Why we get angry — And why uncontrolled anger is a serious health threat
By R. Morgan Griffin
WebMD Feature
Reviewed by Amal Chakraburtty, MD
Life provides men with an endless supply of things to get angry about. There’s the sullen waitress who refuses to look in your direction while you wave desperately for the check. There’s the oaf who drifts across the road without ever using his blinker. There’s the dropped call, the tepid shower, the gum on the bottom of the shoe.
While it’s perfectly natural to get angry about any of these things, anger comes to some men more naturally than others. For the hot-tempered, the pettiest annoyance results in out-of-control anger. And some guys, despite the fact anger is listed among the deadly sins, genuinely like having a hot temper. It can be a source of pride and a badge of masculinity. Even if you’re not busting heads every weekend at a roadhouse, you might enjoy indulging your angry side. You might feel that anger helps you succeed and inspires respect.
But there’s a downside to the manful, short-fused Type A personality. “In researching people with this disposition, we found that anger and hostility may actually be lethal,” says Charles D. Spielberger, PhD, a distinguished research professor of psychology at the University of South Florida who’s been studying anger for 25 years. And he means lethal to the person who gets angry, not the one on the receiving end of the anger. The evidence that anger can detract from your health is mounting all the time. And of course, uncontrolled anger in men can leave your marriage and your career — not to mention your crockery — in pieces.
So what is this emotion that we all share but rarely think about? How do we know if our anger is out of control — and what is it doing to us?
Understanding anger
Is anger just an emotion? While we think of it that way, it’s really much more. “Anger is both psychological and physiological,” Spielberger tells WebMD. When you lose control of your anger during a traffic jam or at your son’s soccer game, your nervous system triggers a number of biological reactions:
• Levels of hormones, like cortisol, increase.
• Your breathing gets faster.
• Your pulse gets faster.
• Your blood pressure rises.
• As you heat up, you begin to sweat.
• Your pupils dilate.
• You may notice sudden headaches.
Basically, your body is gearing up for intense physical activity. This is the “fight” part of the “fight or flight” response. If we’re exposed to something stressful, our bodies get ready to do battle or run away.
Spielberger says that anger is common because it has an evolutionary advantage. “Anger isn’t just a human emotion,” he says. “Fear and rage are common to animals too. They developed over eons to help creatures fight and survive.”
Don’t have a coronary, dude! Health risks of uncontrolled anger
The problem is that, nowadays, your body’s full-blooded physical response to anger isn’t always so useful. It might have come in handy when our ancestors were trying to club a cave bear to death. But it really doesn’t help much when you’re standing in a line at the DMV.
In fact, uncontrolled anger is worse than useless: It’s bad for you. Several studies have found a link between anger and disease. For instance, a large study of almost 13,000 people found that those who had high levels of anger — but normal blood pressure — were more likely to develop coronary artery disease or have a heart attack. The angriest were three times as likely to have a heart attack as the least angry.
So how does anger turn into disease? Your body’s physical reaction to anger is intended for the short-term — it gives you the immediate boost you need to survive. But if this explosion of hormones is triggered too often, you can suffer long-term effects. Anger’s stress hormones may contribute to arteriosclerosis, the build-up of plaques in the arteries that can cause heart attacks and strokes. These hormones may also increase levels of C-reactive protein (CRP), which causes inflammation and may also contribute to cardiovascular risk. One 2004 study in Psychosomatic Medicine found that people prone to anger had levels of CRP twice or three times as high as others. Anger can even cause electrical disturbances in the heart rhythm.
Anger has also been linked with depression. People who report being frequently angry are less likely to take care of themselves. They’re more likely to smoke, drink to excess, and eat badly, and they’re less likely to exercise. While it’s hard to say that in these cases anger is the cause, it’s certainly linked with a lot of unhealthy behaviors. Anger can also be an expression of feelings of helplessness or depression.
Controlling your anger
But Spielberger doesn’t want anger to be demonized. It’s not evil. “Anger is a natural, human emotion,” Spielberger says. “There’s nothing abnormal about it.”
