Chapter 8

When people become problem people, the thoughtless negative reactions of people around them tend to provoke and then reinforce more of the same. If you want to have a positive influence, thoughtful responses are required. It is in your interest to assume the best by giving them the benefit of the doubt. It is also in your interest to help them break their associations to negative behaviors and limiting self-concepts and to reinforce their associations to the behaviors you want them to engage in. If you do this habitually, difficult people may come to see you as a valued ally rather than an enemy, and surprisingly they may fulfill your positive expectations.

We heard of an interesting study many years ago in the Chicago school system that shed light on the power of expectations. The researchers conducting the experiment asked a few teachers for their assistance. The teachers were told that they were picked because of their teaching abilities and that gifted children were to be placed in their classes. The experiment was designed, the researchers explained, to find out how gifted children would perform in school if they did not know they were gifted. Neither the children nor the parents would be told of the experiment.

The result: The scholastic performance of the children, as the teachers expected, was exceptional. The teachers told the researchers that working with the children had been a delight, and they expressed the wish that they could work with gifted children all the time. Robert Rosenthal and Lenore Jacobson then informed the teachers that the children were not necessarily gifted since they had been chosen at random from all the students in the Chicago school system! Before the teachers could get swelled heads about their own gifts, the researchers informed them that they too were chosen at random.

The researchers called this remarkable performance outcome the Pygmalion effect in the classroom. The teachers’ high expectations for the students, though never officially expressed, helped the students to believe in themselves and act accordingly. Other studies have similarly revealed that to some degree, people rise or fall to the level of others’ expectations.

Perhaps you have experienced the difficulty in overcoming someone’s negative opinion of you, where in spite of your best efforts, anything you said or did was distorted into something else. Parents use Pygmalion Power whenever they tell their children, “If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a thousand times! You’re messy / clumsy / a liar / a slob. You don’t care about anyone but yourself!” This mechanism can be utilized, instead, to bring out the best even in people at their worst. Wise parents will find it far more valuable to tell their children, “That’s not like you! You care about your appearance. / You know how to take care of your things. / You’re a loving and honest person. / You know we love you. / You are capable of doing anything you put your mind to!”

When your difficult people are engaging in their problem behavior, you may be tempted to think or say, “That’s the problem with you. You always ...” or “You never ...” To use Pygmalion Power effectively, learn to say, “That’s not like you! You’re capable of ...,” and describe how you want them to be as if they truly are capable of living up to your description. And whenever your difficult people behave in a manner that you would like to see repeated, learn to say, “That’s one of the things I like about you. You ...,” and describe their positive behavior as a way of reinforcing their identification with it.

Betsy had been married to Sullie for several years. Sullie had a terrible temper. Sullie was one of those people to whom home is where you go when you’re tired of being nice to people. As soon as he walked in the door, he would unload all his frustration about work on Betsy.

Betsy honestly asked herself if she wanted to leave the relationship, and she decided she didn’t. She resolved then and there to change her own behavior in order to change the situation. That evening, when her husband walked in the door and began his habitual outpouring of anguish, she raised her voice loud enough for him to hear and said, “Sullie, that’s not like you!—even though it was! She continued, “You know we don’t deserve this. You’re the kind of man who cares about his family, and I know you would never want to upset us intentionally.” Her remark caught Sullie by surprise. Not knowing how to respond, he spun around and left the house, coming back home a little later and keeping to himself.

Betsy continued to greet his temper tantrums with these kinds of statements, and after about three weeks, a remarkable thing happened. Sullie walked in the house upset about a day at the office, but before she could say a word to him, he held up his hand to silence her, and he nodded his head: “I know, I know. That’s not like me!” He laughed, she laughed, and that was the end of the negative behavior pattern. Her use of Pygmalion Power changed their lives.

We realize that Pygmalion Power is not the easiest thing to use when people are acting like jerks. You may have to spend some time mentally rehearsing it before you’re able to talk this way with ease. You may have to force yourself to hope that they have it in them to change, when no evidence of such an ability is apparent. Yet, we have no doubt that you can surprise yourself delightfully with your power to bring out the best in people at their worst.

Joe was an engineer facing a crushing deadline. He had retreated to his office in the hopes of getting some quiet time to concentrate on getting the work done. Yet here was Carl, a fellow engineer, sitting in his guest chair giving him advice about the project. The advice was nothing Joe needed. He just needed to be left alone. If Joe had said, “Look, Carl, I don’t have time for this right now,” Carl might have left thinking, “Fine! Last time I try to help him out.” But instead, Joe said, “Carl, I really appreciate your willingness to help me out on this project, with your time and your ideas.” To which Carl proudly replied, “Anything for a pal.” Then Joe continued, “What would really help me out, at this point, is if I could be alone for a while, so I can focus my attention. Would you do that for me?” And of course Carl said, “Sure. No problem.”

Assuming the best can have a positive effect on problem people, whether it’s true or not. In the last example Carl may not have been trying to help. Maybe he was sitting in Joe’s office avoiding something he didn’t feel like working on. But when Joe acknowledged the positive intent of Carl trying to help him, Carl was not going to say, “Help you? Nah, you got me all wrong, Joe. I am just sitting here wasting your time while I procrastinate on what I don’t feel like doing.”

