How To Deal With Difficult People At Work: 4 Secrets From Experts
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Each workday we march into battle against the most fearsome foe imaginable: other people’s personalities.
Every office contains exactly two types of people:
- People trying to do their jobs
- People bent on making #1 impossible.
Most are low-level annoyances. There’s the Devout Scheduler who sets meetings the way Victorian doctors prescribed opium: generously, for every ailment, and with utter disregard for long-term consequences.
We also have Beelzebub’s Barrister, that guy who always says, “I’m just playing devil’s advocate.” And then proceeds to be the devil.
They’re enough to make you want to opt out of people. (I have the temperament of a housecat who glares at guests from under the couch.)
But those aren’t even the worst types we face…
(Cue the horror-movie violin.)
The Tier One Toxics are the real problem: the Narcissist Superstars, the Drama Monarchs, the Bullies, and the Perfectionists. These are the ones that make you want to change your name to “Out of Office.” And they’re what we’ll be covering today.
We’ll get insight on how to handle each from clinical psychologist Albert Bernstein. His excellent book is “Emotional Vampires at Work.”
Let’s get to it…
The Narcissist Superstar
They smirk with the buoyant confidence of a person who has never once said the words “That’s my fault.”
The Narcissist Superstar will do anything, I repeat anything, to manifest their grand plan. They were born two minutes early and have been sprinting ever since. They work hard. They work you harder. They are terrifying because sometimes they’re right and often they deliver.
And because the universe is a prankster, their fevered dreams occasionally benefit everyone else. A narcissist’s crusade to prove their own divinity might cure a disease, revolutionize an industry, or invent a sport that ruins Sundays globally.
But telling a narcissist what’s wrong with them is like lecturing a tornado about zoning laws. Do not attempt to teach them empathy. They have heard the sales pitch and are not in the market.
“But can you believe that they…”
Yes. I can. They do it every Tuesday.
“But their lack of consideration hurts me.”
Because you think it reflects on your value. You’re asking the wrong question. You’re asking, “What must they think of me to treat me like this?” The answer is: they don’t think about you. You are furniture that occasionally speaks.
You don’t reform narcissists. What works is not denunciation but redesign: framing your requests so they can hear them without forfeiting their favorite illusions about themselves.
Tell them they’re smart. Not because they deserve it (they’ll assume they do), but because their ears won’t open otherwise. Begin by acknowledging competence: “You saw a way through this that no one else did.” Then frame things within their cosmology: What’s In It For Me?
Every management book gesticulates toward motivation; only a few admit that many people are motivated primarily by themselves. The narcissist is simply unembarrassed about it. This is not a tragedy. It’s a blueprint.
They believe the only human motive is self-interest (which is tidy, if you’re the self). So if your proposal does not include ROI for their image, time, or budget, they will not hear you.
Then shift the conversation from rightness to results. They don’t want to be right; they want to win. Say: “Building on your insight from last week, if we do it this way, you get the win Friday instead of Tuesday, and we don’t have to involve Legal.” You aren’t being mercenary. You’re being bilingual.
And what about when they want something from you? Oh, they always want something. A report. Your weekend. The marrow from your femurs.
You think fairness is persuasive. They think price is reality. If you want to deal with them, you don’t teach empathy. You price the transaction.
Before fulfilling their “quick ask”, decide exactly what you want in return. Resources. Assistance. Compensation. Something. Drive a hard bargain and make them pay up front.
“I can do X by Y once you deliver Z.”
Notice: you did not argue about right and wrong. You didn’t explain your feelings. You priced the outcome in fluent narcissist: time and money. They may not agree. But they’ll understand.
(To learn how to win with a narcissist, click here.)
So we’ve learned how to deal with the toxic people that feel too little. But how about the ones that feel too much?
The Drama Monarch
This entry catalogs the appearance, habits, and ecological mischief of the Office Drama Monarch: a positivity-forward organism selected for charisma during hiring season yet frequently maladapted to the task known as “doing the actual work.”
They’d rather organize a pep rally than read paragraph two of anything. They sincerely believe that if everyone beams with the optimism of a thousand suns, that invoice will pay itself. “Don’t ask how, just believe,” they say. That’s perfect for Christmas movies. Less great for a product launch.
It’s easy to scoff, and believe me I am gifted at scoffing, but the truth is they’re genuinely fun when the seas are calm. The office is brighter with them around. However…
These are the nicest dangerous people alive. They aren’t sadistic or lazy but they are fundamentally disconnected from reality. In their narrative they are the kindest person at the office, misunderstood by ogres who fetishize “deadlines” and “consequences.” If you so much as raise an eyebrow, you become the villain in their hero’s journey.
