I’m sure there’s not a one of us that can say that they’ve escaped being torpedoed by a co-worker or, worse yet, by a boss. I know that I have, and have also witnessed many a verbal “flattening.”  It’s not a pretty sight – and it is very visible, because one can’t truly be thrown under the bus without there being at least one witness.  It’s the witness factor that makes the verbal squashing so effective.

So what do we do when we’ve been so succinctly placed on the alter and sacrificed for the sake of someone’s reputation, image, social standing, or just plain mean streak.  How do we respond when we’ve been flung under the bus?

Human nature screams DEFENSE! You know what that feels like — everything is cruising along, all is well with the world, and *wham* — someone says or does something that makes you physically pull back in disbelief.  You know the feeling, the double take that makes you stop and do a quick rewind to what just happened.  It feels like a verbal slap, and when you’re being slapped you either want to slap back or duck, depending on how risk averse you are. Unfortunately, in the workplace, we can do neither without consequences. And let’s face it, some are better at handling conflict “in the moment” than others. So we often say nothing and brood, gossip, snipe at someone else, or plot some type of evil revenge, even if we never plan on carrying out our diabolical plot.

For those of us who have been verbally tossed under the wheels, take heart — most of us have been there.  To address it, you will need to put your emotions in check, because I’m sure you’re not going to want to give the tosser additional ammo. So how do we not succumb to the urge to get even or depressed?

Probably the most sage advice I’ve ever found has been in the Crucial Conversations/Confrontation series by Vital Smarts.  I haven’t found any better techniques than I have found in these two books. If you’ll forgive my paraphrasing, the first step is to humanize the problem. By asking ourselves why a normal, rational, intelligent person would behave in such a way forces us to look away from our own hurt and dismay to take a second look at the situation from the other’s point of view. This exercise also helps to redirect our emotions to something a little more positive that making an effigy of the individual and sticking it with pins.  If you can assign reasons rather than blame you are more than halfway to the point of being able to deal with the problem. At some point you will need to make the decision to confront or to let go.  If you choose to let it go, you need to be ok with how you feel about that choice.  If it starts to really eat at you, then probably letting it go was not the best course of action.  This means at some point you will need to address the issue with the bus tosser. So how do we begin the conversation — it starts with us. Click here for a great video on how to begin a difficult conversation.

More on this topic in the next post.