Working with drama on the job is one of the worst parts of being an executive. It has the potential to suck living out of you, and to kill your motivation, and for many of my clients, it leaves them wondering: "Why did I choose this career?" The very best exemplory instance of this is one my clients - we will call him John.
John is the CEO of a production company. He hates drama. You are able to literally see his skin crawl when he talks about it. His face scrunches up. His shoulders tighten and he winces when he talks about the most recent drama of the day. "I recently don't get it. What is everyone's problem? Why can't they only do their work? It's like coping with children." Then his body crumbles, and he looks defeated. Exhausted. Helpless. Weighed down.
We are able to all relate genuinely to John. We have all experience political situations that people choose to forget. Those occasions when we're caught in a pinnacle of workplace drama - one individual is upset, gossip in the business is rampant, and we feel like a ping pong ball as we bounce around trying to make sense of the issue. So, what is an executive to accomplish? If you should be caught in drama, how do you get free from this dark hole?
To start, let's talk about what never to do. John illustrates this well. Everytime John experiences drama, he avoids it. He literally shuts down. His face goes blank. He starts to squirm, and he typically nods in a placating way. And in addition, the placating nod does the absolute most harm. When he nods, people feel understood, nevertheless when John he takes no action, they get mad. Final result? They attack John. Dramacool They whisper in the lunch room: "What's his problem? He doesn't do anything!" Some people get angry. The irony is that now folks have a brand new issue to bond around - John's deadbeat behaviour. It's not surprising that John has 45% turnover in his company. Not good.
So, what was John doing wrong? Well, several things. For starters, he distanced himself from the drama to the point he escalated the problem. By distancing himself, John became area of the drama problem because nothing got handled in a constructive way.
One of many basic principles of coping with drama at work is to acknowledge your emotional patterns whenever you encounter drama and to acknowledge how your typical reaction plays a part in the problem. Does it escalate it? Enable others? Or diffuse it? If John could self-manage his reactions better, he could have taken a different tactic when employees came to him about issues. He would have expressed confidence in their ability to deal with the specific situation constructively, facilitated the development of a behavioural code of conduct, or brought in a talented third party to simply help them. Instead, he was so busy managing their own anxiety, nothing got done.
Second, he created a "drama triangle" - a seductive high energy interaction including blaming, defensive behaviour, and rescuing. Drama triangles are recognizably consistent no real matter what the important points of the specific situation and they include the following roles:
The Persecutor: "This company is such a hole." "I can't believe the quality of management." "It's all John's fault." "That VP, Sales is a real idiot." All the vitality goes into finding someone or something at fault for the company's problems. Blaming somebody else makes people feel better and, needless to say, this means other folks have to change, not you.
The Victim: "I tried my best." "I couldn't get through." "They did this to me." This is actually the victim in the drama. They work with a helpless tone, and don't take personal responsibility. They might look for you to definitely rescue them, or at fault, to be able to eliminate their negative feelings.
The Rescuer: Rescuers need a prey to feel good. They're "do-gooders" without boundaries. "Allow me to fix this. Allow me to take this on." "I could save the day." "Allow me to rescue this poor person who was hard done by." Rescuers may try to simply help people without having to be asked, or they take a twisted pleasure in getting their nose into other people's drama.
A lot of people learn the power of being a persecutor, victim, or rescuer as children and they continue doing this behaviour in their career without having to be alert to it. As an executive, if you engage in this behaviour or react to it, you'll escalate the drama and there would have been a price to pay for - people won't want to do the job, you'll feel drained at work, and you'll produce a negative culture.
To break the cycle, you'll need setting the tone of personal accountability, respect, choice, and principled behaviour in your organization and work culture. Below are a few specific tactics:
- Look out for drama triangles and start to focus on who is playing the role of persecutor, victim, and rescuer. Be mindful which role you tend to play.
-Consider the payoff in your organization to take on a certain role. Are people "bonding" with each other when they have somebody else at fault? Are they avoiding coping with the complexity of issues by blaming one individual? Do the "victims" get pity? Do people feel sorry for them, or stay clear, thereby giving them power? Are you creating dependence in your organization by rescuing people? Self-righteousness?
- Explore what is being avoided by participating in the drama. Are there some deeper issues in the business that need to be addressed? If that's the case, what're they?
- Notice your reactions to drama. What have you been doing? Not doing? What have you been taking responsibility for? Maybe you have agreed to accomplish significantly more than you want to?
- Whenever you get brought about by an episode, give attention to grounding yourself. Don't cope with the drama until you can get involved without escalating your own personal emotional reaction.
- Facilitate a healthy outcome by concentrating on principles - respect, honesty, and making agreements that work. Understand that the more intense the drama, the harder it is to get visitors to come up with a healthy outcome.
-If you are too close to the issue accessible, get a facilitator or executive coach to facilitate healthy dialogue.
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