By Jose Ruiz Jose Ruiz serves as Alder Koten’s Chief Executive Officer providing vision, strategic direction and the roadmap for the firm’s future. He is also involved in executive search work focused on board members, CEOs and senior-level executives; and consulting engagements related to leadership and organizational effectiveness helping clients create thriving cultures.
Can you deal with negative emotions in the workplace?
A workplace can become an emotional place. It is where people of various backgrounds and temperaments must work together while showing the best traits of themselves and producing outputs of high value. It is a competitive place where people race through days to climb the career ladder. Ability in managing negative emotions is both valuable and a necessity in ensuring long-term career advancement.
For this, every person has their own coping mechanism, depending on their personality type. In general, however, there are two proven ways to manage negative emotions based on Neuro-Linguistic Programming practices.
First, understanding other people’s negative reactions.
Whenever you did something, be it good or bad, there are four types of negative reaction from people around you. They are: placating, blaming, reasoning, and distracting. Recognize them well, so you would understand their thought processes and how to deal with them.
Placating occurs when someone disregards their feelings and hand over responsibility to you or someone else. Blaming is when someone thinks that whatever happens to them is caused by you. The reasoning is when someone uses logic and reason to oppose whatever you are communicating. Distracting occurs when someone behaves improperly to avoid confrontation, which is pretty much like a class clown.
Understand that those reactions are theirs, not yours. It is their state of mind, which is based their values. Apparently, when people react negatively to something or someone, it says a lot about themselves.
Second, understanding your moods.
Mood is an emotional state that changes from moment to moment depending on various external and internal factors. External elements include the workplace, people around us, and other environmental conditions. Internal elements, however, largely depend on our mental and physical health.
Memories, beliefs, and values combined with stress and external elements can significantly shift our emotional balance. Thus, it is imperative that we understand which mood we are in right now and what we can do about it. In the workplace, having an advanced emotional management skill can take you to leadership positions.
Carefully notice how you stand: are you standing straight or with a hunch? Are you smiling or frowning? Are your fingers and toes straight or curled? Are you sucking in your stomach? Is your mind ruminating with so many thoughts? Are you doing several things at the same time, which is also known as “multitasking”?
Recognize your stress level and current mood. While it is true that external environment directly influences our mood, realize that you can take charge for your reaction. If you have been involuntarily become negative due to the not-so-favorable ambiance, recognize this as well and regain your control to stay positive.
At the end of the day, we are responsible for our mood, happiness, and positivity despite people’s negative reactions and external environment. Moreover, when we react positively despite the negativity around us, we can help changing the ambiance and others’ mood for the better. The key is being mindful of our own emotional state and understanding that others cannot make us angry or sad. We are the master of our own emotions and, eventually, destiny.
About Alder Koten
Alder Koten helps shape organizations through a combination of research, executive search, cultural & leadership assessment, and other talent advisory services. The firm was founded in 2011 and currently includes 6 partners and over 28 consultants in 4 cities. The firm’s headquarters are located in Houston and it has offices in Guadalajara, Monterrey, and Mexico City with partner firms in New York, Boston, Chicago, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Denmark, Finland, France, Hong Kong, Italy, Germany, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, and United Kingdom. We know where to find the executives you need and how to attract top talent to your organization. Our approach to executive search is based on a thorough understanding of the strategic, cultural, financial and operational issues our clients face. Our executive search engagements are targeted and focused on the specific requirements of the position including industry and functional experience, skills, competencies, cultural fit, and leadership style. Our process is rigorous. We take a disciplined and structured approach to identifying potential candidates that meet the position requirements including subject-matter, functional and regional expertise. We use our high-level professional networks, industry knowledge, and internal research resources to achieve results in every executive search engagement.This is a text block. Click the edit button to change this text.