My bittersweet relationship with aggressiveness
How do you deal with aggressiveness at work?
You certainly came across a co-worker, a customer or a supplier who displayed aggressive behaviours.
You say one thing; they will ostensibly take the opposite stance. You ask a question; they answer abruptly and curtly. You make a comment; they get straight away at you with acerb justifications. They may even shout. In these conditions, working and maybe just communicating is difficult and energy draining.
Aggressive behaviours are a nuisance at work. Left unaddressed, they will erode trust and team efficiency.
We are not all equal to handle or deflect aggressive behaviours.
When you lead from the middle, you must continuously watch for aggressive behaviours and promptly address them. You also need to support those who might suffer from aggressiveness.
But whenever I am subject or made aware of aggressive behaviours, I always try to understand the reasons behind, and care not only for the “aggressed”, but also for the “aggressor”.
If this seems illogic, I will explain why.
I have developed a special relationship with aggressiveness.
I had a happy and privileged upbringing. I have never seen or been subject to any kind of physical violence. But there were too many arguments at home. One second everything was fine, the next one, hell broke loose. Too often, temper would suddenly and sharply raise in the household, without any reasons – at least any I could understand as a kid – which made things worse. I could not make sense of the situation. I absolutely hated it. To this day, I can still remember very vividly those moments, even though so many years have passed by.
As a result, I have learned to build defence mechanisms. I was in permanent state of alertness, detecting the smallest signs of the next storm. And because I wanted to prevent any new outburst, I did all I could to keep harmony.
I eventually moved out of home, first at boarder school and then at university. Things got easier. I did not have to cope with much shouting and yelling anymore. But, as I found out many years later, I did carry with me some scars, and obviously, at the workplace too.
My relationship with aggressiveness had two distinct phases in my adult life.
The first one runs from my twenties to my mid-thirties.
I started my career in the construction industry.
For 6 years, I had the absolute privilege to work with very experienced construction supervisors who travelled the world to build breath-taking gigantic pieces of civil work. The construction sites were their kingdom. Communication was often loud and brutal. But it was strangely effective in this context. After the workday, those who spent the entire shift shouting at each other became heartful colleagues and respectable citizens. It was almost like they wore a disguise at work. I found that odd and fascinating at the same time.
As a young engineer, I tried to mirror this behaviour. But I was not good at it. It did not fit my slightly introvert personality and my desire to keep a harmonious work relationship with my colleagues.
I started to repeat some of the behaviours I suffered from when I was a kid.
Allow me a reference to Freud. The well-known psychanalysis pioneer coined the “repetition compulsion” phenomenon, consisting of repeating the patterns of behaviour which were difficult or distressing in earlier life.
During this first period of my life, I did not have a family of my own. I spent most of my time at work – I was an expatriate. Naturally, it is at the workplace that I displayed aggressiveness. But I did it on my very own terms, quietly. I have never been a loud and angry person at work. But when under pressure, I was passive-aggressive with my colleagues.
As I transitioned to a new industry and a new workplace culture, I slowly became aware of my passive-aggressiveness.
If irony and sarcasm – which were my favourite passive-aggressive behaviours – had some impact in my former South-European native ecosystem, it did not translate at all in Nordics workplace cultures.
When colleagues with low-context and task-orientated cultures were receiving one of my passive-aggressive emails, they would often get back to me and ask for some explanations – they were genuinely trying to understand what I meant.
If at the beginning I might have thought they were not very smart, I slowly realised that I was the culprit in these situations.
This was a long coming and painful eureka moment.
The second phase in my relationship with aggressiveness started in my mid-thirties.
A couple of significant life changing events pushed me to be more self-reflective. I became aware of the value of time – as in “life is short”.
I realised that I needed to use my time and energy differently. Call it maturity…
The biggest hurdle was to recognize my passive-aggressive behavioural patterns.
