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You are here: Home / Employee Engagement / Employee Engagement and Managing Negative Emotions

Employee Engagement and Managing Negative Emotions

April 16, 2008 by David Zinger 1 Comment

We can find ourselves moving rapidly from engaged to enraged.

Many of us are not only emotionally guided we are emotionally governed. Our emotions govern whether we do something or do not do something. Emotions are much more than touchy-feely fluff. If you take the “e” off of the word emotion you have the word, motion.

stormy clouds

I appreciated William Ury’s book, The Power of a Positive No. Although the book is primarily about being a better negotiator I think it was valuable resource to think about emotions and engagement. I think we should all pay heed to his statement:

Anger can blind, fear can paralyze, and guilt can weaken.

How might these negative emotions interfere with your own engagement or engaging others.  Anger may blind you to potentials in others or your own role in engagement problems at work. Fear can hold you in place and paralyze you from taking actions to engage. Guilt may weaken your determination or resolve.

Fear or guilt may drive you to accommodate or avoid while anger can move you from engaged to enraged.

Ury is adamant that we don’t suppress our emotions. When you are in the grip of negative emotions do not suppress them or act them out. Take a middle road where you become aware of you emotions. Take control of them rather than have them control you.

William Ury also stated: The most effective way to deal with your negative emotions is not to act them out. It is to hear them out.

What role do emotions play in your engagement and the engagement of people around you?

Photo Credit: Story Clouds by http://flickr.com/photos/adrian_wallett/382889860/

Filed Under: Employee Engagement

Comments

  1. How To Be A Boss says

    April 22, 2008 at 2:28 pm

    I think that emotions have their place in the workplace but not in terms of anger.

    An understanding of stress shows us that stimuli per se are not stressful, but our reactions to them are.

    So I think that prevention of negative emotions through learning is necessary.

    On the other hand, “good” emotions should be encouraged via e.g. humor and team building events.

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