Latest / It’s All Your Fault: High Conflict People / HCPs in HR, Genuine vs. Feigned Empathy, and Child HCPs
Transcript
- Speaker 1 (00:05): Welcome to, it's All Your Fault On True Story fm, the one and only podcast dedicated to helping you identify and deal with the most challenging human interactions, those with someone who may have a high conflict personality. I'm Megan Hunter, and I'm here with my co-host, bill Eddie. Hi everybody. We are the co-founders of the High Conflict Institute in San Diego, California, where we focus on training, consulting, and education programs and methods, all to do with high conflict. The last three episodes have been full of listener questions, and this episode is no different. We'll be answering a lot of your questions here as well, and thank you so much for sending them. But before we get into those, we have a couple of notes. If you do have a question about a high conflict situation, please send it to us at podcast high conflict institute.com or on our website@highconflictinstitute.com slash podcast, where you'll also find the show notes and links. We are so grateful that you're here today listening to us, and, uh, we are ready to dive into these questions. Speaker 1 (01:17): So here we go. Bill, uh, question number one. I read your book called It's All Your Fault. For the first Time While on the Beach with my young family in 2016, after some very difficult work challenges as a young and naive professional, I was having a hard time understanding specific people at work, some in my own family, and many high conflict tendencies in myself. I remember discreetly weeping when I read certain portions of the book due to the clarity it provided me and my situation. Since then, I've reread the book a half a dozen times, that, that's amazing. I read it with my staff in staff meetings and recommended it to dozens of folks who get bogged down by HCPs in their lives. A sincere thank you for the work you do and for the podcast. It's fantastic. Thank you very much. Today, I listened to the podcast with Cheryl Nap and Bob's Tenhouse, and in my opinion, it was extremely helpful. Speaker 1 (02:12): At certain points, Bob was talking about training HR professionals, human resources to help them recognize HCPs, and I kind of snickered every time he did in my organization. Our HR office is led by a textbook high conflict person. The Biff method and setting clear boundaries have helped limit their organizational toxicity to an extent. However, they are of course, oblivious to their own behavior and how it negatively affects our organization. There is very little trust in this person's stewardship, and they obviously undermine their credibility. Often , I've tried to be very dutiful and disciplined with my interactions with this person after reading the book, and it's helped tremendously. But the behavioral fallout is not isolated to me and my department. A visual metaphor that I find useful is I have the so on from the Lord of the Rings films. Um, I'm guilty here. I don't . I haven't watched it. I don't, Speaker 2 (03:13): I watched it, but I don't remember that Speaker 1 (03:16): . Okay, so we apologize if we there was a mis pronouncement. Um, but basically if the eye is on you look out if it's off you for a moment, it's a relief, but it's certainly aimed somewhere else at someone you work with and soon, you know, it will be focused on you. Again, it's a dreadful reality, but a useful analogy. This person is a retirement age, but plans on working for a good while longer. I believe that senior management knows what's happening, but they seem like it's better to let the problem retire than confront it, which I understand, but I don't agree with. This is how it appears from my angle at least. Nevertheless, the question is a pretty big one. How does one handle it when your HR professional is a high conflict person? So, um, that's a, a great, great question that makes it a little bit tough when you need to, uh, go to HR to work on any kind of situation. What are your thoughts, bill? Speaker 2 (04:15): The first thing is to point out that high conflict personalities are in every occupation. That it's the personality, not the position that you have to deal with, and that gives you trouble. And so it's important for everyone to know that they can be hr, we train hr and they may be part of the people we're training, so sometimes they use, uh, people who've had our training, but are also high conflict. People use our techniques as if it's everybody else, but it high conflict people become obvious, uh, over time. So just that it's not a big surprise. And I've, I've consulted on cases where the head of h HR was the high conflict person, or even worse, they were high conflict and the head of the company was high conflict and they reinforced each other. Speaker 1 (05:13): Kind of like a, a high conflict lawyer with a high conflict client. Speaker 2 (05:17): Exactly. Yeah. And, and sometimes they find each other, um, and settle in and reinforce each other's bad behavior. With that said, be before I go too far, I wanna thank you for reading. It's all your fault and point out that you may wanna read. It's all your fault at work, because that's, uh, more focused on the workplace building on the concepts in the book. It's all your fault, which is 12 tips for managing people who blame others for everything. With all of this said, you know, you want to try to find the healthy people in the organization at least to talk to and