I once heard a story about a traveler harassing a ticket agent at the gate of an airport terminal. The traveler didn’t want to wait to get on the plane so he went into a tirade. “Do you know who I am!” he shouted repeatedly at the poor woman handling the tickets. But the ticket agent handled him beautifully – she simply picked up the intercom and announced over the loudspeaker that this man needed help because he didn’t know who he was. Everyone at the gate laughed – especially those who witnessed his bad behavior.

We all have dealt with difficult people at some point in our lives. Unfortunately, some people tend to forget that we’re all humans. Sometimes success, or the perception of success, causes a person’s head to swell and makes him or her feel like they are entitled to certain privileges that others aren’t entitled to. This happens especially in the corporate environment – people lose their patience and become more demanding as they work their way up the corporate ladder. Or, if their business experiences sudden growth, they suddenly come into money or they get some public recognition, they change. While they certainly have the right to change and act like a big shot, they are often better off remembering where they came from. From the unselfish perspective, we all want to be treated with respect so you’re just a better person when you act civilly towards others. I honestly think people fail to understand the effect they have on people when they treat them like dirt. It’s a form of bullying that often results in low self-esteem, added stress in the other person’s life and in some cases, even suicide.

But from a selfish perspective, you’ll get more accomplished and receive better services from others if you just act nicer. People will want to help you and go out of their way to make sure they keep you happy when you’re nice to them. I remember how at my first job in an office environment, people would jump because someone high on the food chain wanted something. As I got accustomed to corporate life, I saw a lot of name dropping and title dropping when people wanted something. I’ve never been into that – I treat everyone like they’re important (unless they’re mean).

Now yes, being a bully does get stuff done but the people doing the work resent the behavior and usually do just the bare minimum. If they are treated a little nicer, the person doing the job would take more pride and produce better quality work. Remember, most people make more mistakes when under pressure.

You really do catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar. So keep this mind next time you’re about to drop names or titles. And if you know someone that likes to a lit of name or title dropping, then email them this article (or print it out and leave on their desk) – they may get the hint.

Related posts:

1. Job Interview Success: Multiple Interviewers: What to do when more than one person is interviewing you at the same time
2. Quick Tip: How to Stop Mumbling
3. Public Speaking: Hostile & Difficult Audiences – Part 1: What Causes a Hostile Audience:
4. Buying the ticket

I was driving the other day and an experience with a rude driver got me thinking about how you not only can’t please everyone, but you shouldn’t want to please everyone or even try to get everyone to like you. The bottom line is that while there are a lot of great people out there, there are also a lot of not so great people out there. In fact, there are quite a few people out there who are, to be blunt, just plain jerks.

So let me start with my story. I was driving on a two lane road in the left lane and another car merged into the right lane. I needed to take a right turn about a mile down the road so I put on my signal to get into the right lane. This other car sped ahead so I couldn’t switch lanes but then the car in front of her slowed down so I sped up and got into to the lane two cars ahead of her. When it was time to take the right turn I started moving over and noticed the other car trying to cut off some cars by going in the bicycle lane (and practically on the sidewalk). She got behind me and essentially tailgated me for about two miles – even though I was keeping up with the car in front of me. When I made a left turn and got away from her, I noticed she stuck her middle finger up at me.

At first, it bothered me because, like most people, I generally try to be good to everyone. I don’t think anyone likes it when someone else is mad at them. But then as I thought more about it, I realized how much of a jerk the woman was (remember, I’m trying to be professional here) and how there are certain people that you are better off not having in your life – both personally and professionally.

On the professional side, a common mistake that many business owners (both small and large) make is to try to please everyone. But truthfully, some people are just bad customers and you’re better off letting them go to your competition so they can deal with them. I had a woman take one of my classes a few years ago that was a perfect example of this. I was teaching a hands-on technical class and this woman needed a lot of hand-holding – to the point where other attendees were starting to get annoyed with her. It was a two session class and she contacted me after the first session to tell me that she had decided to drop out of my class and take another one that was closer to where she lived (the first thing she said when she came into the room was a complaint about how far she needed to drive to get to my course). At first, I was a bit upset when she decided to drop the class (and request a full refund) but then I realized I was better off without her. In the second session, some asked if we were going to wait for her to start and I informed the group that she had decided to drop the course. Several people in the room then shared that they were glad she left because they felt she held up the rest of the class.

It’s funny because when I first started out as a speaker, I used to give a talk about “Devil clients” – clients that you’re better off dumping because they just make your life miserable. I talk to too many business owners that bend over backwards for these types of clients, only to get burned in the end. Ten years ago, I worked for a decent-sized company that made this same exact mistake several times. One of our services was to provide a data feed and this one client requested about $30,000 in customizations on a feed that they paid $1000 for per month. I used to get paged in the middle of the night because they had a problem on their end that prevented the feed from going through, and instead of checking it, they’d call me and I’d check it for them. I hated them with a passion and even shared my concern with the executive in charge of my division (my boss did the same). And sure enough, they dropped us after three months. So we spent $30,000 in effort to get $3000 in revenues.

The bottom line is that sometimes when people don’t like us, don’t hire us or choose to bring their business elsewhere, it’s for the better. Obviously, you need clients – you can’t just dump them all even if they’re all bad or you’ll go out of business. But if you get to the point where one particular client seems to drain 80% of your resources so you can’t focus on your good clients, you might want to consider dropping them.

