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Juanita: What's gotten into Jeff lately?

George: You noticed too?

Juanita: How could I help it? He has been moping around like a wounded puppy dog.

George: Yeah, ever since his "promised" promotion fell through.

Juanita: Do you think that's it? I'm not sure what's bugging him. All I know is that his attitude is really sour. Whatever happened, he isn't doing much work these days.

George: The worst of it is, he's dampening everyone else's enthusiasm about the upcoming trade show.

Juanita: You're right about that! It's no fun to be around him-he's so cynical-it's a pain to work with him.

Conflict affects performance

Juanita and George are frustrated. Their frustrations can manifest into ongoing resentments, conflict, and sabotage. I have learned much about emotions from Elleva Joy McDonald, in Minneapolis. In one of our conversations she told me: "We don't like anger-we don't accept it. We really don't know what to do with it, in our selves or others. We think that all anger is ‘fundamentally bad.'

But there are two kinds of anger. One kind of anger is good-we need it to survive. It's the anger that comes from our dignity rising up and shouting: ‘No, I won't let you treat me like this! This is not right! No, I won't tolerate this anymore!' It's the part of us that propels us into action!

We need anger. Without it we are wimps-unable to rally to our defense, strike out in new directions and put an end to manipulative, abusive situations. It is necessary for survival-for our lives to be our own. But we are terrified of it. This is the anger that we must learn to accept.

The second kind of anger is unhealthy. It is utterly hopeless and despairing. At its core are bitterness and rage that come from the loss of hope. This is the anger that causes people to kill-themselves as well as others. The feelings are: There are no options left. Someone must pay. Something must happen. If I go down, you go down! Nothing is possible. Nothing is ever going to change! It's hopeless. I can bear it no longer.

Our anger does not have to be vented in self-destructive ways. It can be used to help us discover our needs.

Emotions are the gateway to vitality and feeling alive

Our feelings are volatile when we work day and night in long meetings using only our brains and we don't acknowledge our need for laughter, movement, emotions and variety. We create a volatile situation. Then we eat too much, drink too much or misdirect our sexual energy. It isn't just sex we want. We want to feel alive. We want the safety of belonging and the warmth of intimacy.

Underneath our frustrations is the desire for personal vitality and connection with others. When these needs go unmet, some part of us rebels. Then our needs emerge in self-destructive ways. The alcoholism, abuse and anger are misguided attempts to meet our true needs.

We do not want volatile or extreme emotions breaking out in the workplace. We know that without limits, boundaries and expectations about emotional control, relationships and work suffer. Social norms regarding behaviors exist for a reason. Our expectations of emotional control help us to:

• Reduce volatile reactions.
• Create an environment of safety.
• Provide balance necessary for our well-being.
• Ensure the stability of the group.
• Allow us to focus on tasks that need to be done.

However, completely suppressing our feelings keeps us from being in touch with:

• Work situations that are abusive to our well-being.
• Our larger goals and dreams.
• Seeing important clues in interactions with others.
• Recognizing unhealthful motives and con games.
• Appreciating our need for balance and connection.

If welcomed and used properly, our emotions are the literal doorways that can lead us out of destructive work relationships and into clear inner and outer realities that are supportive of who we are and what we need.

Immediate reactions to problems often disguise deeper feelings.

Our initial response to a problem is often not the same as the deeper feelings involved. Denise, a health care consultant, walks into her office one day and discovers that the contents of her desk are piled in the corner of her office. As she surveys the situation, she becomes angry. She thinks: Who would dump my stuff on the floor without asking me first! This is an insult. Someone is going to hear about this. Shortly thereafter, Denise's supervisor comes in and says: "An emergency came up and we must use your office for two weeks. I am sorry we had to move your office unexpectedly. I didn't have a chance to warn you, so I put your things together in the corner so you could move them easily."

Later that night Denise reflects on the incident and realizes that although her initial reactions were anger and indignation, her real feelings are hurt and fear that perhaps they do not really want her in this job.

We have four possible responses to the presence of strong emotions. We can run away, respond with anger and deny the importance and intensity of what we are really feeling. The fourth option that is available to us is to correctly identify our true feelings and use them to address the situation by sharing our concerns and asking for what we need. It takes courage to implement this option.

Running away from the problem

A frequent response to intense feelings is to remove our selves from the situation by avoiding others, not talking to them, moving to a new location or job, pretending the event never occurred, acting as if the person is not in the room. When a situation or person activates our deepest emotions, we may go to great lengths to avoid these feelings. At work, we avoid: disrespected bosses, making presentations, working with specific individuals, tackling a technical problem, attending certain meetings, and controversial topics we need to discuss-all in an attempt to avoid the feelings that are activated by a situation.

