While most of us will give lip service to feedback there is a deep tendency to shrink away from being told anything that smacks of negativity. Out loud we usually say “Thanks for telling me, I’ll look into your comments” while internally the thought is: “Who do you think you are, that’s just the way I am!”

There is such powerful resistance to change that most of us would rather be right and defend our position. We tend to dig our heels in and while we hear the words to make change happen in our lives, they slide away like an ice cream cone rolling down a toddler’s face on a hot summer day.

It takes real effort to listen.

Ingrained habits and patterns of behavior have their place. They are important for basic processes so we don’t have to reinvent ourselves every morning of our lives. Just think of what effort it would take to relearn how to brush our teeth every day, or look at a map to plot out how to get to work each morning.

Yet, way too often we go on automatic, not thinking about what we are doing and how it impacts others. Gandhi put it perfectly when he said we should not mistake what is habitual for what is natural. Changing what is habitual is one of the goals of self awareness, one of the key elements of becoming a great leader.

Becoming pattern aware goes hand in hand with developing high emotional intelligence. Here are some thoughts to help you move from “It’s just the way I am” to “Here is how I choose to be”.

First take the time to really listen to feedback. It is there for you to move to higher levels of self awareness and leadership excellence. While listening, rather than brushing comments aside, notice your gut reaction. If you tend to feel tightness in your stomach or notice you are clenching your fists or your jaw, pay close attention.

You can learn a lot about yourself simply by monitoring your own body sensations. Most of these basic reactions started in childhood when you were yelled at by a parent, sibling, or a teacher. This is where we all learned to hate feedback. It was rarely given in thoughtful, well planned ways. Usually it was a slap on the rear or a taunt, or a detention. Not good for learning better habits. Good for creating defensive positioning.

Let me tell you about Rob. He was a highly successful sales executive, knew how to bring in the bucks. Yet his team saw him as an old fashioned command and control type who took the word boss to mean he could “boss them around” in a bullying manner.

The feedback he got from a 360 evaluation made him cringe. He responded in a typical knee jerk manner saying about his direct reports “Who do they think they are criticizing me. I help them bring in the bucks. They get great bonuses every year….the ingrates. I have a good style of leading and furthermore, that’s just the way I am!”

When I began executive coaching with Rob it was painful for both of us. He did not know how to listen and was a master at defending his position. It seemed to go nowhere until one day I took a risk and asked him to look at his hands, clenched into fists as he talked.

He looked down and could not ignore hands ready to punch someone. I then took another risk and told him how well he fit one of the behavior patterns that had shown up on his 360. Rob was a real persecutor, a bully boss.

He hated hearing it and yet, and yet, he did finally listen. We were able to track this ingrained pattern back to the behavior he had learned as a kid where he had to defend himself from two older brothers and a father who were constantly putting him down.

Fast forward to an off-site with his team; in the past they had reluctantly sat through days of hearing Rob tell them what to do and how to do it. This time was different. Rather than ignore the workplace conflict, the invisible yet large elephant in the room, the rolling eyes and sighs of his co-workers, he spoke from a place of self awareness, of being pattern aware.

He did not go into detail about what he had learned from looking back at family patterns. Instead he showed strong leadership qualities by being accountable for his past in the team malfunction. He said he had become aware of his strong arming tactics, his need to be in charge and how this did not help create a positive and creative atmosphere at work.

Then he looked at the group and said “I am willing to change and listen to each of you and I hope together we can find better ways of reacting and responding. You have my commitment that you will no longer hear me say, ‘That’s just the way I am’.”

Gandhi was right, what is habitual is not truly natural. What is natural is to tell the truth, be accountable and look for ways to cooperate and accentuate creativity.

Author Bio: Dr. Sylvia Lafair is President of CEO, Creative Energy Options, Inc., a global consulting company focused on optimizing workplace relationships through extraordinary leadership. With a doctorate in clinical psychology, Dr. Lafair, formerly a practicing family therapist, took her skills into the work world and has revolutionized the way teams cooperate. Her book, “Don’t Bring It to Work”, published by Jossey-Bass is in bookstores everywhere. For more information email: info@ceoptions.com

Category: Leadership
Keywords: Leadership, Leaders, Collaboration, Relationships, Evaluations, Behavior, Patterns