get some encouragement from. And if there's somebody higher up who you can talk openly with, say, Hey, there's a problem you don't see, and what's gonna happen is you're gonna have good people leave your organization. That's what a lot of organizations do. Speaker 2 (06:16): They try to limp along until the high conflict person retires, and then everything will be solved. But in the meantime, good people are leaving the company. And what's interesting with the great resignation over the last couple years is that people have been surprised that there's less tolerance for bad management than there used to be. And this is so important for companies to realize that they need systems to evaluate each other. I wanna mention, so I I have the, uh, Kaiser Healthcare system and I must say I am very pleased with their ongoing evaluation. If I've seen a doctor, like on the, on the weekend for urgent care for, you know, ear infection or something like that, um, a week later I get a thing, how'd the visit go with 20 questions? And frankly, if there's a problem, they're gonna find out right away. And everybody gets this. Even the senior doctors and the, the receptionists and this and that ongoing evaluation seems to be present in the healthiest organizations. And that's something that is ideal Speaker 1 (07:35): As long as something is done right. I I I, if they take that data yes, and do something with it, it's the thing. But as we know, a lot of times it's really hard to, um, either discipline or terminate an employee Speaker 2 (07:50): Yes. That something is done with that information. But I, I think we're, we're society is seeing that people need a little bit more supervision that we just can't count on people to monitor themselves. Maybe we could 50 years ago, but now people push the boundaries. There's so much change, things are confusing, the rules aren't clear, all of that. And high conflict people tend to be more aggressive and they, they, they kind of run through the gaps in the system. So finding people that help. But another thing that I hate to say it is, and maybe it goes with what we said with last week's program, is sometimes it's time to to distance yourself from someone like this. And you may end up looking to work in another division of the company or even go to another company that values employees like you more. So, so it's a, it's a, it's a common problem, but there's a lot of people that are very happy in their work, in well managed organizations. And so sometimes it's better to, to move on and find that, that happier place to be Speaker 1 (09:05): Yeah. Either within the organization or even external to the organization. Yeah. In a whole new company or, or, um, agency or something. Yeah. This, it's, it's tough. And if you, I guess if you have to have much interaction with the HR H C P, uh, you just use, continue using the skills that we talk about, using b f responses, using ear statements, uh, asking questions, right? And making proposals. I I think that can always relying on the, the skills no matter what role you're in, can be so very helpful connecting with that person. Um, but yeah, it can be, it can be a tough one, especially if they're, you know, there's no way that person is leaving for a long time or they're your boss and they, they just are going to stick around. All right, uh, second question. In everyday life, I am not considered an H C P, but when it comes to my legal case, I am considered an H C P by attorneys representing me. Speaker 1 (10:05): I often don't have a lot of money. I experienced domestic violence from my ex-husband, and despite hard evidence of him putting bruises on our child, he won custody due to defamation. And my breaking down my frustrations with not being heard, and the exhaustion and the mess has turned me into someone impatient with attorneys or excessively clingy with them. I don't have the money to pay them to care to tolerate such behaviors. My mental health diagnosis is complex. PS p t PTs d recently an attorney I became strongly attached to wouldn't tell me that I bothered him, but instead, when I attempted to switch attorneys, he told the new attorney, I begged him to be straightforward with me. He led me to believe I didn't bother him. I found that out through another attorney, and it broke my heart. Again, I was strongly attached to him. Speaker 1 (10:59): I suspect he was attempting to use Bill Eddie's recommendations for communicating with HCP people. Some of the recommendations bother me because it feels like manipulation. I like receiving communication with empathy, but I don't like being babied. And I know, like knowing exactly where I stand with people so that I know if I can trust them or if I should move on. It seems like his communication tips teach attorneys to almost lie to their clients until they hear about it from someone else and get their hearts broken. Had the attorney been straight with me three years ago, I would've left him alone and moved on. It would've spared me a tremendous amount of heartache, bill Eddie advocates for showing genuine empathy for HCPs. But the legal community instead seems to be patronizing, diagnosing, stigmatizing and segregating such people. It's almost an adverse effect. I want to be held accountable for my actions, and I want to know exactly where I stand with people. I need to know exactly where I stand with people for my children's sake. I don't really have a question, just my thoughts. And I just wanna thank you to the