You think you can end their self-deception by “telling it like it is.” That’s adorable. Attempt to announce, “This is not, strictly speaking, reality,” and they’ll shift into Persecuted Victim Mode. And nobody victimizes like a victim.
They become drama incarnate and can make your average Tuesday feel like an end-of-season finale. They’re capable of passive-aggression at levels never before seen on planet earth.
“Totally fine if we de-prioritize my item 😊 I’ll just work late again 😊😊.”
Those smileys are tiny yellow shivs, by the way.
How do we survive without becoming bitter gargoyles perched on the copier? Do not go passive-aggressive; you’re an amateur, they’re a professional.
Remember: they are not scamming you; they are scamming themselves. Con artists need to be exposed. Sleepwalkers need to be steered. Win the outcome, not the argument. You don’t need therapy for the team; you need economics for attention.
If you attack the delusion, you’ll get tears and counter-accusations. If you address their fear (no attention)—without naming it—you’ll get work. Yes, it’s perverse. But so is the rest of your job.
Their show thrives on audience participation. Stop clapping at the wrong times. Replace indiscriminate attention with contingent attention.
Catch them being good and praise the heck out of them. Maybe you think praise should be earned like a knighthood. Fine. Keep your feudal ethics in your diary. In the meantime, behavior follows reinforcement. Praise specific actions you want repeated, in public, in near real-time.
Give double what feels natural; quadruple if you self-identify as “tough.” You’re allergic to this because it feels like pandering. It is pandering. Also: it works, as surely as gravity works, which has never once asked your permission.
“What about when I have to be negative?”
Stop delivering criticism like a brick through a skylight. Speak ad copy, not accusation. Ever wonder why great advertising works? It tells you who you already are, then gives you something to buy that proves it. So tell them what they need to “buy” to sustain their delusional narrative: “Tighten this presentation, and you’ll own the room.”
(To learn how to deal with passive-aggressive people, click here.)
What about the people whose aggression isn’t passive?
The Bully
You’re familiar with this genus of office wildlife. AKA “Charisma With Teeth” or “HR’s Seasonal Meteor,” but most commonly referred to as “That Guy.”
Take a normal human. Double the energy, triple any sadistic impulses, disable the worry circuits, and you get this bullet-time blur of confidence stomping around like a middle manager in a community theatre production of “Gladiator.”
“How do they get away with this behavior?”
Because the bully often moves numbers. Numbers are the gods. The gods forgive blood.
You probably think addressing this is a matter of fairness. It isn’t. It’s about reinforcement schedules. The bully behaves this way because it reliably produces the results they want: panic, fear, spectacle. They press a button, you make a face, they get a treat. This is not Freud; it’s a Skinner box.
People are always like, “Stand up to bullies!” As if you’re going to vault a conference table and tear off your cardigan to reveal a WWE singlet. No. “Standing up” in adultland is not an elbow drop; it’s slow thinking. The essential countermove is to recognize the pattern, step out of it, and turn their favorite sport into something they hate: work.
When Chuck turns the conference room into the coliseum, shouting unreasonable demands at you in front of everyone, say, “Give me a minute to think about that.”
You might think this sounds weak, like asking a mugger for a bathroom break. Actually, it’s checkmate in three.
Of course, he’ll growl a response but he’s no longer on firm ground; he can’t really attack you for taking him seriously. And when the next insult tries to tow you back into the old choreography, repeat yourself: “I’m thinking it through.” This has the devastating advantage of being reasonable.
Delay is not cowardice; it’s sabotage. You are removing the fun. You’ve stopped a stampede with a crosswalk. What’s key is that you don’t scramble to explain. Explaining is catnip for tyrants. We mistake explaining for persuasion, forgetting that a person committed to humiliating you doesn’t want a truth; he wants a tremor.
Instead, ask questions. There’s a reason therapists answer questions with questions: it changes who is doing the cognitive work. So ask questions that force choices: “When you say ‘done,’ do you mean demo-ready or production-ready?”
The moment you start asking, the performance becomes logistics, and logistics are nobody’s idea of fun. Questions turn dominance into homework. And Chuck did not come to the meeting for homework; he came for a live sacrifice and maybe a muffin.
Chuck will snarl something like, “Figure it out!” Treat this as a badly phrased answer to the question. “To figure it out properly, which constraint matters most? Time, budget, or quality?”
Important distinction: you’re requesting information, not conducting a midnight interrogation under a swinging bulb. Your tone should be a calm, polite “help me understand.”
If you consistently deny the reward, the behavior extinguishes or at least migrates to someone more delicious.
The above can be nerve wracking but you need to let go of the bedtime story about justice descending from the rafters. Usually, the bully brings in numbers. Results excuse many sins; organizations forgive what produces. (Yes, reality is poorly designed for your feelings.)
