"I cannot believe you totally overreacted over a chair. Like something else is going on under there, isn't it?"
Is what another colleague said to me as I had just caused a scene about a chair.
But it wasn't really about a chair. It was really about the person sitting in the chair. I had an issue with her and I didn't address it with her prior to.
As I sat in the conference room I felt my face getting hot and my head began to hurt.
It was anger stemming from hurt and now the embarrassment of the situation. I should have addressed my colleague prior to the start of the conference however I did not and what happened next was totally out of character of what I was expected to do and be.
I am a professional performance coach however my performance was anything but professional. A major challenge as a performance coach is not only are you the president but you are also a member. You are human and will do human things. A good performance coach, however, will learn from their challenges in order to advise their clients. So here’s my case study.
Let’s address the first issue. I just overreacted. How did I get there?
I had some unresolved conflict that I needed to address with a colleague and I thought that I would just wait until the end of the day to address them. Sounds familiar?
What I didn't realize is that stewing in unresolved conflict is never a good thing. For anyone. Ever.
So against my better judgment, I sat in my conflict and "put it aside" so that I could get through the day. Not realizing there is no possible way to put your feelings aside if you are honest and truly self-aware. Total self-awareness is the goal for top performance.
So when I had reached my max of agitation with the particular colleague, I overreacted in a major way and everyone in the area suffered because of it. When you have unresolved conflict with someone, any and everything they do will bother you and you will react in ways that are unfavorable.
When you want to perform at your highest level, being aware of your emotions and feelings at all times takes top priority. If you ignore your feelings, they will take over. You've heard the phrase, "Emotions are a wonderful servant but terrible master" and this is true.
When you ignore your emotions they began to dominate and will take over your entire personality if allowed. This is why you have some managers that may be moody, grumpy, or just all together difficult to deal with. Emotions are a terrible master so therefore you want to stay on top of your emotional game in order to stay on top of your performance game.
Never leave issues unresolved when you are working in a team environment. Period. The sooner you address the them the less likely you will waste time putting out fires in order to get to the root of the issue. In order to understand the fruit, you’ve got to look at the root.
Once I had spent some time reflecting on my behavior, I then took immediate action. I apologized to everyone involved for my behavior and then told the person I had the original issue with that I needed to address some concerns with them.
After that conversation, I was able to connect with the other colleagues on a deeper level and they trusted me more simply because I allowed myself to be human, showed them I wasn’t above an apology, and was totally accountable. That day I could have asked for a million dollars and received it because of the level of influence I had just set which is a major reward of being a performance coach; setting a deeper level of influence in order to tap into the inner greatness of others to perform on a higher level.