Personality Clashes

6 Jun 2007

Not really a swinging issue, but with people on here makeing friends in chat rooms, forums or even by PM I wondered if others had experienced an instant problem when it came to building empathy with someone.
I work in direct sales in a very niche market and to be truthfull I'm pretty good at it and am trained as well as managed by the best in the country, however the other day I found myself really strugling with a customer.
The ethics of my job may be a bit in question from time to time but after all it is business simple as that and i'm not here to discuss that. Customers are sometimes unwilling and hard work all of which I'm used to dealing with and never normally have a problem untill the other week. By the time they walk through the door a relationship has been built up with the customer that it's a doddle to deal with them. But this paticular one had me beat from the start.
I greated them and setteld them into the waiting area but from the moment I first saw them I knew I was strugeling. They were not nasty or hard work in anything they said or did but I instantly found their demeanour disamring. Now I'm not very thick skinned and if I'm honest am quite shy and sensative however it doesn't normally affect my work. Some customers I like some I don't but the way I cope with tough ones is simple. I sit back smile let them think they are getting their own way and that they are in control when inside I know its me in charge and that in an hours time I will have made myself a couple of hundred quid from them.
However with these I had met my match as I went through each step of the process we use I was finding it harder and harder to deal with them. My hands started to shake to a great extent and just before I admited defeat I even had tears welling up in my eyes. redface

What I found disarming I really can't put my finger on. There were tough questions and a little bit of hostilaty from them but nothing I've never dealt with before and am more than capable of doing so that wasn't the problem. It was more their body language and personality that I couldn't handle. Now I have met worked and dealt with pretty much every type of personality, race and nationality and to be honest have never strugeled before. But for some reason from the word go with this pair I was on the ropes.
Like I said purely by body langueage and actions this middle aged couple who quite frakly weighed 8 stone between them and had the apearance of your typical train spotter (i'm not calling peoples hobbies or style here i'm just trying to build a picture of how they were and came across) had completely detroyed the emotions and confidence of a 6 foot(ish) quite rough around the edges executive who to be honest is bloody good at what he does for a living.
I'm not bitter or resentfull as I simply admitted defeat to myself and asked another exec to deal with them and he did so with no problem (though I'll admit he is a lot touger skinned than me). I'm just more curious as to if anyone else has had this problem where as no matter how hard you try you just can't cope with one type of person on a face to face basis or as I mentioned at the start online. I'm not even sure if it is classed as a personality clash but for whatever reason this couple had me beat simple as that confused

6 Jun 2007

(completely ignoring the point and going off on a blatant hijack)

OI WHERES ME FECKING OATCAKES?
Thought I saw you lurking the other night- welcome back you tart passionkiss

6 Jun 2007

Quote by winchwench
(completely ignoring the point and going off on a blatant hijack)

OI WHERES ME FECKING OATCAKES?
Thought I saw you lurking the other night- welcome back you tart

I saw you'd been pervin my non excistant profile t'other day and as for the oatcakes................
..............I had em the other day for lunch and they were lovely with some cheddar bacon and branston pickle.
FFS bloody thread hijackers lol

6 Jun 2007

It might help to say the type of work you do. People take different things more seriously than others.
There's not much you can do with professional hagglers, they will try everything they can to get a better deal.
I have encountered some tough customers before, but in my work, general building, I can easily walk away from a nightmare.

6 Jun 2007

You get people like this in all walks of life and meet them through work, social events, friends etc. I've met a few people that, through no fault of their own, I cannot take to no matter how hard I try dunno

Others might just have that type of personality or demeanour that makes them seem unfriendly and unapproachable. Sounds to me like your pair are in the latter category.
Best thing is to be as polite and professional as you can then wave them off as they go. You're not likely to have any contact with them again and they will have no influence on your life
kiss

6 Jun 2007

Quote by duncanlondon
It might help to say the type of work you do. People take different things more seriously than others.
There's not much you can do with professional hagglers, they will try everything they can to get a better deal.
I have encountered some tough customers before, but in my work, general building, I can easily walk away from a nightmare.

The type of job I do I can't disclose as it may disclose who I am if anyone I work with or know reads this. But it wasn't a job problem and as for hagglers that wasn't the problem. I know they were being stand offish and distant purely because they knew they were quite frankly about to be done over big style by me but that I can deal with on a regualr basis do so with great ease.
It's just that from the very first words we said to each other "Hi my names Sheddy welcome etc etc" I knew I was in trouble for what ever reason I simply couldn't cope with this type of personality. Like I said tough questions and haggling are all part of the job and I'm trained to deal with this and do so with no problem.
It was just bizzare for me not to be able to cope with the situation as all I was stumbling on was their personality. Yep tough questions were asking all I answered with ease as I'm used to doing so it was more body language I wasn't copeing with.
It's hard to explain if it'd been anyone else sat in front of me asking the same questions or doing the same actions it'd been no problem. But for what ever reason I simply couldn't deal with this couple's demeanour.

6 Jun 2007

We've had conversations about this in the past and discussed the 4 main personlity types, whilst any one of these four pesonality types interacts well with 2 of the other types, they generally do not interact well with the opposite peronality type. It seems to me that your situation was a straight forward case of this.
I found a bit more about this here:
This is by no means the only personality test out there just thought I'm mention that one I know you have some understanding of it.
It might be worth having a browse of the wip wap and doing some other personality tests as they can be quite interesting and learning about other personality types can be helpful as it can help you understand someones motivation behind the way they are behaving or for instance the questions they are asking you.