Before pulling any grievance lever with senior management, do some archaeology first. What became of the last three souls who tried that? If they were reassigned to a desk in the sub-basement behind the water meter, you just answered your own question.
Instead, ask yourself: Why am I still here? There are acceptable answers: money, experience, health insurance. Fine. Acknowledge the tradeoff. But if the answer is fear, leave. You deserve a workplace where “deep breath” isn’t a recurring calendar event.
(To learn how to survive a toxic workplace, click here.)
And what about those folks that don’t have anything wrong with them?
In fact, nothing is wrong anywhere near them. Ever. Because they spend so much time making it exactly right…
The Perfectionist
Every office has at least one precision zealot who believes everything belongs in a labeled bin within a labeled bin on a labeled shelf under a sign that says “Labeled.” They do the thankless work that keeps the building standing and also the thankless work that makes you want to jump from that building.
For all the sighing and eye-rolling we do, we depend on them. Give them the unpleasant jobs and they don’t flinch; they sharpen a pencil you thought was already sharp and handle it. They’re on your side; they just want your side to be left-aligned, 1.15 line height, and free of passive voice.
I promise, they are not rearranging commas because they hate your face. Their rituals are not oppression; they’re containment for anxiety. The engine that powers their personality is not joy or spite but fear. It’s like they’re terrified that if they relax for a second, the “fun” people will turn the office into a Chili’s at happy hour.
The only way to get a perfectionist to chill is to make it painfully obvious that you care about the work at least as much as they do. Here’s how:
- Take Notes: When they talk, write it down. A page is a promise: “You won’t need to repeat this.” One visible notebook can buy you more credibility than six months of “trust me.”
- Read Everything: “Did you read the doc?” is not a question. It’s a spiritual audit. Nothing sparks their contempt faster than asking something answered in the title of the first document they sent you.
- Generate Text: If you think one update a week will do, send three. It feels excessive because it is excessive; that’s the point. A steady drip of evidence turns off the baby monitor in their head. Some will say, “I don’t have time for long updates.” Really? You have time for the meetings spawned by your short ones. Pay now or pay interest.
(To learn how to get promoted, click here.)
We’ve covered a lot. Time to round it all up and learn the fundamental rule for dealing with difficult people…
Sum Up
This is how you deal with difficult people at work…
- The Narcissist Superstar: Skip the sermon. People like this don’t do self-reflection; they do mirror selfies. Treat interactions as transactions. Praise as prelude; bargain as principle; distance as policy. Translate everything into their native currency: time, status, money.
- The Drama Monarch: Make the attention they crave contingent on performance. And for the love of PTO, don’t be negative. Speak in ad copy.
- The Bully: You are not their therapist. You are just someone trying to get through the week without developing a new tic. They want you emotional and reactive so they can dine on your cortisol. Request time, keep calm, and ask questions. Turn their fun into labor.
- The Perfectionist: Their underlying fear doesn’t respond to your eye roll. It responds to evidence that the future has been handled. And don’t say, “It’s not a big deal. We can fix it when we get around to it” unless you enjoy thunderstorms indoors.
This is where I tell you the thing you don’t want to hear: The secret to dealing with difficult people at the office is not handling them better. It’s handling you better.
There isn’t some Jedi mind trick. It’s much simpler and much more annoying:
You have to think instead of react.
Yes, that’s it. That’s the big reveal. You can boo now.
The unglamorous truth is that the real leverage point isn’t them. It’s that tiny, miserable half-second between what they do and what you do next. You can tell this is the truth because nobody likes it.
It means that when the misbehavior occurs (because it will; difficult people are reliable in that way) you take a step to the side and ask a very unsexy question:
“Which choice aligns best with the life I want?”, instead of “What will feel satisfying for the next 12 seconds?” I promise you, those are rarely the same answer.
Thinking is not surrender. Thinking is aiming. The goal is to ensure that your first reaction is not your final answer.
You wanted this story to be about justice. But I am telling you it is about discipline. This is not a popular idea. The culture encourages us to “speak our truth,” preferably with a kind of performative immediacy that plays well in short-form video.
But dealing with difficult people at the office will rarely be satisfying in the way you want it to be. You won’t get the apology, the moment of public vindication, the swelling orchestra in the background as someone says, “You were right all along.”
They’re just stimuli. Tests. Every difficult person at work is basically a pop quiz in: “Are you going to repeat your pattern, or are you going to think?” Thinking instead of reacting doesn’t magically fix the other person. It only prevents you from adding yourself to the list of people you’re frustrated with.
You wanted an answer that would change them. But the answer changes you.
