On Fri, 25 Apr 2008 14:02:53 +0100, Invisible wrote:

> I really hope I manage to sort out this giant mess sometime soon -
> because I do *not* enjoy being this worked up.

You know, I just ran across something yesterday that's helping me with a 
vaguely similar situation; look for a book entitled "Perfect Phrases for 
Dealing with Difficult People: Hundreds of Ready-to-Use Phrases for 
Handling Conflict, Confrontations, and Challenging Personalities" by 
Susan F. Benjamin.

I'm not a huge fan of this type of book - "phrasebook" puts me off, 
because there's no ready-made list of things you can say that will make 
things all better, because situations vary widely, so just a list of 
"comebacks" tends to not be useful.

This book includes some of that, but in the context of understanding the 
underlying motivations that people have - and the strategies you can use 
to get what you need out of the working relationship.  So rather than 
being a "cookbook" of "in this situation, say this and everything will be 
fine", it instead discusses the underlying motivations behind someone 
who, say, has a negative attitude, and then focuses on how you can direct 
them in a way to get what you want/need.

So, for example, from Part 3 - "Perfect Phrases for Communicating with 
Difficult Bosses", an example given has to do with distant, weak, or 
hands-off bosses.  The suggested strategy is to be more proactive in 
communicating with the boss - so rather than just saying "my boss doesn't 
listen to me", continue to provide them with feedback, ideas, and your 
opinions.  They need to be presented in a way that is positive (ie, focus 
on positive results, not the problems you're trying to avoid".

In your situation, you've got someone who's taken total control away from 
you, and you feel this will leave you holding the bag when the auditors 
come in.  Take a minute to talk with the head guy from HQ and say "you 
know, I'm really concerned about the changes here, not because they're 
not going to be better for the organization, but instead because when the 
auditors come, I'm the one they're going to talk to - and I don't 
understand why you're making the changes you're making.  Since our 
company is answerable to regulatory authorities, can you help me 
understand these changes so I can explain them to the auditors and avoid 
the company potentially being fined over something that I just didn't 
understand?"

What this does is it acknowledges the expertise they bring (whether 
there's any real expertise or not there isn't particularly relevant - 
they're the ones calling the shots, and you'll get a better response from 
them if you acknowledge their position in a positive manner).  "You guys 
clearly have a plan here - but I feel I need to understand this 
because ..." and give them the reasons.

Then follow the conversation up with a quick e-mail - it never hurts to 
have a paper trail.  Be objective in the e-mail rather than subjective, 
and more specific rather than less.  "Per our discussion, you'll provide 
me with full documentation for these changes for the next audit by June 
21, 2008.  Does that date sound good to you?" - that gives you a 
trackable goal they need to achieve, and if they don't meet it, you can 
refer back to that agreement when the auditors are scheduling their time 
to come in (if they do that, I don't know if they do or not).  By ending 
with the question, you give them the opportunity to say "yes".  That 
works well in person as well.

A friend of mine has tried an experiment along these lines recently - her 
boss is a micromanager.  New boss, unfamiliar with the business, wants to 
change everything right now to what he thinks the business should be 
doing.  Recently, there was a discussion about a decision point where the 
boss was very adamant about a change being put in place that my friend 
was dead-set against.  Instead of digging in, she acknowledged the 
experience the new boss has, but presented a different perspective and 
followed that up with an e-mail outlining a possible compromise that 
could allow the boss to implement what he wanted, it wasn't without any 
controls at all (which was the perception of the initial request).  By 
suggesting there might be room to make the suggested change but while 
incorporating some reasonable controls, my friend was able to say to the 
boss "I can see this is a good idea, but I'd rather not compromise 'x', 
'y', and 'z' because we've worked hard to address those issues, and I 
feel that this could undermine the issues we've worked so hard to resolve 
the past 2 years.  But if we did 'a', 'b', and 'c', we could accomplish 
this goal without compromising on the things we've fixed."

The response was quite positive from the boss - and I suspect (as I don't 
know the boss in question) that the boss was more receptive to these 
suggestions because there was an acknowledgment that the idea wasn't a 
bad one and with some minor tweaks, it would be workable and could 
actually resolve more issues.

Anyways, have a look for the book - I've been impressed with it so far, 
from the standpoint of the insights.  Since I've had to deal with some 
difficult people recently myself (including one individual who actually 
filed legal action to get their way), I thought it might be worth a look, 
and I've learned quite a bit as a result.

Jim

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