cross-posted from: https://linux.community/post/3626563
with people with good skills to defuse a tense situation at the workplace I mean everyone of you, because I suck at this and I’m sure anyone here is better than I am with this kind of stuff.
Tense situation is a karen yelling at one of my colleagues because her father’s operation was postponed because I kid you not 4 doctors called in sick today. Rumor has it they’re striking for better pay.
My instinctive response if someone starts behaving like a childish, snippy, entitled karen and acts passive-aggressively is to leave and ignore the person. In this case, the karen started ranting to my coworker, getting all snippy and wouldn’t shut up. A rational conversation with people that irrational is impossible, so I kept doing my job, transferring a patient to another ward.
I never expected this colleague to tell me she felt let down because I didn’t help her to deal with said karen. She said simply staying next to her would have sufficed. I told her I’d do that next time someone yells at her.
I consider myself lucky because I can leave to do my job but my colleague was trapped with this person.
My questions to you people with good social skills:
does it really help to simply stay next to my colleague, letting her do the talking while I do nothing but looking at the karen in the eye?
what if, each time the karen opens her mouth I repeat ‘calm down’ ad nauseam till she either tires, shuts up or walks away?
what do you say or do to support your coworkers while they’re being verbally abused that somewhat defuses the situation?
what if avoiding conflict is a trait of mine to the point that I let people walk all over me?
how do you resist the urge to walk away? Situations like this trigger my fight or flight response.
what if I have to do this with a man and it gets physical? If somebody strikes me and I strike back, and I can guarantee you I’m striking back, I’m as guilty as the first aggressor.
Frist rule. Acknowledge the problem. Don’t tell them to ‘calm down,’ say something like “yes, you are not getting what you were promised. You have every right to be mad, but getting mad at the staff isn’t going to help.”
One thing to distract is to ask their name. “Hello, Mrs. Karen, my name is vestmoira. I’ve been on this job for a while. Let me see what I can do,”
Second, yes, physically and morally stand by the co-worker. “So-and-so isn’t the reason this happened, but if we work together we can come up with a solution.”
If the woman persisted, it would be time to call for a manager/higher up. That’s their job.