The 7 Cs to positively dealing with difficult team members as a manager or team leader

Check out these tips on how to engage better with your team.

You know the ones. They complain or bully, are unreliable, or simply refuse to take on any responsibility.

Their presence can disrupt the flow of the lesson or meeting and drain your team’s motivation and morale.

What can you do about these difficult learners?

When communicating with them, I recommend using the 7 Cs to be:

• Clear: Don’t leave the recipient of the message struggling to “read between the lines.”

• Concise: Keep the message as exact as possible using the minimum number of words.

• Concrete: Deliver content, fact, and detail-rich messages with laser focus.

• Correct: A correct message is not only correct in content, but also delivered in a way that matters to the recipients. Know your audience.

• Coherent: Your message is relevant and delivered logically.

• Complete: The recipient has enough information to understand the entire message.

• Courteous: Even the most severe messages should be delivered in a respectful, open, and honest way.

When using these Cs, remember that you have no control over the event. Meaning, whether or not an individual chooses to be difficult isn’t up to you.

However, you do control your own response.

So, if you’re leading an event and encounter a difficult learner, remember to apply the 7 Cs.

Want to learn more about how to work with difficult learners?

I’ve got a series of posts all about the different types and recommendations for how to work with them.

Check out the first post linked in the comments below!