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WORKING❚ ❚ ❚ THE GAZETTE | MONTREAL | SATURDAY, AUGUST 5, 2006 | WORKING EDITOR: BRENDA O’FARRELL | 514 987 2563 | ofarrell@thegazette.canwest.com

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Want to get irritated? Lookaround your office.

There’s the loud talker whomakes personal telephone callsat her desk. You know far toomuch about her life.

Then, there’s the guy wholeaves his dirty coffee cups in theoffice kitchen for others to wash.Does he think the dish fairieswill do the job with their magicwands?

And what about your desk-mate in the adjacent cubicle whosounds like a hyena while he’sscarfing his lunch on the otherside of the divider?

These folks are annoying. Andyou spend at least eight hours aday with them. The question is,if you could, would you tell themthe truth?

Should you talk to them aboutthe things that get under yourskin?

“Yes, you should address it,”said Frema Engel, an organiza-tional consultant and trainer withEngel and Associates and authorof Taming the Beast, Getting Vio-lence Out of the Workplace.

“When people don’t addressother people’s irritating behav-iours, they continue to be irritat-ed and a little thing can becomelike a volcano,” she explained.

“Speaking to someone about aproblem doesn’t make the problemworse. But things do get worsewhen you don’t deal with them.”

It’s worth remembering, too,Engel said, that “we all have be-haviours that irritate others.”

“Being in the workplace meansbeing able to adapt to them. Butwhen there are behaviours thataffect your work and the work ofa team, you do have a responsibil-ity to talk to the person display-ing those behaviours.”

Engel, who specializes in con-flict resolution in workplaces,says she often sees unpleasantsituations that escalate fromminor annoyances.

Kathy Coughlin Whittaker, aWest Island psychologist whospecializes in couples therapy,says people display behavioursat work that are tolerated in oth-er areas of their lives, notably intheir families.

Workers can ask themselvessome key questions before ad-dressing the irritating habits ofco-workers.

“Is the behaviour disrespect-ful?” she asked. “If someone

swears in the office, for in-stance, it is.

“Another thing you want toconsider is whether it impedesyour ability to get your job done.”

It’s also key to examinewhether a habit or behaviouryou deem offensive is culturallydetermined, she said.

“You may think that someoneis rude because he doesn’t lookyou in the eye when he speaks toyou, but this may be cultural.”

If you decide you do want toaddress the problem, she added,there are ways of speaking thatwon’t alienate your co-worker.

The best approach is the use ofan “I message,” she said.

“An I message sounds like this:“When you (describe the per-son’s action), I am (describe yourreaction),” she said.

“Do it with empathy, but bedirect. For instance, you can say‘When you leave the cupboarddoor open in the staff kitchen,I’m annoyed because I bump intoit. I need you to be more con-scious about closing it.’

“It’s not only what you’re ask-ing that’s important but howyou’re asking.”

That means being aware of

what Whittaker calls “metalan-guage,” the angle of your body,voice pitch, intonation, speed ofspeech and facial expressions.

Engel says it’s also useful to tellthe co-worker that he might not beaware of the offending behaviour.

“You can say: ‘I don’t know ifyou’re aware, but when you talkon the phone, I can hear yourpersonal conversations. The sec-ond reason I’m talking to you isthat when you speak in a loudvoice, and while I acknowledgethat may be the way you talk, Ican’t concentrate on my work. Iwould appreciate you lowering

your voice on the telephone.”Your tone should always be

non-threatening, Engel said.“Often, we’re not aware of our

irritating behaviours untilsomeone tells us about them.”

Inviting an irritating co-work-er to a discussion over coffee in aneutral environment can also re-move the sting of the message,said Daryl L. Dagenais, a humanresources adviser with VertexHuman Resources Solutions Inc.

“You want to build a bridge,not destroy one,” she said. “Startby ensuring the situation is posi-tive by telling the person what he

does right and offering to helphim with his projects.

“Then, say something like: ‘Ineed your assistance with some-thing that’s bothering me. I needyou to make sure I get my reportsby 9 a.m. so I can be ready for the10 a.m. conference call. Whenyou bring me the information at9:45, I’m stressed because myboss is asking for it before then.”

Humour also defuses a poten-tial confrontation, Dagenais said.

“Let’s say someone alwaysleaves the milk out of the fridgein the coffee kitchen and itdrives you crazy,” she said. “Trysaying: ‘It would be helpful ifyou put the milk container backin fridge. I know it’s really heavy,but I’d appreciate it.’ Then, makesure you thank the person whenhe does what you’ve asked.”