He points out that when it’s correctly channeled, anger can be constructive. It can drive people to speak out and solve problems. It’s the impulse behind much great literature and music. The white hot anger of the righteous has often been a powerful, positive force in our world. But the problem is that for every man who uses his anger constructively, there are a dozen brawling knuckleheads who waste their lives making appearances in the local paper’s police blotter.
Since anger is natural, what are we supposed to do with it?
Spielberger says that there are two wrong things to do with it. One is to think that it’s healthy and normal to have uncontrolled anger released in an explosive rage. Some guys just assume that screaming at people, throwing things, and punching walls is cathartic and will make them feel better. In fact, getting into a rage can just ramp up your reaction — making you even less in control of your anger.
Here’s the other wrong thing: to push down the bile and keep smiling. Some men think that any expression of anger is unhealthy or antisocial and should be suppressed.
Studies show that both approaches — noisily expressing your anger or soundlessly burying it — are equally harmful and may pose the same health risks, Spielberger says. But if neither corking up your anger nor blowing your stack is a healthy option, what’s an angry man to do?
There is another option. Let anger out, but control it, Spielberger says. The first step is to become self-aware. Don't let yourself fly into a rage. Instead, be conscious of your anger. It’s the only way to figure out exactly what is making you angry.
Once you can identify the real problem, you can try to solve it rationally instead of getting pointlessly furious. If you’re angry with someone, talk about it in an assertive — but not aggressive — way. If a certain situation predictably sparks uncontrolled anger, learn how to prepare for it. Better yet, learn how to avoid the situation altogether in the future, if possible. The advantage to channeling your anger in this way is that you get a concrete benefit: You’re actually trying to deal with the problem rather than just yelling about it, and you’re more likely to get the result you desire.
Chill out, man: Tips for cooling down
Since feeling angry is in part a physical process, you won’t be able to just talk yourself out of it logically. Instead, you need to calm yourself down physically. With these techniques, you can lower your heart rate and blood pressure as well as control your anger.
• Take a deep breath. Breathe in and out deeply from your diaphragm, which is under your chest bone. After a minute or so, you should feel some tension ebb away. The advantage to breathing exercises is that you can do them anywhere, says Spielberger. Once you’re good at them, you can even do them in the middle of a marital spat or a staff meeting.
• Take a break. If you feel your anger getting out of control, get a change of scenery. If possible, leave the room or go for a walk.
• Focus on something else. Count to 10. Try imagining yourself in a calm place. Or repeat a soothing word to yourself.
• Get some exercise. Building physical activity into your schedule can be a great stress reliever.
More serious problems with anger need to be treated. Yeah, the phrase “anger management” can sound pretty feeble and goofy. It’s often seen (and used) as a punishment, a humiliation to be endured — like doing community service picking up litter on the freeway — rather than anything you’d ever want to seek out on your own.
But if you think uncontrolled anger is interfering with your life, get help before it’s court mandated. Learn how to turn your rage into something useful. Because taming your uncontrolled anger won’t only benefit the people around you — it will make your life better and healthier too.
Like any other human emotion, it’s how you use — not abuse — anger that matters.
Sunday, January 13, 2008
How To Relieve Stress in Men
Admit It, Men: You’re Stressed
How you can recognize and relieve stress
By Sean Elder
WebMD Feature
Reviewed by Amal Chakraburtty, MD
You probably think of yourself as an average guy. And you probably think you cope pretty well with everyday stress. Sure, the boss might be causing you stress at work and making you uneasy about how secure your job is. Yeah, and maybe your wife has been too busy or too tired lately to notice just how much stress you have to deal with. And look at how fast your daughter is growing up. It’s as if you’re watching her in time-lapse photography while your college-aged son is still stuck in high school. . .
But that’s all right. You’re cool. Except for those stressful moments when you snarl because your shirt buttons are too big, or you bust a blood vessel because some old lady is taking forever to get off the bus, or the blankety-blank CD, which you paid perfectly good money for, is shrink-wrapped so tightly that you break the case trying to open it. Whoa! Maybe it’s not the disc that’s wrapped too tight.
Do you think maybe you are feeling more stress these days? Maybe even more stress than a woman?
