Five ways to deal with difficult customers around Christmas

Difficult customers add to end of year stress

Five simple ways to let go of end of year pressure and enjoy the holidays

Wellington, 20 December 2012 - Exhausted Christmas shoppers and end of year revellers put extra stress on retail and hospitality workers. The high toll on their health and well being can be off-set by a few simple holiday tips.

Communications specialist, John Faisandier, recommends five key tips for anyone experiencing stress at the beginning of the holidays.

1. Relax your body
Breathing deeply and consciously, let go of negative feelings and breathe in goodness and health. Neuroscience research has shown that deep breathing revitalises the brain.

2. Focus your thoughts on the positive things that have happened
Recall the positive things that happened throughout the year. Savour the feelings that go with those events. This will inspire and motivate you for the coming year. Let the unpleasant experiences fade into the back ground as you focus on the good.

3. Get with people who make you feel good.
Being with positive people is a powerful way to become positive yourself. If those around you are not very positive, look for the good in them and tell them what it is. The more you affirm the positive in others the more they will live up to the labels you give them.

4. Be kind and compassionate to everyone
If people are negative towards you they may be feeling hurt from past experiences, even as far back as early childhood. Show empathy by acknowledging their feelings. Affirm them for who they are, even if you don’t agree with their ideas.

5. Give your body a chance to recover.
Walk, exercise with friends, play games, laugh and eat and drink enough to get pleasure from the nourishment and the company.

Enjoy the positive feelings this generates and you will have new energy to take back to work with you.

Special bonus tip from kindergarten wall poster:
Be nice and share your toys

John Faisandier, trainer and author. For the past 14 years has been training people to deal with emotions in the workplace much of which comes from difficult customers and annoying colleagues. His initial work as a Catholic priest and then as a psychodramatist working with drug and alcohol rehabilitation has given him unique insights into emotions and how they can help and hinder effective communications and healthy living. His book “Thriving Under Fire: Turn difficult customers into business success” is published by Steele Roberts Publishers, Wellington. Information on the TUF award winning training programme TUF: Thriving Under Fire can be found at www.tuf.co.nz

ENDS

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