Technical Affairs

Mike Aamodt, Associate Editor

This month's column contains an article on screening difficult employees written by guest columnist Bobbie Raynes. Following the article is another piece of HR humor.

Screening for Difficult People

by Bobbie L. Raynes
Employee Training and Development, Inc.

Numerous self-help books have been published over the last decade giving insight into difficult employees, also known as "jerks" and "toxic people" (see the list of books at the end of the article). These are individuals who engage in such negative workplace behaviors as complaining, yelling, gossiping, or procrastination. Such problematic behaviors reportedly can create fear, confusion, intimidation, and resentment in others, thereby lowering morale, job satisfaction, and team productivity. While it's true that most of us are guilty of occasional inappropriate behaviors (such at times when we are stressed), difficult employees' behaviors have become alife-style response to various interactions with others. Consequently, their behaviors are relatively enduring and almost impossible to change.

The self-help books on the topic attempt to offer effective strategies for dealing with difficult employees, but, unfortunately, there are two major flaws common to all of the suggestions. The first is that the responsibility appears to rest on good employees to change their own behaviors in order to "cope" with their difficult coworkers. This is both unfair as well as unrealistic as there will always be more "good" employees than there are "difficult" ones. The second flaw is that there does not appear to be any empirical evidence that the strategies actually work. At best, the techniques may be more appropriate for use with current employees whose behaviors are only a temporary lapse in rationality and control.

Because the feasibility and success of the recommended coping techniques are questionable, an alternative to dealing with future difficult people is screening them out before they are even hired. Many organizations, such as law enforcement agencies, already use a battery of selection tests to evaluate applicants' knowledge, skills, cognitive and physical abilities, and even psychopathology. But testing for chronic "difficultness" is a concept that has not yet been explored by human resource specialists. Yet, because of the organizational consequences of difficult employees, it is critical that more attention be given to this area. This article describes difficult employees, the organizational consequences of their behaviors, and the results of some preliminary data that support the concept of testing for such behaviors.

Types of Difficult Employees

The literature on difficult employees defines problematic behaviors by assigning names to the various types of people who use such behaviors. For example, Sherman Tanks are confrontational, pushy, aggressive, hostile, and intimidating, They rarely, through words or actions, acknowledge the skills and abilities of others. They intimidate other employees by yelling and/or criticizing. They are often impatient with others. Snipers are also aggressive but unlike Sherman Tanks, instead of yelling they use sarcasm, rudeness, and gossip to intimidate and make others look inferior.

Whiners complain about everything and blame others for what is happening in the Whiners' lives. Rarely do Whiners apologize or admit they are wrong. Although they have many complaints against various real and/or fictitious "problems," they seldom offer solutions. Their constant complaining and bad moods can affect the moods of others. Whiners, like Snipers, are often the backstabbers and gossipers in an organization. Whoever isn't part of their conversation at the time will usually be the person Whiners blame for something that has happened.

Clams are basically non-communicative and apathetic. Their usual response to questions or requests for feedback is a shrug or such comments as "Whatever" or "I don't care." They do not feel comfortable giving input. It is difficult to know exactly what such a person is thinking. Clams make poor team members because their silence is often misinterpreted as judgmental, causing discomfort in other team members.

No People are like Whiners in that their pessimistic attitudes can lower the morale and attitudes of others. But No People are usually mild-mannered and relatively quiet. They just do not believe any idea--old or new--will work. In fact, almost every idea is met with a stern "it won't work" even before careful analysis of the idea has been completed. These individuals can very quickly deflate the eagerness of creative employees who have many workable and feasible ideas to offer.

Yes People are overly eager to assist in every project they can. Their friendly smiles and faces make it easy for others to take advantage of them. Out of all of the identified problematic behaviors of difficult employees, Yes People fall on the positive side. Although they are usually very responsible, they very quickly become overloaded with work in their desire to be helpful. Their tendency to over commit themselves often results in uncompleted or late work, which subsequently affects the entire organization.

Know-It-Alls are very bright and don't mind letting others know just how bright they are and how much they know. Because of their intelligence, they have a general disdain for authority because authority represents ignorance. This disdain is usually communicated nonverbally: they tend to ignore rules they consider "stupid." They also have a low tolerance for correction and contradiction. Consequently, they are unlikely to ask for feedback from others, although they are quite willing, happy, and eager to give feedback!.

Maybe People have difficulty making decisions. It seems the greater the likelihood their decision will cause conflict, the more they procrastinate. If and when they do make a decision, it is generally too late. Unfortunately, decisions that are late or never made can be just as detrimental to a team and organization as bad decisions.

Although there may be other workplace behaviors that any one person might consider annoying, the ones described above are those frequently reported as having the most significant impact on organizations. In order to develop tests to screen for such behaviors, an understanding of why individuals engage in such behaviors is necessary.