Suck it up? How men try to cope with stress
“I think women and men are equally stressed,” says Edward Hallowell, MD. “Men just deal with stress differently.” Hallowell is founder of the Hallowell Center in Sudbury, Mass., and author of Crazy Busy: Overstretched, Overbooked and About to Snap! Strategies for Coping in a World Gone ADD. “Men notoriously have trouble putting their feelings into words,” he says. “They bottle things up so they’re more subject to the damages of stress.”
But aren’t men just supposed to suck it up? “The essence of traditional masculinity is invulnerability,” says Terrence Real, MSW, a psychotherapist in Newton, Mass. Real is the author of I Don’t Want to Talk About It: Overcoming the Secret Legacy of Male Depression. “Vulnerability equals femininity,” he says. “Femininity equals unmanliness. And unmanliness equals disaster. The system that men organize their psychology around is built on a lie. We’re all trying to be little Al Haigs, saying, ‘I’m in charge here.’”
Not that women are any more in charge. They’re just given more leeway and are more apt to be forgiven if they throw up their hands and say, “I can’t handle it!” Hallowell believes they actually have a tougher time of it than men.
“Women’s stress often comes from working as well as having the primary caretaking responsibilities at home,” he says. In fact, the causes of stress may be the same for both genders — too much work and too little time for exercise or relaxation. But Hallowell thinks men are deprived of a crucial safety valve. “Men have trouble saying, ‘Gosh, this is hard,’ and asking for help. In that sense they have it harder than women. But the good news is they can do something to change that.”
Recognizing the symptoms of stress
Before you can change things, you have to recognize the symptoms of stress. Hallowell tells WebMD that stress symptoms may include any of these mild, non-specific afflictions:
• Feeling tired
• Forgetfulness
• Inability to sleep
• Irritability
• Lack of motivation
• Loss of concentration and an inability to complete projects
• Muscular and skeletal aches and pains (“A lot of men carry stress in their lower back or neck muscles,” Hallowell says.)
• Recurring headaches
• Starting to “drink or use to cope,” which puts men further behind and gets men into all kinds of trouble
Stress can also cause more severe medical conditions:
• Chest pains
• Digestive problems
• Elevated blood pressure
• Elevated heart rate at rest
• Sexual problems such as lack of desire, inability to have an erection, or premature ejaculation
• Skin eruptions
“Virtually every system of the body can be negatively impacted by stress,” says Hallowell. That includes your immune system. “And a depressed immune function,” he says, “increases the risk of cold and flu, as well as cancer, and — in the worst case — stroke and heart attack.” What that means is it really doesn’t pay to get anxious.
How men can prevent stress
If you’re someone who hates to be told not to worry, it may be because you haven’t heard Terry Real’s definition: “Worry is having your pain in advance,” he says. When you look at it that way, who wants to suffer twice? “You can learn to keep yourself in the present,” he says. “Don’t project into the future.”
Also, admitting vulnerability can be a way of preventing stress. “Men do not like admitting vulnerabilities,” says Real, “so we don’t go to the doctor.” Real asserts that this is the reason women live longer than men. “It has nothing to do with biology; it’s that men wait longer to go to a doctor than women do. And when we do, we don’t listen to them. That’s what denying your vulnerability gets you.” While not every health expert will agree with Real on his theory about lifespan and doctor visits, overcoming the vulnerability hurdle is still advice worth heeding.
Why work causes stress in men
When working with men, Real likes to use a variation of the serenity prayer, reminding men of all the things they cannot control. “What I do in helping men to reduce stress is tell them that you don’t decrease your helplessness by learning to control things better. You do it by having a more realistic sense of what you can control.” To illustrate, he plays a stress relief game, asking a man to move a box of Kleenex with his mind. Then he reminds him of how often men are asked to do the impossible in their jobs. Job stress can take a major toll on a man’s health.
“Men are taught to act as if we can control the impossible on a daily basis,” Real says, quoting such chestnuts as “I don’t care about your effort, I care about results” and “You’re going to deliver and if you can’t, I’ll find someone who can!”
“We are taught to accept responsibility for things we don’t have control over,” says Real. “Usually we get bent out of shape with what we can’t change and get so involved with that, we fail to step up to the plate and do the things we can. Procrastination is the most naked form of that.”
