Difficult People: What to Do When All Else Fails / The Harvard Business Review Guide

Before you throw in the towel, here are some last-ditch strategies to help you craft a work environment where you are able to do your job without all the drama, and keep your self-respect intact.

00:00 Do you work with someone who’s difficult? Try these tactics before you give up completely on them.
00:45 Tactic 1: Set boundaries and limit exposure.
03:10 Tactic 2: Document your colleague’s transgressions and your successes.
04:30 Tactic 3: Bring the issue to someone in power (with caution!).
05:55 Tactic 4: Think long and hard about quitting.
06:50 OK, let’s review!

Produced by Amy Gallo, Jessica Gidal, and Scott LaPierre
Edited by Jessica Gidal
Video by Andy Robinson
Design by Riko Cribbs, Alex Belser, and Karen Player

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[LeonardSchokker]

Good advice for the workspace. Unfortunately some situations in personal life exist where you are forced to depend on a difficult person and cannot escape the situation.

[yourssachin]

I love these talks, please upload regularly at least twice a month. Your last video was 4 months ago..

[annemaxwell]

If anyone in your workplace is that toxic then your supervisor is not doing their job, as it is highly unlikely the team is working effectively or efficiently. Allowing this type of toxic individual to thrive in any team creates an organisation assasin whose behaviour will eventually adversely affect the wider company and could, if left unresolved put all jobs at risk.

[EvertPruis]

Constructive, actionable and very well narrated and edited. In short: excellent!

[somosagricultura]

Thanks for the tactics, it's really difficult to work with difficult people, but sometimes it's necesary.

[jukkanikki]

Thanks. I got couple of practical ideas.

[accountantreviews]

And I know most companies will tolerate bad toxic people because they don't want to start the hiring process again

[redprice]

Good video. I was hoping for some insight for managers who have difficult employees who are great at their customer service work and we would not want to loose.

[ileoart]

Really good content, I would love to know more about how to deal with really anxious bosses. I can't seem to know how to get around this mega quickness that's expected, and nothing I do, seems to suppress it, The demands aren't well explained, he doesn't have any patience on explaining it and when I'm delivering it he gets mad that it wasn't his way, that I will only be aware when he is shouting out what he meant.

[Soulenergy]

3:20 keep notes of your colleagues bad behaviors
5:42 can you articulate exactly how their behavior is impacting?

[firdausismail]

Set boundaries - sounds like quit quitting

[blanktobefilled]

Will escalating the issue make me look bad? Really? I'm the one who only bring up the issue to superior and that issue happens to anyone and the one who got "punishment" is me. Who is delusional here? Nobody's blind, there's stats to look up.

[sf]

I like the idea, but if this would work 100%, there would be no more wars in the world.