Cultivating emotional agility

It all started with a joke among scientists in a lab: When the women scientists experienced stress, they cleaned up the lab and bonded together over coffee. When the men were stressed, they “holed up somewhere on their own.” That joke lead to a ground-breaking UCLA study that turned five decades of stress research on […]

Conflict hooks are your personal hot buttons. They come from within you, not really from someone else pressing them, though that’s how we generally talk about them (He just presses my buttons). They’re based in your identity, or how you see yourself (and want others to see you) in the world. >

If you’re in a dispute that’s heating up and you’re finding yourself hot under the collar, make it your mission to stop the conversation. For now. Let yourself—and the conflict—cool down. When a conflict is escalating and you’re experiencing an emotional hijacking, the conversation is more likely to spiral destructively. There’s no rule that you […]

A workshop participant recently asked me, “When I can’t get the other person to talk, and the conflict can’t be resolved, how do I let go of it?” I’ve had the privilege of bearing witness others’ decisions to let go of an unresolved conflict and move on with their lives. And it really is a […]

A few weeks ago I got a call from the agent of four television stars seeking some assistance from a conflict management expert. As the agent and I chatted, I learned that all four stars are anticipating the upcoming Christmas season, with its family gatherings, fast pace and occasional stress. All four have reputations—in the […]

People show their frustration and anger in different ways. Some shout. Some sweat. Some grow deadly silent. Some cry. Some become biting with their words. Regardless of how your anger manifests during conflict situations, there are some tried and true ways to de-escalate things for yourself.  Here are a few simple ways to manage your […]

A client, Meg, told me that in conflict at work she finds it difficult to “think through the noise” in her head. That phrase really resonates with me because that’s my experience as well. I suspect Meg and I are not alone. Here’s some of the “noise” that goes on in my brain when I’m […]

We all know the value of taking a break when things get a bit hot under the collar during conflict. Research on brain function during heightened emotion backs up this practice—and suggests that how we use that time during the “break” makes all the difference in the world. Simply taking a breather is much less […]

A month or two ago I had a long drive ahead of me as I traveled north to visit a client. So I downloaded some podcasts to digest during the trek. In one, marketing professional CJ Hayden shared a list of what she called the seven fears of self-promotion: Rejection Ridicule Embarrassment The Unknown Failure […]

Remember Scotty on Star Trek? I don’t know if it’s just my childhood recollection or if he actually said this a lot, but when he was asked by Kirk to push the ship’s engine hard, he’d say in that Scottish accent, Aye, Cap’n, but I think she’s going to blow! In workplace conflict, how do […]

A couple of years ago I reported the results of research finding a relationship between effective conflict management skills and likelihood of workplace promotion. Now the same folks who conducted that study have released a report on the important link between conflict behavior and perceived leadership effectiveness. The Management Development Institute of Eckerd College reached […]