Three easy steps to reducing stress
If it’s too late to prevent stress, Hallowell has three simple steps you can take to help relieve stress. “Lead what I call a connected life,” he says, “not electronically connected, but interpersonally connected, where you have friends you rely on and talk with. Get physical exercise, a major stress reducer. And get enough sleep. Those three steps, which anybody can do, will make a big difference.”
What about men who say they don’t have time to relax or exercise? Hallowell has heard it before. “Most people are much more aware of how they spend their money than their time,” he says. “Most people waste at least three hours a week in what I call ‘screen sucking’ — mindless emailing, IMing, and surfing the net. If you just cut that out, there’s a workout for you and a lunch with a friend. If you include the time spent watching television, it probably adds another eight to ten hours.”
So stop reading this, get up, and go relax.
How you can recognize and relieve stress
By Sean Elder
WebMD Feature
Reviewed by Amal Chakraburtty, MD
You probably think of yourself as an average guy. And you probably think you cope pretty well with everyday stress. Sure, the boss might be causing you stress at work and making you uneasy about how secure your job is. Yeah, and maybe your wife has been too busy or too tired lately to notice just how much stress you have to deal with. And look at how fast your daughter is growing up. It’s as if you’re watching her in time-lapse photography while your college-aged son is still stuck in high school. . .
But that’s all right. You’re cool. Except for those stressful moments when you snarl because your shirt buttons are too big, or you bust a blood vessel because some old lady is taking forever to get off the bus, or the blankety-blank CD, which you paid perfectly good money for, is shrink-wrapped so tightly that you break the case trying to open it. Whoa! Maybe it’s not the disc that’s wrapped too tight.
Do you think maybe you are feeling more stress these days? Maybe even more stress than a woman?
Suck it up? How men try to cope with stress
“I think women and men are equally stressed,” says Edward Hallowell, MD. “Men just deal with stress differently.” Hallowell is founder of the Hallowell Center in Sudbury, Mass., and author of Crazy Busy: Overstretched, Overbooked and About to Snap! Strategies for Coping in a World Gone ADD. “Men notoriously have trouble putting their feelings into words,” he says. “They bottle things up so they’re more subject to the damages of stress.”
But aren’t men just supposed to suck it up? “The essence of traditional masculinity is invulnerability,” says Terrence Real, MSW, a psychotherapist in Newton, Mass. Real is the author of I Don’t Want to Talk About It: Overcoming the Secret Legacy of Male Depression. “Vulnerability equals femininity,” he says. “Femininity equals unmanliness. And unmanliness equals disaster. The system that men organize their psychology around is built on a lie. We’re all trying to be little Al Haigs, saying, ‘I’m in charge here.’”
Not that women are any more in charge. They’re just given more leeway and are more apt to be forgiven if they throw up their hands and say, “I can’t handle it!” Hallowell believes they actually have a tougher time of it than men.
“Women’s stress often comes from working as well as having the primary caretaking responsibilities at home,” he says. In fact, the causes of stress may be the same for both genders — too much work and too little time for exercise or relaxation. But Hallowell thinks men are deprived of a crucial safety valve. “Men have trouble saying, ‘Gosh, this is hard,’ and asking for help. In that sense they have it harder than women. But the good news is they can do something to change that.”
Recognizing the symptoms of stress
Before you can change things, you have to recognize the symptoms of stress. Hallowell tells WebMD that stress symptoms may include any of these mild, non-specific afflictions:
• Feeling tired
• Forgetfulness
• Inability to sleep
• Irritability
• Lack of motivation
• Loss of concentration and an inability to complete projects
• Muscular and skeletal aches and pains (“A lot of men carry stress in their lower back or neck muscles,” Hallowell says.)
• Recurring headaches
• Starting to “drink or use to cope,” which puts men further behind and gets men into all kinds of trouble
Stress can also cause more severe medical conditions:
• Chest pains
• Digestive problems
• Elevated blood pressure
• Elevated heart rate at rest
• Sexual problems such as lack of desire, inability to have an erection, or premature ejaculation
• Skin eruptions
“Virtually every system of the body can be negatively impacted by stress,” says Hallowell. That includes your immune system. “And a depressed immune function,” he says, “increases the risk of cold and flu, as well as cancer, and — in the worst case — stroke and heart attack.” What that means is it really doesn’t pay to get anxious.
