Duration – One day

Aim
We all encounter difficult people sometime throughout our working life whether they are colleagues, clients, suppliers or competitors. These people have the ability to waste your time, make you angry and frustrated and this means that we have the stress of handling difficult people which in turn leads to poor staff morale and productivity. This course is designed for those who want to be more confident and professional when dealing with difficult people at work.

Objectives
This course will provide participants with an opportunity to:

• Increase their understanding of human behaviour and its effects on others
• Employ established communication skills to deal effectively with difficult behaviour
• Develop specific strategies and actions for dealing with difficult behaviour and promoting harmonious working relationships.

Programme

Course objectives and introductions

Understanding behaviour
• Recognising the components of difficult behaviour
• Understanding the pay-offs which accompany difficult behaviour
• The impact of work behavioural styles on working relationships
• An introduction to transactional analysis

Useful communication skills for dealing with difficult behaviour
• Gaining the right perception – using the right questions and listening
• Paraphrasing to avoid misunderstandings
• The effective use of feedback without making the situation worse
• The subtleties of non-verbal’s

Practical strategies for dealing with difficult people
• Removing the ‘bars’ to our effectiveness
• The 6 step process
• Controlling emotions – separating emotions from facts
• The power of visualisation
• The power of ‘strokes’

Case-studies
• Participants will have an opportunity to role-play relevant situations to their particular needs during the course.

Action Session

Who should attend?
This course is ideal for anyone who encounters difficult people in your workplace. It is also ideal if you want to build or improve on your skills and confidence with difficult people.