樣，你也沒必要壓抑自己，當談話偏離了正題或者要進入你的死穴（你的敏感話題，你知道你會被惹毛的話題）時，就大方的將他們糾正過來。
5.以靜制動
當和一個正生氣或已經神志不清的人打交道時，最糟糕的就是繼續和他們爭論。在一場激烈的戰爭中，任何一個被對方視為具有侵略性的動作或語言都只會引起更激烈的爭論。在很多的情況中，如果有一方感到不滿並加以指責，那麼他的每句話每個動作在對方看來都是帶有侵略性的。的確，正如看上去一樣，這種事情很難辦。最好的方法就是靜靜的坐在一邊，聽他們歇斯底里的咆哮，然後完了之後問他們什麼時候能安排出時間冷靜的討論一下這個問題，重新回到你們正在做的事情上來。如果這樣做引起了再一次的爆發，那就繼續坐到一邊，重複剛剛的過程吧。這些需要沉得住氣，但你需要有自己的底線，那就是和這些正在發怒的人爭論，你並不會有任何的收穫。儘管這樣做，看上去你是放棄了對整體情況的控制，畢竟你只是坐在那，接收了全部的資訊，包括他們的辱罵。事後，大部分人都會很愧疚並且從他們的怒火中醒悟過來，尤其是在那些他們的對手根本就無意激怒他們的情況中，更是如此。若此，當你真正需要對現實情況做出什麼決策時，你又重新回到了主導的位置。
6.拒絕來訪
你可能在很多不同的場合需要和那些你不喜歡的人打交道。記著時間是你自己的，不要讓其他人，尤其是那些你並不想與之有交集的人，佔據控制了你的時間。
從緊湊的行程中安排出來的交談，時間是很有限的，這就需要將雙方的目的進行最簡短的概括，這其實也是一種強制性的縮短了雙方的交談。你需要明確的讓對方知道你什麼時間是沒有空的，並且儘量確實做到如此。如果有能力的話，你可以讓你的祕書幫你安排一個約會，然後禮貌的拒絕任何企圖在計劃之外的時間中和你討論工作的人。任何人，即便是那些令人感到討厭的人，也會尊重那些很尊重自己時間的人的時間。
7.記住你的價值
處於一些義務上的原因，你不得不陪著一些你不喜歡的人，如果你發現你處於這樣的情況之中，那麼你要知道，對方很可能也處於同樣的狀況之中，他們不喜歡的也正是你。無論是工作技能還是天賦，專業技術，或者甚至是一些就像情感上的支援和團結一樣的抽象的東西，你一定顯示出了你的價值，否則你就不會處於這樣的情境之中。這樣來說，你有你的使命，任何使你在完成你的使命時感到分心的事務都會減少你自身的價值。
記住那一點，並且不要俱於讓別人知道。你是有價值的，這就意味著，他們需要你，正如你也需要他們一樣。如果在你工作的時候你的工作團隊裡面有人不斷在說他昨天晚上為今天午餐準備的三明治，不妨告訴她她現在所做並沒有能夠好好利用你所帶來的價值。
那些令人厭煩的，頑固的，吝嗇的，無聊的人，還有那些繁瑣之事，他們的存在有他們的道理，但這些與你無關，你不需要關注或者參與到其中，但也不要聽之任之。不要害怕指出他們的不足並加以糾正。取而代之，你要處理好他們的不滿，不讓他們阻礙你成功的步伐。你所要做的是接管那些別人明確表示拒絕做的，從中找到你自己的位置，並且確保從中得到你想要的。以上的建議或許會給你一些幫助。