At the end of last year I wrote about two difficult personalities that can impact your organization. There are a number of personalities in every team. Some personalities have destructive components, and if not understood fully, these can become disruptive.

All people are different; we all have difficult parts to our character that wise colleagues and management have learnt to understand. Over the following three months I will be describing some difficult personality characteristics and giving some tips on how to deal with them.

The following is a brief overview of two difficult characteristics, and how you can overcome and manage these behaviours to best benefit your team, without people losing their cool.

Pessimistic people

These types take the approach that life consists of “just coping” and “doing the best I can with what I have to work with.” Pessimists feel that things are only going to get worse and always come up with the reasons as to why a new idea won’t work. They tend to make others feel that everyone, apart from themselves, are dreamers and are overly optimistic thinkers.  They like to have everything discussed with them so that they can point out the mistakes that are bound to be made.

Take care to restate the positive case to the pessimist, ensuring the last words are left on a positive note.

Managing a pessimist in a team needs discipline as a team leader on behalf of the team. Teams can be encouraged by management to let what pessimists say go in one ear and out the other, and not to be intimidated by their opinions. Pessimists are impossible to argue with. Their extreme negativity keeps them from hearing rational and positive solutions. Take care to restate the positive case to the pessimist, ensuring the last words are left on a positive note. Ensure that meetings or conversations do not end with opinions from the pessimist, even if the positive case is restated several times.

Picky people

Picky people tend to criticize everything around them, whine and complain. They tend to imply that someone else is always at fault and that they should do something about it. They seem to have an endless list of complaints, and see nothing wrong with complaining to you about one person, and then later on complaining to that same person about you. They send out the message to people that they are perfect and that it is their duty to notice all of the faults around them.

Managing Picky people is tricky. They need their conversation redirected. Use cut offs by minimizing their complaining and consistently paying attention to important ideas or positive things overlooking criticisms. Consistently ask them solution – oriented questions about their complaints. Ask them to write down their solutions to the problem they are complaining about.

Picky people normally crumble if they do not have an audience, and when they are challenged to take responsibility for what they say on a one-on-one basis.

In some situations it is ideal and necessary to confront a picky person in private especially when their criticisms are destroying relationships. Picky people normally crumble if they do not have an audience, and when they are challenged to take responsibility for what they say on a one-on-one basis.

Organisations function by people and their personalities. Harmonious relationships are imperative for quick and free flowing results. Training your people in the art of handling difficult characteristics can improve productivity, workplace energy and culture.