Monitor the intensity of yourdelivery, she added.

“Don’t use a high level of in-tensity for a problem that’s notthat grave,” she said. “If the mes-sage isn’t getting through, youmay have to raise the intensity abit, but don’t shout. If you dothat, you’ve lost control and youbecome the bad person.”

Don’t deliver your messagewhile you’re angry, Dagenaissaid. “Wait for a few days beforeyou speak to the individual.”

There might be occasionswhen it’s preferable to defer toyour superior instead of address-ing the offender, Whittaker said.

“Ask yourself if the person issomeone who can harm your ca-reer,” she said. “Be aware ofwhether this person will misuseyour directness. We all know thepeople in workplaces who every-one is afraid of.”

When in doubt about a co-worker’s intentions, Whittakersaid, talk to your superior.

“If you’re afraid that the per-son is manipulative and deceit-ful or waiting for you to do some-thing because he’s envious or re-sentful of you, use yourjudgment. He may be purposelyannoying you to get you to act.”

And finally, don’t assume an ir-ritating co-worker is aware ofhow vexing her behaviour is, Da-genais said.

“People are not mind readers.”The key to knowing when to

act, she said, is recognizing ifanother person’s behaviour isstressful to you.

“We spend so much time atwork, it’s normal to have con-flict,” she said.

SHOULD YOU TELL PEOPLE you work with what you think of them?The experts say yes. The challenge is doing it in a way that doesn’t offend and ruin your professional relationship

SSTTEEPPHHAANNIIEE WWHHIITTTTAAKKEERR SPECIAL TO THE GAZETTE

If you could,would you?

I took a couple of weeks off re-cently. There were more than 300emails waiting when I returned.

A list that long, no matter howmany are duds, means a bunchof stressful hours deleting, an-swering queries or runningaround trying to figure out thoseanswers.

Doesn’t matter that I’ve left an“out-of-office” reply in my email.Unlike the “out-of-office” phonereply, which gives the personcalling the opportunity to hangup, this one shows up only afterthe message is sent.

What’s the point of that? Add to that the ease of sending

emails for every little thing, andit’s no wonder we’re over-

whelmed by this – yet another –supposed time saver.

Consultant Stever Robbinswas struggling with an evenheavier burden – up to 100 bonafide emails daily – when he de-cided to do something about it.

Head of his own career-build-ing company and a contributor

on management issues to theHarvard Business Schoolnewsletter, Robbins describeshimself as an “overwhelmwimp:” someone who reallycan’t handle being run ragged byemails and cells phones.

“Taming emails,” Robbinssaid, “means training senders toput the burden of quality backon themselves.”

The best way to start – natural-ly, since nothing works betterthan a good example – is with theemails that we send.

The first place to make thechange is in the subject line ofthe email, Robbins suggests. Useit to summarize, not describe, sothat the reader gets the full con-

text of the message. His exampleof a bad subject line, “Deadlinediscussion,” would be replacedwith “Recommend we ship prod-uct April 25.”

Cut to the chase, in other words.If you’re responding to a previ-

ous email, Robbins suggestsstarting the message withenough information about theprevious discussion to orient thereader, and if you’re sending aresponse to a bunch of people, hesuggests marking out each per-son with care.

By doing this, he says, you can“ask yourself why you’re send-ing to each recipient and letthem know at the start of themessage what they should do

with it.In order to get things done, it’s

necessary to make action re-quests clear, Robbins said.

“Summarize action items atthe end of a message so everyonecan read them at one glance.”

And if you want to reach some-one quickly, don’t assume they’llsee your email right away. Ifthey’re as snowed under as manyof us are, chances are the bestmove is to pick up the phone.

The other side of the coin, ofcourse, is how to read your ownemails efficiently. Robbins sug-gests checking email at definedtimes each day, maybe two orthree times.

“When it’s email processing

time, however, shut the officedoor, turn off the phone and blastthrough the messages,” he said.

To keep unnecessary emails atbay, Robbins offers the exampleof the CEO who charges staffmembers $5 from their budgetsfor each email she receives.

Other methods he suggests arekeeping answers so brief thatsenders realize you won’t be in-dulging them with long answers,and sometimes even to ignoreemails so people realize the onlyway to get their message to youis to talk about it face to face.

Remember that.

dnebenzahl@thegazettecanwest.com

DONNA NEBENZAHL

You’re back from vacation and face a mountain of emails: It’s time to tame the beastWO R KO LO GY