By constantly telling your co-workers about your problems, you arouse in them a feeling of pity and contempt at the same time. It seems that your colleagues are obliged to listen to you, sympathize and offer their help, but in reality they do not want to do this at all. Such an explosive mixture can sooner or later lead to the fact that, instead of empathizing with your troubles, colleagues will begin to take their irritation out on you. By the way, constant requests for help work in exactly the same way. Of course, there is nothing wrong with asking your co-workers from time to time to help you sort out your papers or replace you for a while, but you should not turn such a practice into a system.
Gossip
It’s quite difficult to resist the urge to tell someone particularly juicy news. But it’s better to use an outsider as an interlocutor, for example a friend or relative who works in another place.
You shouldn’t share too much details of your personal life with colleagues. Not everyone is interested in this, and many get angry when they are forced to listen to a story about the endless vicissitudes of your relationship with your mother-in-law, about the state of your health and about the success of your children at school.
Arrogance
In order to be considered an arrogant person, you don’t have to talk down to your colleagues. It is enough just not to maintain a general conversation or defiantly leave a corporate party. Take a closer look at the behavior of your colleagues. The longer a team exists, the more different traditions it has. Try not to break these rules: if it’s customary for your department to have tea parties, buy a cake for everyone; if you’re supposed to celebrate employees’ birthdays, don’t skip these holidays and be sure to throw a party yourself when the right opportunity comes up. And of course, don’t forget to say hello. After all, casual disregard for the rules of good manners is often mistaken for snobbery.
Unpleasant odors
Their main source is lunches brought to the office. The best way out of this situation is to eat in a cafe, and not at your desk. But if you really can’t live without homemade food, give up aromatic spices, garlic, fish and other pungent-smelling foods.
In the summer heat bad smell may come not only from the food on the workers’ tables, but also from the office inhabitants themselves. Therefore, do not forget to use deodorants and antiperspirants.
Phone calls
Harsh ringtones and conversations on personal topics in the presence of the entire department can also irritate your colleagues. And if so, you will have to lower the ringer volume, leave the office to talk with a friend or mother, and not leave the phone on the table if you go on business. It won't hurt to follow the rules of telephone etiquette when talking with co-workers. If the phone rings while you are talking to someone, pick up the phone, honestly admit that you have a visitor, and arrange to reschedule the call. If the call is too important to put off, be sure to apologize to whoever is in your office. If you can't stop yourself from making comments after talking on the phone, be sure to make sure that your interlocutor has already hung up.
How to contain your emotions during conflict
If one of your colleagues acts as an irritant, try to control yourself. If the conflict could not be avoided, follow simple rules that will help quickly resolve the scandal.
1. Look at yourself from the outside. Often this is enough to stop arguing.
2. Move away from your opponent. Sometimes, in order to defuse the situation, it is enough just to physically step aside. After all, the closer the interlocutors are to each other, the stronger the intensity of passions is felt.
3. Defuse the situation. A joke or a non-standard phrase thrown at a moment of conflict can extinguish a quarrel. After all, it’s hard to quarrel with a person who is in the mood to joke!
4. Take a break. If the conflict cannot be resolved, just leave. Say that the conversation will continue tomorrow. You will get a break to calm down, pull yourself together and formulate your position.
And then, during the race, one runner turns to another and starts shouting that he is annoyed by his T-shirt, his running style, etc. Who will come running first? The colleague sitting next to you stared at your monitor and commented on what he saw, or went for tea for the twelfth time in the last half hour, while you haven’t gotten up from your seat since yesterday? This will not leave anyone indifferent. According to a study conducted by Office Angels, 33% of those who quit office workers They cite irritation with their colleagues’ habits as the main reason for their decision.
The sources of irritation can be quite unusual. Consulting psychologist of the ANKOR company Vera Alexandrova recalled the story of her friend, who, having got a job, “ended up not in the team, but in the choir.” All the colleagues sitting nearby were humming some kind of melody under their breath. However, they did not seem to notice it. “The funny thing is that what irritated her most was not the fact that they were singing, but the fact that this melody did not coincide with the one that she sang,” says Alexandrova. After a few weeks, everything calmed down: as soon as they all started singing the same thing, the irritation went away by itself.
