I used to work with a wonderful lady (let’s call her Jo) who has left an impression on me as few do.  She was a hard worker who smiled constantly, she helped me grow my business and see the vision for what developed in the year’s after she left.  However the biggest impact she had on me was watching her deal with different people.  She was incredible and always won people over. 

In our job we have to deal with a lot of egos, people who in a stressful situation can try to categorise you and put you in your place as they’re scared of how successful you could be.  In spite of some difficult personalities Jo always managed to take on board people’s comments and keep smiling.  I always envied that ability - and still to this day, 10 year’s later I can hear her saying “ Kill them with kindness”.  Now this wasn’t about violence but about responding in a way that completely disarms your ‘opponent’.

I saw one of our suppliers totally flip out at an event and end up blaming Jo for many, many things, even getting deeply personal.  This lovely lady just kept on smiling and seemingly absorbing all the comments but not once retaliate.  Jo knew she was in the right and she knew that this tirade was the result of a stressful situation and lack of sleep.  So she didn’t rise to the bait but answered questions politely and with respect.  I think she even offered to go and fetch them a cup of tea once the situation had been diffused.  Yes, it did affect her but she was able to move on and keep moving the event forward without going into a corner for a screaming at the wall session.  She had enough self-esteem and courage to let that all wash over her and then not store it for future use.

So to this day I always try to respond to anger with kindness and understanding - I can’t say I manage all the time but it has helped me enormously.  Arguing about a situation in a stressful moment is pointless - what you need to do is let the other person’s steam escape and then work with them to find a solution.

I’ve said before that it’s really important to consider the skills and personality of each team member but it’s become more apparent again as I move forwards and change the way I do business.  Sometimes it’s just a gut feeling but other times it’s a dramatically different approach to a situation that makes me take stock and re-evaluate.

Have you every done a psychometric profile for work?  When I was much younger I always felt that any time I’d done one of these at interview I ended up without getting the job.  The disappointing thing was I never found out what the interviewers learnt - it might have given me some amazing feedback.  I have to say I didn’t go back and ask for the data or any feedback and would now recommend that to anyone who doesn’t get a job.  It may be as simple as your personal style doesn’t fit into the existing team or it may be that they were looking for a team player and you’re a leader.  However, I do believe that knowing that early on in your career can help you make decisions about which route to take.  So as you make career decisions I’d recommend you take any, reasonably priced, opportunity to learn more about yourself.

As an employer I used a system by Colourworks to try to get more information about potential employees before I brought them back in for a second interview.  It was invaluable - not just in learning more about the person but also to help me identify what I was looking for and which of my prejudices I was using to qualify or rule out that person.  After all an office full of me’s sounded great but really wasn’t the best way to build a cohesive progressive team!

So to the current day - things have moved on personally and in my career and I’m once again making some choices as to which direction to take.  As things have changed so dramatically in the past 3 years I’m looking at re-doing my profile to see how my values have changed. Much of this is related to age - I’m more experienced, I’m not quite so ambitious, I’m certainly not willing to drop everything to run to another country (well, not without serious consideration this time!).  As a result I’m really looking forward to exploring my values and motives again and seeing what direction life takes me.