Causes of Difficult Behavior

Past research cites one of two reasons for certain difficult behaviors, both involving self-esteem: the overall affective evaluation of one's own self-worth. According to books on difficult people and an overwhelming amount of the self-esteem literature, problematic interpersonal behaviors result from low self-esteem. That is, individuals compensate for feelings of inadequacy by "acting-out" in some manner. Their behaviors may be triggered by what they perceive as criticism of their work, threats to their abilities and egos, fear of conflict, or fear of being disliked. In other words, feelings of inferiority produces a need to engage in superiority-producing or self-esteem building acts. For example, Sherman Tanks and Snipers may become hostile, aggressive, or bullying when they feel inadequate. They may interpret debate or constructive criticism as threatening instead of helpful. Know-it-Alls may frequently boast about their expertise and abilities as a way of building credibility and superiority in the eyes of others. Maybe People, No People, and Clams, on the other hand, may delay decisions, disagree to new ideas and challenges, or won't participate in problem-solving activities in order to minimize the risk of conflict, failing, or being disliked. And Yes Persons may agree to everything as a tactic to gain approval and friendship, thereby raising their self-esteem.

On the other hand, different authorities cite high self-esteem as the cause of particular difficult behaviors. According to these experts, it is individuals with inflated egos that have been threatened who are more likely to engage in aggressive behaviors such as sarcasm, boasting, or yelling. This is because such individuals tend to make unrealistic positive claims about themselves, thereby setting unrealistic and unobtainable goals, which then leads to failure. To compensate for their deflated egos, high self-esteem individuals engage in inappropriate behaviors. These behaviors presumably restore the difficult individual's feelings of superiority.

The problem with the research on self-esteem is that most studies have been conducted using adolescents or college students. Little research has been done linking an adult's self-esteem to problematic behaviors at work. Consequently, the purpose of the study explained in more detail later in this article was to investigate the relationship between self-esteem and problematic work behaviors of adults.

In addition to self-esteem, it was also posited in the study that another variable influencing certain behavior is overall work interest, an area not previously examined. This hypothesis was based on the observation by professionals in the field of career assessment, training, and development who noted that individuals with overly high or low work interest profiles engage in some of the above problematic behaviors. For example, it has been noticed that people with high work interest profiles often overextend themselves at work and volunteer to work on extra projects. They exhibit a high level of interest in their work and a deep level of enjoyment and involvement in what they do. These individuals appear to be more assertive and more likely to seek additional work assignments because they are rewarded by the challenge they receive. Therefore, contrary to the self-esteem research, overly agreeable behaviors may have less to do with a need to be liked than with a strong interest in and enthusiasm for learning new tasks and trying all available opportunities.

Additionally, it has also been observed that individuals with a lower work interest profile use apathetic, unresponsive, and indecisive behaviors. They are more likely to be satisfied with doing just the minimum amount of work required unless enticed by external rewards to do more. These types of people are often impatient, use poor problem-solving skills, and exhibit negative affectivity.

The chronic use of anyone or a combination of these problematic behaviors can lead to various organizational consequences if ignored or otherwise inappropriately handled.

Organizational Consequences of Difficult Employees

Difficult employees can cause organizational damage when their behaviors become the source of low morale, interpersonal and group conflict, and increased turnover caused by others' attempts to get away from the individual. And there's no question that constant negativity, bullying, backstabbing, and other aggressive behaviors can wear down and intimidate even the most optimistic of employees. This harm can equate into lost dollars for the organization in at least two ways. First, as other employees leave, additional money must be spent on recruiting and training replacements. Second, many organizations spend a tremendous amount of money on third-party intervention to handle the conflict resulting from difficult employees' behaviors.

Unfortunately, termination of such individuals does not always seem feasible for two reasons. First, many of these difficult employees are often highly skilled with satisfactory to excellent performance ratings. So what happens (and this is one of the biggest criticisms in organizations) is that management tends to ignore the behaviors. A good illustration of this problem can be seen in the following example.

An accounting supervisor in a public health agency was well known for his constant complaining and unpredictable angry outbursts. He could be classified as both a Whiner and a Sherman Tank. When something didn't go right, he blamed the situation or others. When his ideas were challenged, he usually ended up yelling at the challenger and storming out of meetings. Although his supervisor was aware of his behaviors and received many complaints from other employees, she refused to terminate his employment because of the high level of expertise and skill he brought to the agency (he has implemented numerous cost-saving measures for the agency over the ten years he has been there). So, instead, the agency put up with the high turnover that continued to occur in his department. The agency failed to look at the expense it incurred each time one employee left and a new person had to be recruited then trained.

The second problem with terminating difficult employees is that their behaviors usually don't become evident until after the employee's probation period ends. Once they become tenured and have ingratiated themselves into the organization, terminating them becomes more complex and risky.

Because of these consequences, it becomes imperative that organizations identify individuals with the potential for using problematic behaviors before hiring them. This can be done through employment testing. Screening for "difficultness" can reduce, if not eliminate, the organizational impact of difficult employees and can protect current good employees from having to deal with such people and their dysfunctional behaviors.