The same holds true with relationships – sometimes some friendships take more effort to maintain than others and you’re better off spending your time elsewhere. One of my friends recently complained to me about a mutual friend that’s always criticizing, judging, complaining and such. My friend felt belittled and just uncomfortable whenever there was any contact with this person. The reason why people tend to put up with this nonsense is because they don’t want to lose a friend, even if it’s an unhealthy relationship.

I gather a lot of feedback from my classes – I used to do three forms but now I’m down to just two. While most people like the classes, there are some that don’t. It took me a bit of time to get over this fact – even the most successful speakers have their critics. Sometimes the problem is me (and yes, I admit I make mistakes and try things that aren’t always successful) but sometimes the problem is the person. Whenever I get bad feedback, I do my best to look at it objectively to see if I can learn from it – and my classes have gotten some changes because of these lessons learned. But I’ve had my share of people that you can never please so I take their negative feedback as a complement – if they liked me, then it would have meant that I did something wrong.

So next time you’re in a situation with a fellow human being where you feel that you’re unliked, don’t sweat it. Look at the situation and if there’s something you did wrong, learn a lesson from it. Otherwise, take it as a complement. There are seven billion people in the world so you only have to worry when you have a few billion people dislike you.

Related posts:

1. Why People Don’t Like You
2. Why People Fail
3. How to Be Liked
4. Do People Really Care About Public Speaking?

Have you ever been in a situation where someone is unexpectedly rude to you? Of course you have. And you know that rotten feeling that you get when it happens. You did nothing to provoke it, so why you? Should you be rude back? Is it worth a conflict? Sometimes it’s tempting to lash out in return, but that’s not always a good idea.

A wise older friend once shared with me after such an incident that most of the time when someone blows up at you for seemingly no reason, it’s almost always someone else (including themselves) that they’re mad at. We all handle stress differently. While I do my best to never take out my anger on someone who isn’t responsible, I’d be lying to you if I said I’ve never done that. We all try our best, but sometimes the moment gets the best of us.

I once remember hearing a story retold by Dr. Stephen Covey (author of Seven Habits of Highly Effective People) about a man sitting on train watching the way another man’s children were behaving. The kids were acting up and the man was just sitting there as if he were in another world. Finally, the observer asked the father if he were going to do something about his children. The man responded that his wife had just passed away and the behavior was the kids’ way of dealing with it. Now how’s that for changing your perspective?

Life is full of situations like this. Sometimes a coworker might not want to go out for lunch. You might think he’s anti-social or not a team player, but in reality he has a financial hardship and doesn’t want to spend the money. A friend may not tell you about a problem because she’s embarrassed about it, not because she doesn’t trust you.

While it seems like many people act in a random manner, their actions will actually start making more sense once you know what’s going on in their head. While our first instinct might be to fire back at someone or criticize them, you may regret doing so after finding out what caused the person to act like that. It’s like reading part of a quote without its full context. You may read “all people are evil” and think one thing, but then when you see it’s been preceded by “I’ve never believed that” it takes on a new, more positive meaning.

The lesson here is to think for a moment before judging someone. Don’t let your emotions get the best of you. Instead, ask yourself why this person is acting that way. In some cases, they may have bad intentions so then you act accordingly. But in most cases, they need help and lashing out is their way of getting attention.

Related posts:

1. Your Words Have Power
2. Don’t Be a Matt Foley Speaker
3. The Trouble with Hearsay
4. Acting and Public Speaking

I had my first experience in training in 1996 when I was an instructor at what’s now Bentley University while earning my Masters Degree. In the brief training I had before getting unleashed upon five groups of mostly first semester freshmen, something stuck out in my mind. The syllabus that I was to hand out to my students noted that the only dumb questions were the ones that were never asked. The point of it was that you shouldn’t be afraid to ask a question out of fear that you’ll look dumb. I get it – and even bought it, for a little bit. But then after fielding some of these questions, I realized that some questions were better off not being asked.

I was reminded of this recently when someone asked me the very question that is the title of this post. It was in response to my review of the book “How to Be a Gentleman.” At first, I thought it was a dumb question. Phrases like “being open minded” popped in my head and I decided to be open minded about the question and my answer. And guess what? It’s actually an interesting question that warrants a legitimate answer.

The simple answer is “of course” – a gentleman should hold the door for any woman, regardless of sexual orientation, or any man for that matter. Today’s society is so much different than it was even twenty years ago. Women have become a larger part of the workforce and many outperform and out-earn their male counterparts. Behavior that was tolerated in the typical office just a few decades ago is now considered sexual harassment. And of course, people are more comfortable coming forward if they are in a non-traditional relationship. I live in Massachusetts, the first state to allow same sex marriage, so a wedding ring these days doesn’t automatically mean that a person is in a traditional relationship.

So what does all this mean? The bottom line is that you should be polite and respectful to everyone – men, women and children. If someone is following me into a building, especially if they are carrying something, I hold the door regardless of whether or not they have a Y chromosome. I’ll even help them if they are having difficulty carrying their load. Manners and respect never go out of style – no matter how society evolves. And we all appreciate that helping hand from a stranger when we need it.

Related posts:

1. I’m Dying
2. There Are Such Things as Dumb Questions and People Ask Them All the Time
3. Illegal Job Interview Questions: How to Answer Them
4. 25 Illegal Interview Questions