Dealing with a chronic complainer: Validate, sympathize, deflect, redirect
- Validate: Now that you've shown them you're listening, you can deploy the ultimate weapons for shutting chronic complainers down.
- Next, it's time to sympathize. Try to make it as authentic as possible. Avoid all sarcasm as they will notice it, and it will cause more problems.
- Validation and sympathy are usually enough, but for the really tough cases, respond with deflection without shutting them down or telling them they're wrong. For example, if they're complaining about a person, say "It sounds like you two have something to talk about."
- Redirect is similar to deflect. You're changing the subject of the conversation without making it obvious. For example, "The printer jammed on you again? That's so annoying! I know it's hard to shrug off these things, but I hope you can be a trooper because we have to get back to ...."
171
633 reads
CURATED FROM
IDEAS CURATED BY
The idea is part of this collection:
Learn more about communication with this collection
Identifying and eliminating unnecessary expenses
How to negotiate better deals
Understanding the importance of saving
Related collections
Similar ideas to Dealing with a chronic complainer: Validate, sympathize, deflect, redirect
Dealing with a chronic complainer: Listen and nod
Validation is the key to shutting down a complainer initially.
Do not roll your eyes or check your email. Rather say things like "I hear you." Complainers can wear themselves out in five minutes unless you ignorantly add fuel to the fire by suggesting a solution. Then the...
How to deal with a covert-aggressive person
- Let go of the pretense that if you play nice, they will play nice.
- Know your vulnerabilities and focus on the one thing that really needs to change: yourself. You can only control what you do.
- Set some boundaries for yourself. Be prepared for the consequences and set a su...
Read & Learn
20x Faster
without
deepstash
with
deepstash
with
deepstash
Personalized microlearning
—
100+ Learning Journeys
—
Access to 200,000+ ideas
—
Access to the mobile app
—
Unlimited idea saving
—
—
Unlimited history
—
—
Unlimited listening to ideas
—
—
Downloading & offline access
—
—
Supercharge your mind with one idea per day
Enter your email and spend 1 minute every day to learn something new.
I agree to receive email updates