Previously we introduced you to the difficult personality styles. Let’s look at a few characteristics of each.
The Sherman Tank really enjoys confrontation and needs to prove himself right. He attempts to intimidate.
The Sniper wants to undermine your authority often using put downs and sarcasm hidden behind jokes and comments.
The Exploder has wild mood swings between being calm and loud. They often use vulgarity, insults and name-calling. They want to silence you.
The Complainer simply whines constantly and feels totally unappreciated and powerless.
The No Person – the Negativist says no to everything much like lawyers and are never very happy.
The Clam is silent, unresponsive and potentially deadly and respond with “Everything is fine” when asked what’s wrong.
The Bulldozer tries to overwhelm you with facts and figures. He wants to be the expert in everything. He is often arrogant and superior in his demeanor and cares little for others and their opinions.
The Yes person is always quick to agree, slow to deliver and leaves a trail of commitments and broken promises.
The Maybe person when faced with a decision will put it off until it’s too late and the decision gets made for them.
The “Think-They-Know-It-All” person really doesn’t know much at all but he doesn’t let that get in his way.
None of these styles are “wrong” they just are what they are – humans being humans. Each of these behavioral styles reside in all of us. We will assume for the purposes of this discussion that one of these styles is predominant and is pretty consistently observed in the person we are choosing to interact with and help become more productive.
You can learn how to handle these types of people when I speak to the Bluegrass Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America on June 16th in Louisville, Ky.
Get details and reservations at http://www.bluegrassprsa.org
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