What do you do when someone’s irresponsible or unkind behavior is causing a problem for you or your business?

Yesterday I was sitting at a coffee shop working on my book. A customer at the next table was receiving a lot of text messages. The loud and somewhat piercing ringtone was going off every few seconds. I saw glances and raised eyebrows, but nobody said anything. I didn’t either. I kept trying to write, but my train of thought was suffering.

After a few more minutes of dinging and blinging, I leaned over and said “Hey would you be willing to silence your phone?” She looked up from her daze, remembered other people exist, and switched it to silent. Problem solved.

Asking for changed behavior is the first step. “I need you to start coming to work on time every day.” or “I need you to complete your projects on time.” or “I need you to leave the personal attacks out of our conversations”. Ask for the specific change in behavior that you want to see.

Sometimes asking for specific change is not enough. Some people aren’t clueless, they are irresponsible or unkind. It’s easy in that scenario to just let the problem continue, as if we are helpless to do anything about it because “they won’t change”.

If they don’t change their behavior, there’s another step. Say to that person “I was hoping you were going to take care of the problem that your behavior is causing me, but since you haven’t, I am going to make sure it doesn’t cause a problem for me anymore.”

“I am going to solve the late attendance problem by terminating your employment here.”

“I am going to solve the project deadline problem by giving the project lead role to someone else.”

“I am going to solve the personal attacks problem by leaving the conversation every time you start to speak to me that way.”

“I am going to ask the manager to talk to you about your phone use.” or “It’s time for me to find a new coffee shop.”

Nothing in their behavior needs to change in order for you to solve your problem. When you set appropriate limits, the other person will still have a problem, but you won’t have a problem anymore.

You can’t make them change. You can solve the problem.