How men can prevent stress
If you’re someone who hates to be told not to worry, it may be because you haven’t heard Terry Real’s definition: “Worry is having your pain in advance,” he says. When you look at it that way, who wants to suffer twice? “You can learn to keep yourself in the present,” he says. “Don’t project into the future.”
Also, admitting vulnerability can be a way of preventing stress. “Men do not like admitting vulnerabilities,” says Real, “so we don’t go to the doctor.” Real asserts that this is the reason women live longer than men. “It has nothing to do with biology; it’s that men wait longer to go to a doctor than women do. And when we do, we don’t listen to them. That’s what denying your vulnerability gets you.” While not every health expert will agree with Real on his theory about lifespan and doctor visits, overcoming the vulnerability hurdle is still advice worth heeding.
Why work causes stress in men
When working with men, Real likes to use a variation of the serenity prayer, reminding men of all the things they cannot control. “What I do in helping men to reduce stress is tell them that you don’t decrease your helplessness by learning to control things better. You do it by having a more realistic sense of what you can control.” To illustrate, he plays a stress relief game, asking a man to move a box of Kleenex with his mind. Then he reminds him of how often men are asked to do the impossible in their jobs. Job stress can take a major toll on a man’s health.
“Men are taught to act as if we can control the impossible on a daily basis,” Real says, quoting such chestnuts as “I don’t care about your effort, I care about results” and “You’re going to deliver and if you can’t, I’ll find someone who can!”
“We are taught to accept responsibility for things we don’t have control over,” says Real. “Usually we get bent out of shape with what we can’t change and get so involved with that, we fail to step up to the plate and do the things we can. Procrastination is the most naked form of that.”
Three easy steps to reducing stress
If it’s too late to prevent stress, Hallowell has three simple steps you can take to help relieve stress. “Lead what I call a connected life,” he says, “not electronically connected, but interpersonally connected, where you have friends you rely on and talk with. Get physical exercise, a major stress reducer. And get enough sleep. Those three steps, which anybody can do, will make a big difference.”
What about men who say they don’t have time to relax or exercise? Hallowell has heard it before. “Most people are much more aware of how they spend their money than their time,” he says. “Most people waste at least three hours a week in what I call ‘screen sucking’ — mindless emailing, IMing, and surfing the net. If you just cut that out, there’s a workout for you and a lunch with a friend. If you include the time spent watching television, it probably adds another eight to ten hours.”
So stop reading this, get up, and go relax.
Your Own Worst Enemy
Are You Your Own Worst Enemy?
WebMD Feature from "Men's Health" Magazine
By Gil Schwartz
7 mental roadblocks that undermine your success.
You know the guy. He could be right down the hall. Or looking back at YOU in the mirror. He's got the talent, the looks, the hair--but he's not going anywhere. He seems to streak past others and then, wham! Suddenly he's flat on his back watching all the tortoises cross the finish line ahead of him.
No, he's not stupid. Nor is he incompetent, foolish, weak on strategy, or lamer than your average dude. He's suffering from a malady that afflicts just about all of us at one point or another: He's tripping over himself. He's throwing up obstacles where none previously existed. He is, in short, his own worst enemy.
I'm going to tell you about seven bombs you can blow yourself up with. There are more. But I like lucky seven, because if you pay attention, you may be fortunate enough not to stab yourself in the eyes. So pay attention!
Procrastination
Don't get me wrong: I'm a master procrastinator myself. But you need to be smart and tightly wrapped to make it a way of life.
Begin by ascertaining exactly what "the last minute" is for a given project. The night before it's due is not the last minute for a 40-page speech to investors, or a strategic-planning document that's going to be presented to the board of directors. The last minute, in those cases, is a month prior to the night before. A big project will generate many tasks that can, of course, be done the night before, but there are even more that can't. Learn to identify each type.