listener who wrote that and, and shared that because it's very important. And, uh, bill, I I'm very anxious to hear what you have to say. Speaker 2 (12:15): Yeah, that's a really tough, tough and touching question. Even though it's not a question , it's sharing thoughts and it is one of those dilemmas thoughts that go through my mind are, it may be you're expecting too much from lawyers in terms of a really great relationship. Um, it may be more positive and helpful and good feedback. Having a relationship like that with a therapist, um, I, I kind of recommend getting attached to a therapist rather than a lawyer. Um, because therapists can give you more empathy and warmth and understanding and work through issues and also have healthy boundaries without being, um, what'd you say? Patronizing, stigmatizing all of that. Yeah. But lawyers by nature are focused on problem solving more than relationship skills. And there's a wide range of lawyers. I think there's a lot of really great lawyers and, and I learned that after becoming a lawyer and getting to know some of them. Speaker 2 (13:28): I didn't realize there were some really great lawyers in terms of people in terms of having natural empathy, attention and respect. But I also learned that there's some lawyers that just can't do that. That's just not who they are. Even though they may be good at representing clients, good at problem solving, uh, legal research and stuff. So I think part of it is, is adjusting your expectations for the kind of relationship. If expectations for professional relationships need to be realistic, I guess, and lawyers aren't always necessarily gonna be that communicative around your relationship, they're gonna be focused on business and they may hold back saying that you're irritating or frustrating or clinging or whatever, whatever it is. That's why I think therapists are, are better people to not only have a more secure relationship with, but be able to talk about those things so they can help you in your own life, have happier relationships with people who aren't professionals and can give you the support that professionals can't. So it's, it's tough. I, I do wanna say that teaching empathy and attention and respect, that some people are just naturally patronizing and we give them this skill and they do it in a patronizing way. You know, I'm hoping it's better that they give empathy in a patronizing way than to not give empathy at all. But we're not talking really about changing people's personalities. And you may wanna look for people who really have genuine empathy, um, to work with and to be around in your life. Speaker 1 (15:21): Yeah, and I, I, I can, uh, definitely see where it, you know, things can come across patronizing because let's say a busy professional is, you know, really focused on, we gotta get to the, you know, the nuts and bolts of this case. I need to know what's happened. I need to get going here. And, you know, we're on the clock charging by the hour, so , um, they go, oh, what's that? What's that ear statement thing? Oh yeah, give an ear statement, something with empathy, and they say, oh, that sounds hard. Right? And it might be come off as, as patronizing or, um, just not really genuine because they're in a hurry and they're just trying to do their best. So maybe, you know, give a little bit of, of room for, for that a little grace space and grace is what I'd say. And at least they're trying, like Bill said. And, uh, it'd be better than, probably better than no empathy at all. I would think. So. Anyway, great question. Great, uh, life experience you shared, and I'm sure there are many others that ha ha you know, have very similar experiences. So thank you. Now we'll move on to question number three. I have really been enjoying your podcast and it has helped to ease conflict in our home significantly. So thank you so much. And I don't know about you, bill. Well I actually do, but that to us is gold, right there. Say hearing. I Speaker 2 (16:43): Love it. Yes. It keeps us going. So thank you. Speaker 1 (16:47): Mm-hmm. , it does, the person in my life that is potentially a high conflict person is my six-year-old son, six-year-old who is adopted. He experienced a lot of trauma before coming to us. We have tried all the trauma informed approaches, and they have not helped, and they potentially have added more conflict. But since discovering your podcast and implementing many of the techniques, there has been significantly less conflict. I was wondering if you have ever considered doing a podcast about high conflict personality traits in children. So, very fascinating, uh, question. And it, it is heartwarming and very gratifying to know that the conflict has been reduced for both you and your, your child in this situation. Speaker 2 (17:34): Yeah. So I, I think on this, that we really steer clear of identifying children as having high conflict personalities because in terms of diagnosing personalities and personality disorders, that's really not supposed to be done until people are adults. And you can see that they have a rigid pattern of behavior, cuz that's what it is, a rigid pattern of behavior. With that said, children have high conflict behavior, they have a lot of it . And so the thing is, when is it ordinary and when is it extraordinary? When is it too much? And the sign you have trouble coming and there isn't a clear line with that. But if you're concerned, it's usually means that it may be more than normal. And you