“Everyone has encountered a situation where a colleague literally shakes you at some point,” says Andrei Davidovich, general director of the market research and consulting agency Market. Some time ago, an explosive situation developed in this company. In a predominantly female non-smoking team, there worked a man who loved cheap cigarettes. When he arrived at the place after the break, the women were simply suffocating from the smell of bad smoke. They complained to the boss. Davidovich called the smoker to his place and told him about the essence of the complaint. The smoking employee was very surprised and immediately agreed to change his cigarettes. He didn’t even suspect that he was annoying his colleagues; he himself didn’t notice the smell.
The situation, fortunately, was resolved calmly. “If the women decided to tell him (the smoker) directly, it would have been done in an irritated manner and a conflict would have been inevitable,” Davidovich examines the situation. “And so they came to me, explained everything, I, in turn, called the man , talked to him calmly (this smell doesn’t irritate me), and that’s how everything was decided.”
In the vast majority of cases, people do not notice their habits that irritate others, agrees Alexey Pugachev, general director of the Art-Com advertising agency. If a person pours half a bottle of cologne on himself, then he does it not to annoy his colleagues, but because he considers it the norm. It is possible that his sense of smell is dulled.
Alexandrova advises starting work with any irritation from the most irritated one. Perhaps a person is consciously or subconsciously looking for a reason to be irritated. “It happens that a person did not get enough sleep or had a fight with his wife in the morning - of course, he will be annoyed by everything around him that day,” Davidovich continues his thought. At his agency, such spontaneous irritability is combated with the help of a flag that is set by an employee who feels too irritable that day. “When I approach a colleague and see that he has put up such a red flag, then I would rather postpone an important conversation with him until tomorrow,” says Davidovich.
If overall everything is fine, but your colleagues are still annoying, it makes sense to find out the reason for the annoying habit. “Most likely, there is a reasonable explanation for this, and the irritation comes only from ignorance,” says Marina Melia, general director of the MM-Class company. She talked about a friend of hers who was infuriated by the fact that his business partner called his wife every three hours, no matter where he was. “He (an acquaintance) said that he was sometimes ready to hit his partner with an ashtray - it irritated him so much,” says Melia. “I advised him to talk to this person and find out more about him.” When he found out that his wife was seriously ill and bedridden, not a trace of irritation remained. “What can we do - human nature is such that we tend to notice things that lie on the surface and do not want to go deeper,” sums up Melia.
If, despite the work done on yourself, your colleague still gets on your nerves, you need to take active action. “It is best in a confidential conversation to carefully draw a person’s attention to his habit without naming it,” says Pugachev. At the same time, the phrase “Vasya, how you stink” is not the most the best choice. It’s better to quietly bring Vasya out for a conversation about how stuffy it can sometimes be in the office in the summer. “A person will understand everything himself,” says Pugachev.
Sometimes it is useful to come up with some life situation like: “I, too, used to wear only a comfortable sweater, and then because of this I ruined a meeting with a client, after which I only walk around in this “noose” - it’s inconvenient, of course, but it makes me more personable.”
However, such hints are also not always effective. For example, they don't work as well with extroverts who comment on their actions without noticing it. Meanwhile, this habit can also irritate colleagues. There are such people in any team, and they are very easy to recognize: “Where is this Petrov’s phone number... Where did I have it? I’m always putting all these pieces of paper with phone numbers somewhere... Oh, here it is... Now I’ll call him...” What follows is a conversation with Petrov and then an appeal to colleagues: “Imagine, I called Petrov, and he tells me...”, etc. With such people it will be more effective to “depersonalize the problem”: turn to. colleagues with a proposal to follow the “thoughts out loud”. It’s even better to translate this to yourself: “I began to notice that I often began to talk to myself, let’s remind each other of this.”
If the hints do not go through, then you should contact your boss or HR director. At one of her previous jobs, Vera Alexandrova sat in a room with a colleague who was talking very loudly on the phone. To any hints, she replied that her artistic voice simply did not allow her to communicate more quietly. “After a while, I began to understand that when she picks up the phone, I am immersed in her conversation, mechanically sorting out pieces of paper or staring at the monitor,” says Alexandrova. An appeal to the manager decided everything instantly - the artistic employee was moved to a separate office.