Screening for "Difficultness"

Tests which screen for certain traits and skills such as communication skills, leadership skills, or difficult behaviors must be developed based on the constructs which drive them. As previously noted, there are two hypothesized reasons for the behaviors of difficult employees: low self-esteem and/or overall work interests.

To test these hypotheses, a study was conducted with 169 law enforcement officers from three different law enforcement agencies. These officers were administered both a self-esteem inventory and a vocational interest survey. Their supervisors were asked to rate their officers on the extent to which the officers used the difficult behaviors described throughout this article: gossiping, disagreeing, complaining, knowing-it-all, yelling, apathy, sarcasm, unresponsiveness, indecisiveness, and overly agreeable. These rating forms were than correlated with the officers' self-esteem inventories and vocational interest surveys.

Several interesting results came from this study. The first is that the outcome of a factor analysis showed these difficult behaviors falling under two basic types: aggressive behaviors (gossiping, disagreeing, complaining, knowing-it-all, yelling, sarcasm, and apathy) and passive behaviors (unresponsiveness, indecisiveness, and overly agreeable). The significance of this finding is that difficult employees are more inclined to use several problematic behaviors (such as yelling, whining, and gossiping) as opposed to just one.

The second result, which is contrary to much of the literature on self-esteem, is that overall self-esteem did not significantly correlate with any of the two types of behaviors. Overall self-esteem (also called global self-esteem) is related to overall psychological well-being. Based on this study, there is no indication that difficult people use aggressive or passive behaviors because they feel less worthy than other people.

However, when self-esteem was broken down into three dimensions (self-worth, social consciousness, and self-confidence) through a factor analysis, aggressive behaviors significantly positively correlated with self-confidence and with disagreeing and knowing-it-all. Self-confidence involves specific self-esteem which is relevant to behavior in specific situations and involves an individual's evaluation of how well they can do an assigned task and how they feel about their interactions with others. From the results of this study, it appears the more that individuals feel they can do a task, the more comfortable they are with disagreeing with or debating others and boasting about their skills and abilities. Although confidence about one's abilities is a good trait, perhaps it is when individuals overextend that trait that problem behaviors begin.

The third interesting result from this study was the role overall work interest plays in difficult behaviors. Complaining was negatively correlated with vocational interests but didn't correlate at all with self-esteem even though it appears logical that people who complain are insecure and feel less worthy of others. This would seem to indicate that whining may have more to do with a lack of interest in work than with low self-esteem. Overly agreeable behavior, on the other hand, positively correlated both with vocational interests and self-confidence. Specifically, people who tend to overextend themselves and appear to be overly agreeable are both very confident and have an interest in many different work areas. Again, this is contrary to past research which states that Yes People are unable to say "no" because they fear rejection and have a high need to be liked.

Summary

This study is important in that it begins to lay an empirical foundation from which to screen out difficult people with problematic behaviors. Instead of concentrating on overall self-esteem (self-worth) as a predictor, the answer seems to lie in focusing more on self-confidence and overall work interest. We are currently conducting further research in this area to clarify our initial findings.

For more information on this study, contact Bobbie Raynes at maamodt@runet.edu. Bobbie is a consultant with Employee Testing and Development, Inc. She received her master's degree in Corporate and Professional Communication from Radford University and spent over 15 years working in the public sector.

Books on Difficult Employees

Bernstein, A. & Rozen, S. (1992). Neanderthals at work: how people and politics can drive you crazy . . . and what you can do about them. New York, NY: Ballantine Books.

Bramson, R. (1981). Dealing with difficult people. New York, NY: Dell Publishing.

Brinkman, R. & Kirschner, R. (1994). Dealing with people you can't stand. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Glass, L. (1995). Toxic People. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster.

Keating, C. (1984). Dealing with difficult people: how you can come out on top in personality conflicts. New York, NY: Paulist Press.

Meier, P. (1993). Don't let jerks get the best of you: advice for dealing with difficult people. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

HR Humor

The following is a sample of the "true meaning" of phrases used in employee references. These phrases were taken from Thornton, Robert (1988). Lexicon of ambiguous recommendations. Deephaven, MN: Meadowbrook Press.


          Recommendation                          Actual Meaning


          He is a man of great vision                   He hallucinates

          He is definitely a man to watch               I don't trust him

          She merits a closer look                      Don't let her out of your sight

          He's the kind of employee you can swear by    He likes dirty jokes

          When he worked for us, he was given many      He was arrested several times
          citations

          She doesn't mind being disturbed              She spent 10 years in a mental hospital

          If I were you, I would give him sweeping      He can handle a mop
          responsibilities

          She commands the respect of everyone with     But she rarely gets it
          whom she works

          You will never catch him asleep on the job    He is too crafty to get caught

          In my opinion, you would be very lucky to     She is lazy
          get this person to work for you

As Associate Editor for the Technical Affairs column, Mike answers technical questions and serves as our unofficial humor editor. In real life, he is a Professor at Radford University. If you have a technical question you want answered or a humor submission please send it to Mike by email (maamodt@runet.edu), phone [(540) 831-5513)] or fax [(540) 831-6113].