Can you guess from this photo what it’s going to be? This afternoon, I’m co-presenting a session at Lloyds learning week to appro
ximately 200 Insurance professionals. Nicky and I are sharing our “Notice – Assess – Engage” model on How to deal with difficult people which includes a variety of strategies, tools and techniques for understanding and improving how you approach and handle conflict. One of the techniques we offer is to consciously choose your intention. The reality is if you don’t consciously choose your intention, then your body will choose it for you. No matter how controlled you think you are being as you start to engage with a difficult person, your underlying intentions will leak through your non verbal body langugage. I am sure you can all remember seeing a kid being asked by their parents to apologise for something, when it’s clear they don’t think they ought to. You might hear the words “I’m sorry!” but every inch of their body is telling you they’re not! So if you are hoping to resolve an issue with any difficult person, we recommend you choose an enabling Intention, such as “Open to explore possibilities” or “Calm”. The risk if you don’t, is that you could unintentionally sabotage all your endeavours. So back to the Old Library at Lloyds… and my chosen intention for this afternoon, as I seek to share insights into how to deal with difficult people…. Can you guess?? Well I’ve chosen “PLAYFUL!” Let’s hope it’s a good choice and a great session!