No solutions needed – an HR story

In one of the workshops I gave to HR people, we did an exercise of translating judgments to needs, taking real situations they face at work. One of the participants said one of the team leaders entered her office one day being all  upset, complaining that management made a certain decision without asking him. He was angry and raised his voice. 

The HR lady felt annoyed and mainly helpless therefore stressed out because it was not her decision and she couldn’t do anything about it. She kept telling him to go to higher management and complain to them. She was upset that she had to endure his energy while not being able to do anything. 

After working with her by looking at needs and doing some role play, she came to the realization that what he wanted was just to be heard and she was the person he turned to. See, her stressful feeling that she needed to give him a solution and her helplessness in doing so left her unable to give him what he needed, which was compassion and listening. 

Many times we are so engaged with finding a solution that we do not see what the person really needs. After realizing that it was not about finding a solution she relaxed. She felt that she had now tools to deal with those situations because  as she said it will probably happen again with other people.