No more suggestion box
How to mitigate complaints from others
Complaints are not always as satisfying as many think
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We complain about everything: the weather, work, other people. How you can deal constructively with constant naggers.
“Why is it so hot/cold/wet again?”, “It was so exhausting/boring/unbearable at work again today!”, “The guy just now was really rude/annoying/clingy/abusive” – this one three examples should make one thing clear: we complain. You’re welcome. As annoyed as we may be by a wide variety of things – be it the weather, our work situation or our fellow human beings – we seem to like to vent our displeasure. Just “let off steam”, that’s supposed to help – right?
In fact, verbalizing their frustration isn’t terribly helpful to the person — and neither is it to the person listening, also known as the “suggestion box.” Why, then, do people still feel the urgent need to let off steam? What’s the real point of this? And above all: How can we – those who are letting off steam as well as those who are getting steam – deal with it constructively?
Why complaints are not particularly helpful
Why do we complain about so many things and what is the goal behind it? That question went a study after which students kept diaries about the things that upset them about others. The result: 75 percent of the complaints were not targeted. That is, they were not aimed at changing a circumstance, but rather used to relieve one’s frustration or to gain sympathy from others. On average, participants complained four times a day, and the most common response to their complaining was approval.
Letting out frustration, verbalising negative emotions – actually, one might think that this is good for people. Doesn’t it mean that you shouldn’t eat your emotions? In fact, complaints about circumstances that we don’t — or don’t want to / can’t — control aren’t particularly helpful, like differentstudies have already determined. Still, blowing off is very common, and the last thing a person venturing out to you wants to hear is phrases like, “You know you’re not helping me or you with your bitching?” However: What does a person want to hear or what should they hear? What is the best way to deal with complaints?
The:the “challenging listener:in”
In a study, who deal with work-related grievances, found that the person who challenges the thoughts and feelings of the person making the grievance is most helpful in resolving the issue. The point here was not necessarily to find a direct solution to the problem of the complaining person, but rather to help this person to reconsider their own reaction.
An example: Your colleague complains about another person. “Tom is always late, it’s so disrespectful!” Now you could jump in and say, “You’re absolutely right, Tom’s manner really gets on my nerves!” And already both get upset about someone. Or you could be a challenging listener and challenge your co-worker’s point of view: “I can understand that you might find this disrespectful, after all you’re on time every day and you might feel silly when others seem to think so Don’t mean that seriously. But do you really think that he’s late so often? Maybe Tom has some problems and doesn’t dare to bring it up.”
On the one hand, with this statement you take the negative emotions of your counterpart seriously – but you also help the person to question their own perception and to look at the whole thing from a different perspective. With this constructive approach, you as a listening person are more than a mere suggestion box – and the complaining person may receive the necessary incentive to deal more closely with the uncomfortable situation and, at best, to change something.
Sources used: psychologytoday.com, journals.sagepub.com, pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov, slate.com, journals.aom.org, psycnet.apa.org