Getting angry

Anger, although it appears direct, is one of the strongest avoidance tactics we have because it keeps us away from our deeper, more vulnerable emotions. Outwardly, we seethe with resentment, yell at someone, stomp our feet, slam doors, make sarcastic remarks, talk behind the person's back or sabotage their success-all because we do not want to feel the emotions that are being activated inside of us. Anger frequently masks feelings of being hurt. It is safer to react with the brittle, harsh emotions of anger and resentment than it is to express the deeper, more vulnerable feelings of hurt, disappointment and sadness that are present.

Deny importance

When a person or situation hurts us in a significant way, we may attempt to diminish our strong feelings by rationalizing: This is not really that important. I am a "big girl/boy." This will blow over. I'll get used to it. They didn't really mean it. Sometimes we are able to forget about the incident and go about our business. But if the situation really bothers us, lingering resentment remains and minor incidents remind us of the very feelings we are trying to forget.

Unraveling reactions

Our emotional alarms rarely come as a single feeling, but more often as a cluster of feelings. When strong emotions are present, it is not unusual for us to experience all three reactions to the same situation.

I remember observing my irrational responses to a friend's neglecting behavior. Initially I pretended that I didn't care and was not bothered. I am not a great pretender and was able to sustain my indifference for only a day. The next day when I thought about the situation, I felt angry and resentful and imagined myself lecturing, moralizing and delivering ultimatums about how "I should be treated better." Later that day, I entertained vivid fantasies of the person's leaving town so that I would never have to feel this way again. In a short period of forty-eight hours, I watched myself experience all three reactions to the feelings of hurt and insecurity. Even the most educated among us find ourselves reeling when people and circumstances activate our deepest hurts.

Addressing the situation

To make the best use of primal emotions, we are required to move beyond initial reactions and claim our feelings before engaging in problem solving with others. Until then, our actions, problem solving and solutions are aimed at the wrong problem. In the earlier example of Denise, she could have easily responded by asserting her right to be treated differently or by pretending that the incident did not bother her. However, Denise decided to address her true feelings and so she took a different approach. She set up a meeting with her manager and asked for feedback on her performance. In the meeting she expressed her need to be assured about the value of her work. Explicitly addressing the need to feel valued was more beneficial to Denise than discussing the incident of finding the contents of her desk on the floor!

Solutions based on surface reactions never satisfy us because they do not respond to the heart of our concern. Many a lawsuit has been filed because of deep hurt activated by the way someone has treated us. Even when we win and there is financial remuneration, there is still the feeling of not quite getting what we wanted. True satisfaction comes when we identify, accept and respond to our deeper needs.

Clarify individual needs before problem-solving

It is a myth that we will ever become "mature enough" or "important enough" to stop having needs or caring if others like us. No amount of status and income can replace the joy and connection that we feel when successfully bonding and being appreciated by others. But to get this approval and keep it, we deny our feelings and do not admit them to ourselves, much less to other people.

In a seminar on "Self-Empowerment," participants identified a problem in their work life. Next, they were told to write ten or more statements describing how they really felt about the problem. They were asked to not share these feelings with anyone because it might inhibit what they wrote! After participants completed the task, they described how it felt to write "unedited" statements. Participants made the following comments:

"I feel guilty for having these thoughts."

"I have never expressed these feelings before."

"I learned something new by doing this."

"I think if I admit how I feel, I have to fix it."

To identify our genuine needs and claim them, we must allow our reactions and feelings to exist and not judge them. Knowing that we do not have to act on our feelings, express them to anyone or fix the situation frees us to be absolutely honest with ourselves.

Express positive feelings - but communicate negative ones

The first challenge in using our emotional energy at work is to get in touch with the feelings that we experience. But getting in touch alone is not sufficient. The second step is to learn to express our feelings in such a way that they can be heard!

For some, getting in touch with our emotions means relearning spontaneity and a childlike sense of wonder, getting out of our rational minds and allow our feelings to blossom and be expressed. Too many of us are overly analytical people who have lost our emotional spontaneity as we have immersed ourselves in structures of rationality and logic.

Others are too wanton and free with the expression of emotions and lack the discipline to discuss difficult issues with calmness and the necessary degree of rationality. For expressive individuals, getting in touch with emotions means learning to separate themselves from negative feelings, detach and observe-instead of responding to every emotional cue-and redirecting emotional reactions into calm communication and the ability to listen to each other instead of taking things personally.