When under pressure or if things were not going exactly as I wanted them to be, I could be trapped in toxic thoughts closed circles. I would withdraw and avoid direct interactions with my colleagues. I would switch to acerb emails communication.
Paradoxically, I would feel the victim of the situation that was unfolding. I would also expect from my closest colleagues to guess and understand what I was going through. It felt unfair and outrageous that they would not. And as nothing was resolved, the patterns were just self-reinforcing, until enough time would pass, so I could forget and move on.
These were my patterns. Not great indeed…
I took me years to identify and acknowledge them.
In the hindsight, it has been a difficult process because my passive-aggressiveness was diametrically opposed to an idealised version of myself I thought I was. Another element of complexity is that passive-aggressiveness does not necessarily prevent you from being viewed as a valued asset for your organization. If you bring a critical subject matter expertise to your company, your passive-aggressiveness might be excused or overlooked. That has certainly been the case for me.
The border between your private life and your professional one is becoming increasingly blurry. My partner was the one who helped me to make me aware of this issue. But it was on me to do something about it. And as I found the courage to admit that I was a passive-aggressive person, it encouraged me to have a more holistic approach. I started to address this issue in all compartments of my life.
In the work context, I realized that aggressiveness was ineffective at best, and counter-productive in most cases.
It is ineffective because passive-aggressiveness did not solve any of the problems or issues that were triggering my unprofessional behaviour. It just made them worse.
And it is counter-productive, as I started to build a reputation of a competent but difficult person to work with. Passive-aggressiveness was a hurdle to personal development because it became difficult to give me feedback.
Becoming aware of my repetition compulsion patterns, both at work and in my private life, was a painful moment. I felt deeply ashamed that I was not only hurting myself, but I was also hurting those around me. It was painful, but pivotal as well.
I promised myself to implement a few simple things:
Stop and breath when my aggressive behaviour patterns were kicking in,
Engage directly with people, so I would not come up with crazy assumptions, and I would not withdraw and shut off,
Listen more and welcome others’ perspectives – one of the biggest game changers for me,
Do not reply to emails under the emotions, let it rest and come back to it with a clear and calm mind,
Ask for feedback.
I believe I have made tremendous progress over the years.
Like everyone, I also have bad days. And old and bad habits might come back. But I do not think passive-aggressiveness is a trait of character that would come first if I was to be described by my colleagues or by my close ones. I certainly need to check-in every now and then, mostly through feedback – that I would ask.
The process I went through has been conceptualized by Elizabeth Kütler-Ross with the eponym change curve.
Shock – Realising that I was passive-aggressive came as a complete shock. I was totally oblivious to it.
Denial – I could not believe it. It was unconceivable, because of my own history and the fact that harmony is so important for me.
Frustration – I felt ashamed about my passive-aggressive behaviour, I was angry at myself.
Depression – I had to accept that I was not that perfect colleague and partner. I had to grieve from a version of myself, even if it was a bad one.
Experiment – I considered what were the options I had at hand – see the few simple things I promised myself to implement.
Decision – I committed to enforcing them and ask my close ones to keep me accountable for my actions.
Integration – With the time, and by enforcing new behaviours, I felt more aligned with my aspirations and values.
Addressing such complex and deeply engrained behaviour is not a linear process – well, it is a curve. But it is also a cycle or a loop. Improvement is a process that needs to be reiterated continuously.
Back to my aggressive colleagues…
Although I will do my outmost to care for my colleagues who are at the receiving end of aggressiveness – as a leader from the middle, it is my job! – I will also try to understand those who display aggressive behaviours, passive or not.
They too come with their own background and history.
And where it is blatantly clear that I am not a psychologist, given my history, I consider that it is my duty to help my co-workers if they struggle with their aggressiveness.
It might be just enough to help them passing the first peak of the Kübler-Ross curve, and they will start a journey to address their issue with aggressiveness, for their benefit, and for the benefit of their colleagues.
What about you? What is your relationship with aggressiveness?
Get in touch!
As always, I will be happy to get your comments and feedback.