At the same time, experts do not recommend using anonymous messages to colleagues. Most likely, they will be written in an irritated manner, which will not solve the problem, but, on the contrary, will aggravate it. “And then the director will wonder why an excellent specialist suddenly sends a letter of resignation e-mail", says Pugachev.
If a colleague is stubborn and won’t take anything from him, there is only one thing left to do: go deeper into work and reduce the amount of communication with the irritant. Davidovich usually tells his friends who are concerned annoying colleague, such a story: he invites them to imagine a competition between two athletes with the same characteristics - weight, muscle strength, fitness. And then, during the race, one runner turns to another and starts shouting that he is annoyed by his T-shirt, his running style, etc. Who will come running first? Of course, the one who just runs, because he concentrates on the main thing, even if he also believes that the opponent’s jersey is too open and therefore very provocative. “It’s the same in business: the one who constantly thinks about work, and not about how much his colleague annoys him, will achieve more,” he explains.
If you are annoyed by a colleague with whom you often have to deal with for work reasons, try to immediately establish certain boundaries in communication with him. You shouldn’t be polite and get closer to a person you don’t like; you are absolutely not obligated to do this. On the contrary, maintain a distance from this employee. Communicate strictly about work.
When you don't like someone violating your personal space, state it directly. Say that you are much more comfortable communicating at a certain distance, and ask to continue to maintain the specified distance. You may have to remind the person a couple of times about your agreement, but in the end, if you have an adequate person in front of you, you will achieve the desired effect.
You may be annoyed by your colleague's communication style. If he shows intemperance and allows himself to get personal, do not hesitate to put him down and remind him that you are at work, where you should show less emotions, especially negative ones. Don't be afraid of conflict arising. If you show calm and tact, the truth will be on your side. As a last resort, you can ask management to put you on a team with other people.
Be wiser
Try to remain calm, even if your colleague's behavior makes you angry. Imagine a wall between you that does not allow the negativity coming from a person to reach you. Perhaps such visualization will help you remain indifferent in the presence of an annoying person. Do not give in to outside provocations. Be stronger and wiser.
Try to better understand the person you don't like. Maybe you are too critical of him. Try to put yourself in your colleague's shoes. Think about the fact that he may have objective reasons to behave in a certain way. Be more tolerant of others. Maybe what irritates you about a person is that he is completely different from you. This attitude is not entirely fair.
Do not take to heart what happens to you while performing your work duties. Realize that work is not your whole life. Remember that you are a free person and have the right to independently change your place of work or profession. Sometimes understanding this relieves unnecessary stress and helps you relate more simply to people with whom you have to communicate on duty.
Valeria Chumakova |07/05/2015 | 830
Valeria Chumakova 07/5/2015 830
As soon as one of her colleagues appears on the horizon, a wave of irritation runs through her body. How to cope?
Work is where we spend a lot of time. Ideally, we would like for us to come to work with our eyes wide open with joy and feel comfortable, like at home. But suddenly something goes wrong: colleagues appear who do not allow you to relax and work happily, annoying you with their habits...
Finding out the causes of irritation
It often turns out that we are irritated in the people around us by what we subconsciously would like to have ourselves. Annoyed by the vulgar appearance of one of your colleagues? Perhaps you yourself would like to add a little bit of her image to yourself, but for some reason you can’t afford it?
Agree that this theory has a right to exist, but often admitting your sympathy for a colleague’s annoying trait can be very difficult.
Therefore, first, decide on the cause, the underlying cause of your irritation, and not the superficial one. For example, irritation from a colleague speaking loudly is just the outer side, the tip of the iceberg. What's behind this? What's hiding under the water? Maybe you associate a loud voice with something? For example, with your elementary school teacher who didn’t like you?
Consider what lies beneath the tip of the iceberg. It is possible that the colleague had nothing to do with it at all.
The key to everything is conversation If you come to the conclusion that there are no underlying reasons, and a colleague, for example, uses perfume excessively, while you are allergic to it, then resolve the issue - conversation. Talk calmly with your colleague, explain the situation, offer your vision of resolving the issue that would satisfy the interests of both parties. Or just gently draw your colleague’s attention to her habit, without directly saying that it annoys you terribly.