6 Jun 2007

Your use of the terms ‘defeat’ and ‘beat’ seem more fitting to an encounter where you might be employing a slightly manipulative selling technique (or traditional approach to selling - often associated with ‘hard sell’) as opposed to the more client friendly ‘consultative selling’ approach.
In the later there is no feeling of being beaten or defeat by either the sales person or the customer, as it is ‘customer needs’ based selling and you certainly don’t aim to ‘do them over’.
In the former, however, there will always be occasions where even the most tried and tested sales techniques just won’t work and you are quite right… it is down to personalities or rather personality/behaviour types. There will always be times when the techniques that so favourably work with a whole range of personality types will actually turn off another. What’s more, if it is your approach which is turning them off, the more you try the worse you are making it.
You don’t give much away as to their behaviour other than commenting on the body language and them asking some tough questions. So at best the guess is they (or the decision maker at least) may well have had a strong analytical side in their behaviour type (introvert, requiring detail, oblivious to influence and flattery when seeking information, unwilling to be guided into a decision without adequate substantiated detail delivered in a straight and un-frilled manner). They don’t want to be your friend and don’t have to like you to buy from you (unlike some types). Their body language is always closed to people they don’t know. They don’t do small talk. Flattery, bullshit, flash jargon and hype won’t get you anywhere with this type. In fact you can turn them off with a single handshake if you make it last too long.
Understanding personality types is the foundation to any selling skills training that's worth its salt.
On the other hand, they could have been from a sales background where they learnt all the techniques of sales manipulation and so arrived with their eyes wide open to any technique you threw at them.

6 Jun 2007

we had no idea that the shed market was that pressurised and now have a whole new resect for the people who work in B&Q
... bolt

7 Jun 2007

Quote by sheddy
It might help to say the type of work you do. People take different things more seriously than others.
There's not much you can do with professional hagglers, they will try everything they can to get a better deal.
I have encountered some tough customers before, but in my work, general building, I can easily walk away from a nightmare.

The type of job I do I can't disclose as it may disclose who I am if anyone I work with or know reads this. But it wasn't a job problem and as for hagglers that wasn't the problem. I know they were being stand offish and distant purely because they knew they were quite frankly about to be done over big style by me but that I can deal with on a regualr basis do so with great ease.
It's just that from the very first words we said to each other "Hi my names Sheddy welcome etc etc" I knew I was in trouble for what ever reason I simply couldn't cope with this type of personality. Like I said tough questions and haggling are all part of the job and I'm trained to deal with this and do so with no problem.
It was just bizzare for me not to be able to cope with the situation as all I was stumbling on was their personality. Yep tough questions were asking all I answered with ease as I'm used to doing so it was more body language I wasn't copeing with.
It's hard to explain if it'd been anyone else sat in front of me asking the same questions or doing the same actions it'd been no problem. But for what ever reason I simply couldn't deal with this couple's demeanour.
So I guess a threesome's out then? rolleyes

7 Jun 2007

Quote by PoloLady
........
You don’t give much away as to their behaviour other than commenting on the body language and them asking some tough questions. So at best the guess is they (or the decision maker at least) may well have had a strong analytical side in their behaviour type (introvert, requiring detail, oblivious to influence and flattery when seeking information, unwilling to be guided into a decision without adequate substantiated detail delivered in a straight and un-frilled manner). They don’t want to be your friend and don’t have to like you to buy from you (unlike some types). Their body language is always closed to people they don’t know. They don’t do small talk. Flattery, bullshit, flash jargon and hype won’t get you anywhere with this type. In fact you can turn them off with a single handshake if you make it last too long.....

So you know me.
We were on holiday and got picked on my 'ropers' on the water front. We had nothing better to do, so yes we would take the free instant prize ticket. Yes we took their taxi to collect the prize. Yes we will listen to the time share pitch. There was an outside chance we would buy. About one in a million. So we excepted the drinks, the light lunch. The attention of a young lady, who was turning it on because she liked me. That was a risk, she could have turned W off, how did she know? Then we said no, but I did enjoy the game.

7 Jun 2007

Quote by
So you know me.

Yes Polo is very good with Psychometrics.
She let me do a professional test with her once - it was amazing if not a little scary to have somebody read you like a book!
And what was even more scary is Polo and I are actually very very similar in our personality type.

8 Jun 2007

Quote by Kiss
So you know me.

Yes Polo is very good with Psychometrics.
She let me do a professional test with her once - it was amazing if not a little scary to have somebody read you like a book!
And what was even more scary is Polo and I are actually very very similar in our personality have been looking for someone good at Tel-psycho-mechanics. We call them puppeteers, must look her up.

8 Jun 2007

Quote by Kiss
So you know me.

Yes Polo is very good with Psychometrics.
She let me do a professional test with her once - it was amazing if not a little scary to have somebody read you like a book!
And what was even more scary is Polo and I are actually very very similar in our personality type.
Yes I must say that I agree. Polo is very good at this in my experience too kiss

thats for you and Polo xxxxx