The great procrastinators indulge in a pre-crastinatory phase that involves the full range of thumb-twiddling, foot-tapping, and snoozing while they decide when to put the pedal to the metal. They then enjoy the procrastinatory activity, which often includes late-stage work on other projects. In this way, they are mixing procrastination with multitasking. Very 21st century.
They treat themselves, after the successful event, to a period of post-crastination, in which they ponder how to put off things more effectively in the future.
But for most employees, procrastination is dynamite. Don't fool around with it until you've attained a certain level of proficiency.
Loose Fact-itis
This syndrome involves cooking up a "fact" to bolster one's position during an important meeting--a "fact" that can easily be disproved by saner and more mature minds, leaving the individual who generated it up the creek without a BlackBerry.
Once, I was sitting in a meeting with about 10 other guys, and the boss asks, "What are we going to say to security analysts about our plange rate?" I'm making up the issue here, since there is no such thing as a plange rate, but you get the idea.
So anyhow, Leonard, who is in charge of planges for our company, says something like, "We have the biggest plange rate in the world!" And the chairman says, "Can I use that stat?" and Leonard says, "Yes, well . . ." and begins poring over a spreadsheet--after which he admits that we had the biggest plange rate in the world for about 5 minutes last February. A bad moment for Leonard. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about.
Loose Fact-itis
This syndrome involves cooking up a "fact" to bolster one's position during an important meeting--a "fact" that can easily be disproved by saner and more mature minds, leaving the individual who generated it up the creek without a BlackBerry.
Once, I was sitting in a meeting with about 10 other guys, and the boss asks, "What are we going to say to security analysts about our plange rate?" I'm making up the issue here, since there is no such thing as a plange rate, but you get the idea.
So anyhow, Leonard, who is in charge of planges for our company, says something like, "We have the biggest plange rate in the world!" And the chairman says, "Can I use that stat?" and Leonard says, "Yes, well . . ." and begins poring over a spreadsheet--after which he admits that we had the biggest plange rate in the world for about 5 minutes last February. A bad moment for Leonard. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about.
Hardness of Listening
You have to be a really big wheel to enjoy a total lack of obligation to pay attention to other people. Men work decades to earn that right.
I knew this guy in strategic planning, Huff. He had just come from another company. About a week after he arrived, he was included in a meeting about where the corporation was headed. When it was his turn, he spoke for 20 minutes. "Blah blah blah," he said, as the chairman grew visibly restive. Finally, he was done. Then he lolled in his chair, thumbed his BlackBerry, pondered the view out the window, poured coffee from the sideboard, and gave other signs of terminal not-listening.
Everybody hated the mother so much afterward that he was never invited to a meaningless meeting again. A lot of planes have gone down because the pilot was hewing precisely to the wrong flight plan. Listen. Take it in. There's actually information out there that you're going to need.
Under-Truthfulness
I'm not talking about lying, but the far more common mistake of being afraid to tell the boss stuff he doesn't want to hear.
Berkowitz, our former head of sales, would be called upon to give a status report at the senior staff meeting every Thursday. The problem was that he was afraid to say what was really going on. He put a nice shine on things. Later, the head of finance would paint a much more realistic picture.After a while, when they reached Berkowitz, the chairman would say, "Okay, now let's get a bunch of lies from sales." It wasn't long before Berkowitz took a package.
Over-Truthfulness
I'm not saying that Berkowitz should have said, "We're having the worst quarter in our history, and nothing can pull us out." That's just stupid and crude. Better would have been something like, "We have an issue on the upside that we think we can work on with some success in the coming weeks." See? The message is conveyed without embarrassing anybody.
Senior executives deserve the truth, except when it would do neither them nor the business much good, in which case kindness is better. But truth is like chocolate: A little is a pleasure; too much can be lethal. The smart and non–self-destructive player will make the boss aware of the general outlines of the snake pit but not inundate him with enough rancid slime to wash him over the edge.
Rampant Distemper
My first boss was a woman who was fine before lunch but really crabby afterward. Betty would go into a meeting with the very powerful dudes and sit there with a grumpy expression on her face. Everybody in the room, including the chairman, was afraid of her. When she spoke, they would defer to her, because her ideas were very good and very strongly presented.