may really want to consult with, uh, a child specialist, a therapist who works with kids, even just consulting and saying, is this normal? Speaker 2 (18:38): I remember when I was a therapist for 12 years, 1980 to 92, pretty much that I had a, a woman came in and she told me about her son. She didn't bring her son with her, but her son had just turned one and a half I think. And she said, I'm really concerned that my son is abusive and he is gonna grow up to be an abusive person. And my father was abusive and he, he's frightening me. He was so warm and friendly, my son, and now suddenly he's turned on me and he, you know, will hit me and yell at me and do these things. And, and I walked her through child development and I said, so he's, he's heading into the terrible twos, you say , right? And, and they don't wait until their second birthday to start on that. Speaker 1 (19:36): And that doesn't end at the, at the start of the third birthday, either Speaker 2 (19:41): , right? And so I walked her through that and said that the issue is not that he has these behaviors, the issue is how do you set limits on these behaviors that fit with his age and that it is appropriate to start setting limits and to verbalize we don't hit mommy. You know, that's not a, she was a single mother and that's not appropriate. And look, we need to, you know, let's, let's play a game. Let's do some, let's go for a walk, let's do something. So redirecting the child, realizing that the child's impulses aren't able to be controlled biologically as much as they will be by say, three years old. So this is a, a learning process and your child sounds super healthy to me, and that's, thank goodness that he's got energy and he's trying to find out where the limits are. Now all you have to do is show him where the limits are and, and redirect him and appropriate consequences, et cetera. Speaker 2 (20:45): So, so children's normal behavior doesn't normal high conflict behavior doesn't mean they have a high conflict personality. But with that said, personalities begin in early childhood. The first five or six years is the foundation of personalities. If you have concerns, then you do want to get some help and redirect that at this age, cuz it's much easier to redirect and teach skills to a six year old than a 10 year old or a 16 year old who's engaging these kinds of behaviors. Just one, one more reflection, I'm reflecting on cases I had, is I had, when I was a kindergarten teacher, I had a, uh, five-year-old boy who was very aggressive and he also hit his mother, not a one and a half year old, five-year-old. And we really developed a plan to help manage his behavior. And I coordinated a lot with his mother, again, a single mother on what I was gonna do and what she could do at home. Speaker 2 (21:57): So we'd be very consistent with the words we used in the behavior. And within five or six months, he was pretty much a normal kid in terms of managing, uh, difficult behavior. And part of the problem is she felt guilty for various reasons and was tolerating bad behavior. And so he wasn't learning where the limits were. So get some help, get a child counselor, maybe get an assessment of some type if you're worried. But six, six is is a good age to get some help, but not a good age to worry. Just be matter of fact, you know, Hey, we need to do a little more, uh, attention on all this. Speaker 1 (22:40): You do realize, bill, now that you've said you helped, uh, as a kindergarten teacher, ha you helped that one parent, um, turn that kid around in the space of a few months, which is going to get a lot of, uh, listeners asking you for help with their toddlers and oh, , their , their kids, their kindergarteners and five year olds. Anyway, um, I wanted to mention here too that we have a new ways for life, which is a little early for a six year old. Um, but at some point, you know, that might be really helpful, um, for him that, and that can be found in our show notes today. And also regarding the first question in today's episode about HR and workplace. We do have training for, uh, called New Ways for Work, for HR and coaches and, um, others in the workplace. So that might be of interest and we'll throw that in the show notes as well. And if you are the HR manager, um, uh, it, you know, it's a, it's a good one for you. Speaker 1 (23:46): So that wraps up our listener, uh, question episodes and we're grateful, so grateful for all those questions and I hope it's been very, very helpful to you. So we will be, um, shifting into, uh, a new topic here Next week. We will be talking about a very unusual and fascinating, uh, alienation case in the state of Utah, um, that's been in the news. So you'll want to tune in for that, even if you're not in a divorce case. It's just very, very fascinating. Until then, send your questions to podcast@highconflictinstitute.com or submit them to high conflict institute.com/podcast. Tell all your friends about us and we'd be very grateful if you'd leave a review wherever you listen to our podcast. Until next time, keep learning, keep practicing the skills, be kind to yourself and others while we all strive toward the missing piece. It's All Your Fault is a production of True Story FM Engineering by Andy Nelson. Music, by Wolf Samuels, John Coggins and Ziv Moran. Find the show, show notes and transcripts@truestory.fm or high conflict institute.com/podcast. If your podcast app Laos ratings and reviews, please consider doing that for our show.