Don’t worry about why other people do things, and don’t imagine what they meant by what they did or what their goals might be. Instead, focus on their behavior.

Your boss looks angry. Is that an observation or is it your imagination? In a previous article, Observation, I wrote about how important it is to differentiate between what we imagine others’ motives to be and what they have actually been seen to do. You might think that you have observed your boss being angry. You have not. You have imagined that your boss is angry. What you have actually observed is your boss’s behavior.

The fact is that your boss might not be angry. If you are every going to be able to control your emotions at work enough to become seen as a successful, confident leader who is in control, you will need to learn to differentiate between what you observe and what you imagine about the behavior of others.

You must learn to focus on behavior instead of your imaginary wonderings about what that behavior means.

The Angry Boss

Your boss looks angry. That is your imagination. Your boss’s behaviors you observed are:

• Eyebrows furrows
• Speaking loudly
• Frowning
• Arms are crossed
• Face is red

Those are behaviors. If we observe those behaviors, we might imagine:

• Angry
• Upset
• Disappointed
• Stressed out

The first set are the behaviors. Behaviors are things your boss actually does or says. The second set of bullets are imaginary - they are our conclusions drawn from watching out boss behave. What is the difference?

Behaviors

• Usually nouns and verbs
• You can see it: facial expressions, body motions
• You can hear it: words they say, vocal volume, speed of speech

Imaginary Conclusions

• Usually adjectives (mean, harsh, nice, kind)
• Often emotions (angry, upset, happy, concerned, disappointed, surprised)
• Sometimes motives (answers “Why would they do that?”)

If you can learn to focus on the behavior of others, it will give you several very powerful benefits:

1. Emotional Control. Focusing on the behavior of others teaches you to avoid getting upset about what others might do since you will realize that you could be wrong as to your imaginary reasons for them doing what they did. Focusing on behavior gives emotional control. Emotional control makes you look more leader-like and causes others to feel more comfortable giving you formal authority.
2. Expanding your circle of influence. If you can learn to control your emotions, you will appear more confident, and you will be more attractive to others whom you approach to build relationships. You will also appear more believable and trustworthy.
3. Feedback and criticism is actionable. If you can focus on behavior, you can give people guidance, tips, criticism, or feedback that is easy for them do something about. For example, I cannot do anything with, “Rob, do not be angry.” I especially cannot do anything with it if I am not actually angry. But I can fix, “Rob, do not cross your arms, scowl, and turn your face red.” I can uncross my arms, relax my face, and breath deeply. Focusing on behavior gives us specific things to work on. It makes our communications better.
4. Eliciting feedback. Using the power of understanding what behavior is allows us to get better criticism from others. If someone tells us “You looked too angry,” we can ask them for more data: “What was I doing that made you think I was angry? Something with my face?” We become able to turn situations that would have been useless and frustrating negative encounters into learning experiences.

This is a powerful skill. It is a skill - not a talent. With a little experience, you can easily follow the steps to identifying a behavior and resolve things down to what people said (quotes), what their faces were doing, what their bodies were doing, the actions they took. And, you can learn to ignore the rest and lower your own stress levels by getting past the useless, confrontational adjectives with which no one can do anything.

Focus on behavior when dealing with others.