It wasn't the quality of her work that eventually got her canned. It was the fact that she was what we may define, technically, as a Big Bummer. It was impossible to have a free-flowing discussion around her because she would bite your nuts off.
I'm sure you have a lot to be angry about. But if you radiate bad vibes, the guys who wear the stripes are going to feel them and pinpoint the source. That's not smart. Lighten up. Or at least be strategic and keep your karmic bleakness to yourself.
Bad Credit/Blame Management
This is a tough one. A lot of people trip over this issue. Naturally, you want credit for the good things you do. This means working in such a way that (a) you are recognized as the author of the good thing in question, and (b) others are happy to give you the credit. Satisfying both criteria is not always easy. And you never want to be seen as a man who hogs other people's credit. As a rule of thumb, attempt to receive no more than 70 percent of the credit that's due you. Give away the rest.
Then there's the issue of blame. Real players never dodge it when it belongs to them. There's nothing a senior guy hates more than a craven, cowardly weasel who tries to lay blame on other people.
How you manage credit and blame is directly influenced by your relationship with your senior officer. If he wants the credit, give it to him. That's what you're there for. And if he's trying to escape blame, take it. The guy who decides your upcoming raise is the only one who needs to be satisfied in either regard.
Of course, if a peer tries to suck off your credit for something, cut off his legs. We're talking strategic management of this issue, not surrender.
WebMD Feature from "Men's Health" Magazine
By Gil Schwartz
7 mental roadblocks that undermine your success.
You know the guy. He could be right down the hall. Or looking back at YOU in the mirror. He's got the talent, the looks, the hair--but he's not going anywhere. He seems to streak past others and then, wham! Suddenly he's flat on his back watching all the tortoises cross the finish line ahead of him.
No, he's not stupid. Nor is he incompetent, foolish, weak on strategy, or lamer than your average dude. He's suffering from a malady that afflicts just about all of us at one point or another: He's tripping over himself. He's throwing up obstacles where none previously existed. He is, in short, his own worst enemy.
I'm going to tell you about seven bombs you can blow yourself up with. There are more. But I like lucky seven, because if you pay attention, you may be fortunate enough not to stab yourself in the eyes. So pay attention!
Procrastination
Don't get me wrong: I'm a master procrastinator myself. But you need to be smart and tightly wrapped to make it a way of life.
Begin by ascertaining exactly what "the last minute" is for a given project. The night before it's due is not the last minute for a 40-page speech to investors, or a strategic-planning document that's going to be presented to the board of directors. The last minute, in those cases, is a month prior to the night before. A big project will generate many tasks that can, of course, be done the night before, but there are even more that can't. Learn to identify each type.
The great procrastinators indulge in a pre-crastinatory phase that involves the full range of thumb-twiddling, foot-tapping, and snoozing while they decide when to put the pedal to the metal. They then enjoy the procrastinatory activity, which often includes late-stage work on other projects. In this way, they are mixing procrastination with multitasking. Very 21st century.
They treat themselves, after the successful event, to a period of post-crastination, in which they ponder how to put off things more effectively in the future.
But for most employees, procrastination is dynamite. Don't fool around with it until you've attained a certain level of proficiency.
Loose Fact-itis
This syndrome involves cooking up a "fact" to bolster one's position during an important meeting--a "fact" that can easily be disproved by saner and more mature minds, leaving the individual who generated it up the creek without a BlackBerry.
Once, I was sitting in a meeting with about 10 other guys, and the boss asks, "What are we going to say to security analysts about our plange rate?" I'm making up the issue here, since there is no such thing as a plange rate, but you get the idea.
So anyhow, Leonard, who is in charge of planges for our company, says something like, "We have the biggest plange rate in the world!" And the chairman says, "Can I use that stat?" and Leonard says, "Yes, well . . ." and begins poring over a spreadsheet--after which he admits that we had the biggest plange rate in the world for about 5 minutes last February. A bad moment for Leonard. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about.
Loose Fact-itis
This syndrome involves cooking up a "fact" to bolster one's position during an important meeting--a "fact" that can easily be disproved by saner and more mature minds, leaving the individual who generated it up the creek without a BlackBerry.