Whenever you tell people they are doing something wrong, they will get defensive. You minimize defensiveness in other people by giving them the benefit of the doubt and assuming the best.

For example: Let’s say you have gotten negative feedback from some customers about a particular service rep’s behavior. If you just come out and tell the rep about the complaints, your behavior may be perceived as a daily dose of abuse, and the rep may argue with you or try to prove his or her innocence. Or the rep may begin an internal dialogue of self-justification and not hear another word that you say.

On the other hand, if you begin by assuming the best, you can say, “I know you really care about giving great customer service because you care about our customers.” It is highly unlikely that the rep will respond, “No, I like to annoy our customers because I could care less.” Instead, given the opportunity to identify with a positive intent, the rep is more likely to say, “Of course I do.” Then you can state your intent. “And I would like to see you succeed in doing the best job you can do.” You have now made it clear that your goal is to help. “To that effect, I have some feedback for you from a few customers that I’d like you to take into consideration in your service efforts.”

If you’re one of those people who have a knee-jerk reaction to criticism, particularly when it seems unfair, perhaps you’ve noticed that defending yourself tends to make things worse. “Methinks thou dost protest too much!” said the Bard. The implication is that your defenses are an admission of guilt, and anything you say may be used against you. So the more you try to explain, the more the criticism seems to stick. Here’s a simple short circuit to rapidly bring criticism to a close without internalizing it or fighting against it: Verbally appreciate the criticism as a way of ending it. No defense, no explanation, no justification. A simple “thanks” is all that it takes, and it’s over.

At a conference we attended a few years ago, a participant named Marge took offense at a joke told by the speaker, Leo. On a break, Marge charged up to Leo and angrily accused him of being a horrible and vicious human being for telling that joke. Leo tried patiently to explain that he had been asked to tell that joke by the woman who organized the conference. He didn’t even know what it meant! Marge refused to listen, characterizing his efforts at explaining himself as an attempt to weasel out of responsibility for his behavior and as proof of his lower-than-a-slug character. Then Leo got a little angry, and he took a stand, demanding that Marge stop name-calling and try listening to him for a change. That didn’t work either, and soon they were both shouting at each other. With a finality that didn’t ring true, he declared, “Ma’am, I don’t really care what you think!” With that, he spun himself around and stormed off, stewing in his own anger about being misunderstood.

Later, after most of the conference attendees had left the room, Leo approached Rick, complaining about Marge’s wild accusations and calling her names. With some degree of amusement and dispassion, Rick said, “That was an interesting way of dealing with it.”

“Oh really!? And how would you have handled the situation?” demanded Leo. Rick replied, “I would have just said, ‘Thanks for being honest with me about how you feel,’ and I would have let it go at that.” Leo slapped himself on the forehead, then said, “Unbelievable. Now, why didn’t I think of that?” Then he walked off muttering about the subtlety of simplicity.

When you verbally appreciate people who are criticizing you, you’re letting go of the need to defend, explain, or justify your behavior. You simply hear the other people out, and you thank them for communicating. You don’t have to ask any questions about what you’re hearing unless you think it might be valuable and want to find out more. If you don’t resist it, once critical people have had their say, they’re done with it. Say “Thanks for being honest” or “Thanks for taking the time to let me know how you feel” or “Thanks for caring so much.” Simple, subtle, and sweet.

We know a young man who, after moving out of his mother’s home, didn’t speak to her for almost a year. He was furious with her for her bossy attitude and Know-It-All behavior, and he likened the sound of her voice to a chain saw that started up anytime he failed to meet her expectations. But there came a time when he was traveling, and he came down with a respiratory infection while staying in a hotel. Surrounded by strangers, almost delirious with a cough and fever, he found himself thinking of his mother and the excellent care she had provided him whenever he got sick in his childhood. Oh, how he longed for her chicken soup! Without thinking it through, he picked up the phone at his bedside, and he dialed her phone number. She answered the phone.

“Hello?”

After a moment’s hesitation, he said, “Mom? [cough, cough]”

“Son, is that you?”

“Yeah, it is. Mom, I miss you. [cough, cough]”

She started up the chain saw. “You do not! If you really missed me, you would have called, or written, or something, instead of leaving me to worry about ...,” and on she went, pouring out her anguish and despair.

But in his fevered condition, he had no energy to argue with her. All he could do was lay there, coughing and listening. And as he listened, a strange thing happened. For the first time in his life, he could hear what was fueling that chain saw. He could hear that she was willing to drive herself crazy for his sake. All those years of lectures, sermons, and tirades, he realized, were the result of her efforts to be a good mother, and she had done the best she could with what she knew. Love had been her sole motivating force, and he’d never even thanked her for it.

She stopped, as if running out of things to say. In that moment of quiet, he weakly told her, “Mom [cough, cough, sniffle], thanks for loving me. You really do love me, don’t you?”

“Why of course I do! Honey, are you okay?”

And for the next 25 minutes, all they had to say to each other was “I love you,” and they said it a thousand different ways. Instead of arguing over differences of opinion, defending their points of view, or any of the other futile and frustrating behaviors that had marred their relationship over the years, all that really wanted to be said was “I love you.”

The next time someone criticizes you, try this strategy. You may initially find it hard to keep that knee down, but in exchange for some critical appreciation, you’ll receive a big peace dividend in the long run.