Assertiveness Skills: You Can't Play Win-Win With A Bully Until... http://www.hodu.com/bully-win.

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COMMUNICATION
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Assertiveness skills
You Can't Play Win-Win
Body language
Communicating with
With A Bully Until...
your children
Conversation skills by Laurie Weiss, Ph.D.
Emotional Maturity
Enhancing your marriage
Family Life When being polite and understanding gets you nowhere, you may be trying to
Interpersonal relationships cooperate with a bully. It simply won't work. You must start by giving him a
Speaking skills reason to listen to you.
Writing skills

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"He didn't refund my money. I've called three times and actually spoke to
him once, and he agreed that I was entitled to a refund. He explained that
his bookkeeper was on vacation and told me she would issue the check
when she returned. He has not respond to my emails at all since then and I
have sent 5 or them in the last month. I don't know what I should do now."
After questioning this highly ethical, hard working professional, I learned
that the original payment had been made with a credit card.
"Have you thought about reporting the problem to the credit card
company?"
"Oh, I couldn't do that. I don't want to get him into trouble. I would rather
resolve the problem with him directly."
She was determined to be nice about the situation. It did not occur to her
that he apparently had no intention of refunding her money.
My client made the mistake of believing that everyone is as ethical and
responsible as she is. She is using tactics that would work well to resolve a
problem if someone asked her for a refund. Those tactics are obviously not
working here.
It's hard for her to imagine how differently
To win - or at least not someone else can approach the world. Some
lose - with an people play by an entirely different set of rules.
opportunist, you must
seize the initiative and
Sharks, opportunists or bullies or whatever you
command attention choose to call them just don't care about
cooperating-that is they don't care about playing a
game where everybody wins. What they care about is that they win. It
doesn't matter what happens to anyone else.

We're proud of our If they can manage to avoid you, they have no reason to solve a problem
ethical standards and with you-they don't even see it as their problem.
take your privacy
seriously Mathematical research (1) shows that if you want to win, or at least not
lose, with an opportunist, you must seize the initiative and command
SEE SAMPLE ISSUE attention. Sometimes you need to use tactics that are distasteful to you.

Once the bully experiences being confronted, s/he may start to behave
cooperatively again. Then your original tactics may work-but only AFTER the
bully has shown evidence of cooperating.
Are you

1 of 2 9/15/2007 11:29 AM
Assertiveness Skills: You Can't Play Win-Win With A Bully Until... http://www.hodu.com/bully-win.shtml

tongue-tied... The ethical professional recognized that this bully had completely ignored
and tired of it? her approaches. She decided that complaining to the credit card company
might get his attention and was her best current alternative.

(1) Axelrod,The Evolution of Cooperation

Copyright 2006 Laurie Weiss, Ph.D.

Laurie Weiss, Ph.D., author of The Integrity Course, andDare to Say It! is an internationally known
executive coach, psychotherapist, and author. For more simple secrets for learning how to say
what you think without getting fired or losing your friends, visit http://www.TheIntegrityCourse.com.
For more simple secrets for turning difficult conversations into opportunities for cooperation and
success, visit http://www.DareToSayIt.com.

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How to Avoid a Verbal Fight
Conversation Going For a Win-Win Result: A Guide to Being Assertive
And Small Talk Facing Up to Pressure to Make a Quick Decision
What's Stopping You From speaking Up?
With Anyone How to Recognize a Verbal Bully
That You Meet Dealing With an Office Bully Co-worker
At Any Time!"
Are you too busy
worrying about
what you are
going to say
rather than
actually listening
to the other
person talking?

Don't you just

HATE suffering
those long drawn
out silences!

Now's the time

for change!
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