It's also possible that your coworker simply doesn't know that she's annoying someone. As a rule, most of the things we do are irritating to others, but we simply don’t think about it without intending to annoy anyone. A person simply considers his habit to be the norm and does not notice it.
Keep calm
If you notice that a colleague is doing something deliberately, wants to annoy you and piss you off, try to control yourself. Usually such people calm down when they do not see the return from a person, do not receive the emotions for which they do all this. These are the so-called " energy vampires" Therefore, the less you react, the more likely it is that the factor that irritates you will soon disappear.
Work harder
By loading yourself more with work, you will pay less attention to colleagues who irritate you, and at the same time you will become more successful employee. Get involved in new projects, take extra work, however, stick to the measure - do not overload yourself. Think about your work more often than your colleague - this is more likely to lead to success.
Take a break from your colleagues
A good way to distance yourself from colleagues who annoy you is to wear headphones. Sometimes this really helps to distract yourself, and your favorite music allows you to relax and go into a world of fantasy, without distracting you from the work process that requires automation (photocopies, stamps, etc.).
There is no ideal
Remember that perfect doesn't exist. No ideal men(even though we really want this!), in any man, even a very beloved one, we will gradually find at least some kind of flaw. It's the same with work. There is no such thing as a perfect job with perfect colleagues and bosses. In any case, at least something will be imperfect, because a team is a living system, and not a pile of cold stones. Remember this often.
Ask for help
If a colleague annoys not only you, but also other employees, then it may make sense to seek help. It’s better not to go to the authorities, but to the HR department. Often, HR managers (especially in large organizations) employ competent psychologists who can tactfully resolve the issue or independently contact their superiors.
We communicate in doses
Communicate with your annoying colleague only in substance, on necessary work issues. Remember that you are not obligated to be friends with your colleagues, you are connected only by work issues. At the same time, do not lose face - be polite.
adminConditions modern society oblige a person to work, the natural result of which is to earn money necessary for existence. A highly paid position and a flexible schedule are delights that only a few receive. Most people have to earn money to live and subsist “with blood and sweat.” In order not to need anything, a person devotes 70% of his waking hours to work every day. It is not surprising that for many people work becomes a second home, where some strive, while others go without much pleasure. Considering the amount of time that a person has to spend in the company of colleagues, it is important to establish relationships with the team, excluding the occurrence of regular conflicts on professional grounds. In large companies, curators help employees get to know their superiors and “subordinates,” participate in trainings and become part of a new “family.”
However, hostility between colleagues can appear on an intuitive or spiritual level, when the worldviews of the opposing parties are radically different. In this situation, management loses the opportunity to maintain a positive attitude in the team, so the performance of employees invariably decreases. You cannot come to the office every day, experiencing negative emotions towards a person or group of people, and achieve success in your career “field”. prevent an employee from devoting himself to his favorite work, clouding his consciousness with a feeling of revenge or anger. Both sides of the “opposition” experience discomfort, so management often has to fire the “ringleaders.” However, losing a promising or highly paid position due to hostility towards other employees is an inappropriate decision, accompanied by a professional “victory” of rivals. In order not to give your “enemies” such pleasure, it is important to ask yourself a pressing question in advance: What to do if your colleagues are annoying?
Causes of conflicts at work
It is of primary importance to separate the two concepts that you have for your team members - “ white envy"and irritation. It is impossible to compare such terms, because the desire to be like a colleague, adopting his professionalism or charm, is fundamentally different from the anger and hatred caused by recruitment internal qualities person. If you are really annoyed by the behavior of an employee with whom you have to see regularly work time, then you first need to decide on the prerequisites for a negative reaction. The reasons for the emergence of conflicts in a team include the following factors:
- The duplicity of an employee who is ready for flattery and lies for the sake of career growth. Such a person reveals to his superiors “forbidden” information about his colleagues, trying to remain innocent in the eyes of other employees.
- Selfishness of the employee, accompanied by a sense of personal gain and regular “walks” over the heads of colleagues. Often, such people pass off the successes of other employees as their own achievements, seeking advancement on the career ladder.
- The unprofessionalism of a colleague that interferes with your path to your cherished goal - obtaining a highly paid position, increasing profits or reducing the financial expenses of the enterprise. Lack of competence on the part of an employee is becoming one of the most common reasons triggering the occurrence of conflict situations a team.
