Why are difficult people difficult?
If you've been leading for longer than a week or two, you know what it means to interact with difficult people. A friend of mine called last week to ask advice about how to better lead one of his board members for a small non-profit. My friend, let’s call him Jeremy, is the Director (and Founder) of the non-profit. In the middle of one of the meetings, the board member started a non-agenda discussion regarding his belief that the board members should have more decision-making authority in the day-to-day operations of the non-profit’s endeavors. This was obviously a big surprise and felt like an ambush. Jeremy asked if there was a specific agenda or issue that the board member wanted to talk about, and the response was no, we just need more authority in general. Jeremy asked if he was unhappy with the ministry or his performance. The same response was given: “Everything is fine, we just need to have more say in how things are done.” This went on for over an hour getting nowhere