I attended a meeting of an organization whose board I serve on. I was in the back of the room, and seated behind me were two disgruntled people who were loudly dissing everything that was reported during the meeting.
During the Q&A portion of the meeting, these people went a few rounds with the moderator of the meeting, until one of them stood up and shrieked an acerbic comment. After this drama, she declared, “I’m a communications professional and I know I’m right.”
Seriously? Can you imagine if this person worked for you?
Effective communicators – let alone a “communications professional”- don’t attack people indiscriminately. This woman (let’s call her Karen) is the poster child for someone who is in desperate need of anger management as well as some serious coaching in emotional intelligence.
Emotionally intelligent communicators are aware of their behavior and the impact they have on others. Emotional intelligence means having emotions without being emotional.
Clearly Karen has some work to do.
She lacks self-regulation, which is the ability to keep disruptive emotions and urges under control. People who lack self-regulation don’t take responsibility for their actions and tend not to give a hoot about the impact of their behavior on others.
To be sure, this doesn’t mean that you don’t or can’t get upset, but you manage what you say and moderate accordingly. Karen’s behavior was inappropriate for a large meeting and sucked the energy out of the room as she proceeded. There are plenty of other ways to make a point.
Header image by Image Flow/Adobe Stock.