- Irresponsibility of the employee, because of which all employees of the company often “suffer”. A task not completed on time can become a prerequisite for a number of demanding and financial penalties for the entire team - deprivation of bonuses, assignment of additional hours of work, or reduction in the number of employees.
- Rudeness and lack of education from a colleague who does not know how to express his own thoughts in the correct form. Inappropriate behavior can cause conflicts that end in assault.
- The obsessiveness of an employee who wants to become a friend or workmate. New and relatively “weak” employees who lack professional skills try to communicate with competent colleagues who can “pull” them up the career ladder.
- The arrogance of an employee, manifested in a disdainful attitude towards other team members, is another common reason that causes conflicts within an enterprise.
- The talkativeness of an employee who prefers conversations on distant topics to work irritates his colleagues. It is quite difficult to curb the desire of a talkative person, because such people do not understand hints.
- The trick of a colleague who wants to fraudulently gain professional advantages over other team members. It is worth noting that such people are calm about lies and betrayal, trying to “curry favor” with their superiors.
- Slowness of the employee, due to which the team is deprived of the opportunity to exceed the plan and receive a bonus for the work done. In companies where the productivity of the enterprise “suffers” only because of one person, other colleagues invariably blame him for the events that occur.
- The boasting of an employee who has achieved certain results in his career necessarily causes negative emotions from other team members. Colleagues often do not perceive a person who flaunts his own successes - this angers employees, contributing to the emergence of envy.
To find ways to mitigate future incidents with colleagues, it is important to determine the reason for your irritation with them by reviewing the items in the list above. It is worth noting that in some cases, the cause of conflicts between employees is personal hostility. A person appears at work towards whom you feel negative emotions without compelling reasons. You may be annoyed by the behavior or words, tone of voice or look of an employee, which makes you lose the desire to go to work.
Once you have determined the cause of the conflict, you can easily eliminate it using the recommendations of psychologists. It is important to consider that working communication in a team is an integral component of relationships between people. If you don’t create for yourself in time comfortable conditions labor, then a person may develop internal contradictions. To prevent new ones from occurring, follow these tips:
- If you are “worthy” of getting into a team with an irresponsible employee who does not fulfill his own obligations.
Show your colleague the privileges that he is deprived of due to his own laziness. Motivate the employee to complete the task on time by demonstrating to him the benefits arising from a person’s punctuality - an additional day off or an unscheduled bonus.
- If there is a liar working with you who does not want to “expose himself” to his superiors.
To avoid unpleasant situations with management, take notes own work and record the tasks you complete - take a photo or shoot a video. At the moment when an employee decides to “frame” you, it is enough to demonstrate “innocence” captured on film.
- If a colleague comes to you with complaints about work, personal life or management.
In this situation, it is important not to help an employee who wants to make his life easier. Offer him effective solutions problems, but do not offer your services in implementing ideas. must be able to cope with circumstances, taking advantage of the current state of affairs.
- If you work with a person who regularly “reports” to his superiors about company employees.
You can only “fight” such a person together. As a whole team, ignore your colleague, avoiding communication with him - the lack of information will lead to conflicts between the “outcast” and management. An “informer” who does not bring news from the team will quickly become unnecessary to the authorities.
- If the company employs an unprofessional and stupid employee, who interferes with the increase in the productivity of the enterprise.
In this situation, it is important to consult with the members of the entire team, accepting the only correct solution– open conversation with management. You cannot count on a bonus or an additional day off when the company employs an unprofessional employee. A competent manager will definitely act in the interests of the enterprise, so an incompetent employee will be fired immediately.
- If you are working with a two-faced person who is trying to manipulate you.
Don’t despair, but try to find “levers” to influence your new “opponent.” Every person has weak spots, with the help of which you can control even strong personalities.
A social survey in a large company revealed that 51% of dissatisfied employees hint to colleagues about “indecent” actions, 12% of people directly express complaints, and 37% prefer to avoid such conversation. Psychologists are convinced that the appropriate way to solve emerging problems is constructive dialogue with a person who annoys you during work hours.
Remember that this is an integral part of a successful enterprise, in which each employee is responsible for a separate area of work. Only through joint efforts does the productivity of a company increase, in whose team people “reign” positive mood and positive emotions.
January 15, 2014