Once, I was sitting in a meeting with about 10 other guys, and the boss asks, "What are we going to say to security analysts about our plange rate?" I'm making up the issue here, since there is no such thing as a plange rate, but you get the idea.
So anyhow, Leonard, who is in charge of planges for our company, says something like, "We have the biggest plange rate in the world!" And the chairman says, "Can I use that stat?" and Leonard says, "Yes, well . . ." and begins poring over a spreadsheet--after which he admits that we had the biggest plange rate in the world for about 5 minutes last February. A bad moment for Leonard. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about.
Hardness of Listening
You have to be a really big wheel to enjoy a total lack of obligation to pay attention to other people. Men work decades to earn that right.
I knew this guy in strategic planning, Huff. He had just come from another company. About a week after he arrived, he was included in a meeting about where the corporation was headed. When it was his turn, he spoke for 20 minutes. "Blah blah blah," he said, as the chairman grew visibly restive. Finally, he was done. Then he lolled in his chair, thumbed his BlackBerry, pondered the view out the window, poured coffee from the sideboard, and gave other signs of terminal not-listening.
Everybody hated the mother so much afterward that he was never invited to a meaningless meeting again. A lot of planes have gone down because the pilot was hewing precisely to the wrong flight plan. Listen. Take it in. There's actually information out there that you're going to need.
Under-Truthfulness
I'm not talking about lying, but the far more common mistake of being afraid to tell the boss stuff he doesn't want to hear.
Berkowitz, our former head of sales, would be called upon to give a status report at the senior staff meeting every Thursday. The problem was that he was afraid to say what was really going on. He put a nice shine on things. Later, the head of finance would paint a much more realistic picture.After a while, when they reached Berkowitz, the chairman would say, "Okay, now let's get a bunch of lies from sales." It wasn't long before Berkowitz took a package.
Over-Truthfulness
I'm not saying that Berkowitz should have said, "We're having the worst quarter in our history, and nothing can pull us out." That's just stupid and crude. Better would have been something like, "We have an issue on the upside that we think we can work on with some success in the coming weeks." See? The message is conveyed without embarrassing anybody.
Senior executives deserve the truth, except when it would do neither them nor the business much good, in which case kindness is better. But truth is like chocolate: A little is a pleasure; too much can be lethal. The smart and non–self-destructive player will make the boss aware of the general outlines of the snake pit but not inundate him with enough rancid slime to wash him over the edge.
Rampant Distemper
My first boss was a woman who was fine before lunch but really crabby afterward. Betty would go into a meeting with the very powerful dudes and sit there with a grumpy expression on her face. Everybody in the room, including the chairman, was afraid of her. When she spoke, they would defer to her, because her ideas were very good and very strongly presented.
It wasn't the quality of her work that eventually got her canned. It was the fact that she was what we may define, technically, as a Big Bummer. It was impossible to have a free-flowing discussion around her because she would bite your nuts off.
I'm sure you have a lot to be angry about. But if you radiate bad vibes, the guys who wear the stripes are going to feel them and pinpoint the source. That's not smart. Lighten up. Or at least be strategic and keep your karmic bleakness to yourself.
Bad Credit/Blame Management
This is a tough one. A lot of people trip over this issue. Naturally, you want credit for the good things you do. This means working in such a way that (a) you are recognized as the author of the good thing in question, and (b) others are happy to give you the credit. Satisfying both criteria is not always easy. And you never want to be seen as a man who hogs other people's credit. As a rule of thumb, attempt to receive no more than 70 percent of the credit that's due you. Give away the rest.
Then there's the issue of blame. Real players never dodge it when it belongs to them. There's nothing a senior guy hates more than a craven, cowardly weasel who tries to lay blame on other people.
How you manage credit and blame is directly influenced by your relationship with your senior officer. If he wants the credit, give it to him. That's what you're there for. And if he's trying to escape blame, take it. The guy who decides your upcoming raise is the only one who needs to be satisfied in either regard.
Of course, if a peer tries to suck off your credit for something, cut off his legs. We're talking strategic management of this issue, not surrender.
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