Once feelings are identified, they must be communicated so that others can hear them. If our purpose is to assess blame or seek revenge, we are not ready to talk constructively to the other person. It is important to express feelings so that they can be heard. Positive feelings can be expressed spontaneously. When we express positive feelings, we affirm our aliveness, enthusiasm and responsiveness as a human being. When these emotions are present inside us, we must sing them out or the music will stop. Unexpressed happiness dies on the vine, never bearing the wonderful fruits of enhanced worth and social bonding.

As my friend Bill says, "Some of us have too many words in our head and we miss the music; others of us have too few words in our head and fail to logically interpret or communicate our meaning."

As much as we like to feel good and share positive feelings, it is impossible to have long-term working relationships without experiencing negative feelings. Differences of opinion and conflicting needs are part and parcel of working closely with other people. When negative emotions are not communicated, they grow larger and more intense. Negative emotions are like a ferocious pit bull-the longer they exist without being acknowledged, the more they work up a frenzy internally.

Anger denied eventually turns into rage; suspicions repressed develop into mistrust and blame; dislike ignored festers into cold hatred. We must communicate strong, negative emotions in ways that allow others to feel safe and not under assault. Anger carries with it blame and causes us to erect defenses or retaliate to protect our integrity.

The key to communicating negative emotions is careful communication rather than direct expression of these strong feelings. If I am angry about how you are behaving, I can either throw my anger at you or carefully communicate what I am feeling. Impulsive, unfocused expression of my feelings is a shock that will probably drive you away.

Value of listening

Ironically, listening to the other person is the key to communicating our needs as well. When we listen, we help the other person clarify their feelings and needs. We also create a receptive environment for our needs to be discussed. Listening helps us to:

• Understand the situation better.
• Identify what the other person needs.
• Determine what we can do.
• Increase our ability to respond creatively.
• Gain cooperation from the other person.
• Communicating about problems

Too often we try to problem-solve with another person without understanding the real issues. To communicate to another person regarding a problem, follow these action steps:

1. Affirm the importance of your working relationship.

"I would like to talk with you about an issue that concerns me. But first I want you to know how important you are to me and how much I value our working relationship." Be specific about what you value about your working relationship.

2. Share your feelings.

"The other day, when this happened [be specific about the event], I felt... [describe your reactions and feelings]."

3. Ask them to share their point of view and their feelings.

Carefully listen to their point of view, understand and summarize their response.

4. Ask for what you need (be specific).

"What I want, need or would like to have happen is ______." Listen to and understand their response.

5. Mutually agree on what to do in the future.

As we accurately communicate our feelings about difficult issues and let others know that something is amiss in the flow of the relationship, we alert the group or individual that a course correction is needed if we are to remain effective teammates and coworkers. We clear the path toward productivity by this communication.

But I'm not an expert

We may feel uncomfortable with the task of dealing with emotions. All too often managers delegate the task of "dealing with emotions" to the human resource specialist. These professionals can become a crutch that allows managers to wash their hands of the situation. But the offices of the experts are too far away, the wait is too long, the response is too brief and the need is too great to leave emotional issues solely to the human resource professionals.

Managers and employees alike must become knowledgeable in handling human emotions. We must learn new ways to relate to each other-ways that acknowledge emotional needs; ways that include listening, caring and sharing, as well as the ability to set limits, encourage responsibility and say no. Our emotions can be the best teacher. The feelings and needs we honor in ourselves, we will then understand and honor in others.

As we deal with emotions, we will realize just how much they affect the success of our business everyday. Work relationships are strengthened or weakened by the existence of trust and teamwork. Feelings of skepticism or hope determine whether we are able to achieve a desired vision.

The relationship between managers and employees determines whether individuals feel empowered or negated in their jobs. The ability to implement change is highly dependent on emotional harmony and commitment. The ability to contribute our best talents is determined by whether we feel safe from pending layoffs and that others recognize the value of our skills.

The effectiveness of teams and communication across departmental lines is dependent upon managers having the skills to create synergy among groups and to welcome conflicting individual viewpoints.

Our emotions are like the elements of nature-sometimes raw, violent, changing and unpredictable; other times pleasant, warm, inviting and steady. Whether warm or cold, violent or steady-our emotions can be controlled but never completely tamed. Just as too much contact with the raw elements of nature is dangerous for us, neither is it healthy for us to completely succumb to our feelings. Similar to our need for contact with nature, we need to be in touch with our emotions on a regular basis, but not completely at their mercy. 

Topics

• Resolving Conflicts