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Dealing with difficult colleagues, bosses and clients: Using the DISC language to enhance your workplace relationships – Part 3
Last fortnight we covered the second part of our 4-part series on how to improve your relationship with difficult people in the workplace by using the DISC language.
In this fortnight’s article, we move to the third letter in the DISC language – being the ‘S’ Factor.
Susan’s story – a boss having difficulty communicating with her senior accounting assistant
Susan was a senior accountant in an accounting firm and was experiencing difficulties with one of her recently appointed senior accounting assistants – Debra. While Debra had excellent technical skills and could be counted on to complete all her assignments correctly and within deadline when projects were scheduled at a steady pace, she was unable to maintain this efficiency during extremely busy periods. With the end of the financial year and BAS deadlines looming, Susan needed everyone to take on the extra work, however she could see Debra crumbling under pressure and making numerous errors in her work. This in turn seemed to strain their relationship, with Debra becoming seemingly withdrawn, non-expressive and difficult to read/understand.
Susan, being high in the D Factor, was a very results oriented person, great at juggling numerous things at once, and due to the added pressure did not have time to explain things in detail, or be there to hold Debra’s hand. So Susan wanted to learn some strategies on how she could enhance her communications with Debra, while ensuring that she was able to deliver a consistently high level of work even during busy periods.
Adapting and enhancing your communications and relationships with someone with a high ‘S’ Factor
Susan’s description of Debra’s communication style pinpointed her as someone with a high S Factor. Just to recap, the S Factor stands for Steadfastness; how a person responds to the pace of the environment. People who are high in the ‘S’ Factor are sincere, relaxed, understanding, steady and good listeners. They like to complete a project before moving onto another assignment so having several jobs and leaving some undone can be extremely stressful for them. They are good at building strong relationships with a few close people.
To optimise her communications and ultimately her working relationship with Debra, following were some dos and don’ts that were recommended to Susan.
When communicating with Debra, it was important for Susan to:
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Show a genuine interest in Debra as a person
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Allow time to provide answers to the ‘how’ questions that Debra had
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Provide a clear definition of her goals and objectives and an understanding of the procedure or role that Debra played in the overall plan
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Be patient with Debra
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Offer sincere appreciation for the work Debra was doing
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Provide Debra time to adjust to arising changes in the workplace
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Present ideas and/or changes in a non-threatening or non-overly direct manner
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Provide Debra with feedback as required
When speaking to Debra, Susan no longer:
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Direct, forceful or overly aggressive
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Demanding in her communications and requests
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Confrontational in her approach
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Overpowered Debra due to her sense of urgency and wanting to tackle new projects immediately
Adopting the above strategies allowed Susan to enhance her overall interactions and communications with her senior assistant accountant Debra, who was able to continue delivering great results within the workplace.
Susan took the time to develop a trusting relationship with Debra and allowed Debra the opportunity to voice her concerns and the time and space to complete the projects she was working on. While Susan did have to work at ensuring she listened to Debra, it did make a remarkable difference in their overall collegial relationship and the work outcomes that were now being achieved.
Next fortnight we’ll identify how to enhance your communications/interactions with someone who has a high ‘C’ Factor. These are the people who need lots and lots of facts and figures in order to make a decision; are perfectionists; and dislike disorganisation with a capital D. Know anyone like that in your workplace? Stay tuned!
If you would like to learn more about the DISC language or how to overcome difficulties in your collegial, customer or even personal relationships feel free to contact me on info@a-e-c.com.au
Till next fortnight!
To your success!
Annemarie
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With the end of the financial year here, many of you are probably rushing around trying to get through your end of year taxation ‘to do’ list in preparation for your accountant. Now would also be a good time to see whether or not you are on track to achieve the goals and objectives that you have set earlier in the year, and to confirm whether you need to adapt your action plan or approach to ensure achievement of these goals.
