A difficult person in the workplace can be anyone at any level in the environment: a co-worker, a supervisor, a subordinate, a support staff member, a service provider, a product provider, an owner, a partner, an administrator, a director, anyone, even a consumer. They are generally, for a variety of reasons, constant headaches to communicate and work with. Although their numbers are always small, their impact is very significant. The difficulty they bring to the workplace on a daily basis is the greatest obstacle to the short and long-term success and health of the organization. These people are directly responsible for absenteeism, loss of productivity, and overtime, a loss in profitability that ultimately leads to the demise of the business. They frustrate and demoralize almost everyone in the environment, either directly or indirectly and no one is exempt from their influence. These people are difficult to understand and worst of all, they appear to be immune to all the usual methods of communication and persuasion designed to convince them or help them to change their mindset. Note the use of the word “mindset” here instead of “behavior.” Behaviors are the result of mindsets, and to influence behaviors, you first have to influence the mindset. Those unlucky enough to have to work directly with difficult people are usually the ones most reluctant to confront or deal with them, in part because it’s human nature to want to avoid them, but for the most part, because they don’t know how.