Earlier in my career when I was a young leader, I had a real problem with being defensive.
Someone would say something to me that I didn’t agree with or something I just didn’t want to hear.
Generally it was an email where I would shoot back an immediate smart response, taking a shot at the sender.
I ended up losing a lot of influence, trust and respect with other leaders and contributors.
It caused me to not get support when I needed it most and to miss opportunities
I’m thankful for my mentor at the time, he taught me how to overcome being defensive.
I learned to slow down, take a breath and walk away to let things diffuse.
I accepted the fact I didn’t know it all and began listening.
I stayed positive, remembering that positive thoughts lead to positive actions.
I then started on my path to repair the relationships that I had hurt.
I even set an email rule to hold all my outgoing mail for 4 minutes after I hit send.
This gave me a chance to stop and think about what I wrote.
I still had that email rule on 8 years later when I left my corporate job.
A gentle reminder of who I was at one time.
Have you snapped at someone recently?
Its possible you were behaving badly.
How do you prevent yourself from being defensive?