Working with Toxic People: How to handle them?

Diagnosing Toxic People: Three Kinds of People

Wise: May not always mean the brightest or most talented or gifted although it may not mean they are the most energetic though it may.  Wise means that when the light shows up when the truth enters this person’s circle, they like it and respond to it.  What that means , is they are going along and something is not right and you as their leader comes in and says, you know Joe, the way you are doing this is, or your attitude or your performance or whatever, you can do It differently.  And when they tell them that, the person says, oh is that so and they want to hear what you have to say to improve themselves and move closer to that light and truth you have to offer.  They may not understand it fully but they are open to it.   They take it in and they listen.  They value it and instead of asking the light to adapt to them, they adapt to the light.  One way you can always relate to an addict is they always want reality to adapt to them.  However, those in recovery begin to adapt to reality rather than have reality adapt to them.   Reality is the thing that mostly stays the same and we ask people to adapt to the policies and to adapt to the standard.  When you begin to adapt the church ministry to the person’s wants, then things get upside down.  A wise person you give feedback to and they adapt to it.  These people have certain characteristics, (Proverbs 9:8-9; Proverbs 10:8, 9, 14).  So, if you have a problem person in your group do you nuke them, fire them, or get rid of them?   Not necessarily!  If they have certain abilities and gifts that may lend themselves to the work they are doing, you may want to work that person if they will listen and if they can learn.  Look for an openness to your feedback, wanting it and hungering for it.  A rebuke the bible says will make them wiser and therefore more efficient.  People that are seeking wisdom will want more wisdom if it will help them improve and be better.  This creates a growing team, that is able to bond and becomes healthy and productive.  So, just because someone is a problem doesn’t mean that we write them off as an idiot or someone who is incompetent nor does it mean they are your enemy.  What it means is that they are a temporary problem hindering the progress of your team or ministry.   So you resource them, you train them, you monitor them, and give them very clear objectives and standards and training and abilities to get there.  You will see that someone can go from failure to success not necessary because of talents, brains and abilities but because they are wise.

Foolish: Don’t confuse a fool with lack of talents or brains.  Some of the most talented and smartest people you will ever be around are the biggest fools that you will ever be around.  So, according to this definition, if the wise person likes the light, correction, training and input the foolish person is diagnosed as not liking it.  In fact in Prov. 1:7 fools despise wisdom and instruction and in Prov. 9:8 they will actually hate you.  Often time leaders give feedback and fools blame leadership instead of taking the log out of their own eye.  If they only did this then I would be able to do this.   If they just gave me this or understood what I was trying to say and do then things would flow well.  I just need more time, space, understanding, grace, etc.  They always have a way of judging the judge.  They judge the process.  You try to instruct them they will give you all kind of feedback about how the feedback was given, the way the structure is, if they understood if they just did this or that.  They may say, I know I screwed up but did you see how that person shared that with me?   If the person only did it this way, I would have been alright with it.  They are always judging the judge.  That is foolish behavior.  Now what happens, in leadership because you are loving and soft hearted and want only the best for everyone, leaders then try to resource these fools, they give them more resources or more responsibilities, and they try to train them, and give them feedback and you are wasting your breath when you understand that the only thing that works with this kind of person is limits, and consequences.  These stop the flow of collateral damage, of the person who is in denial.  These folks are not necessarily trying to make your life miserable.  That’s not their goal.  Their goal is to avoid responsibility.  In avoiding responsibility they make your life miserable and make things miserable for a lot of people in your ministry.   Trying to make your life miserable is not their intent, so don’t judge their heart and they are not necessarily bad people here, but are people who are not taking responsibility for their problems.   So a limit and a consequence make the problem and collateral damage fall on their laps instead of yours.

How to deal with fool?

1. What is the problem? Find the problem. Collateral damage something they did wrong. 
2. State the problem clearly. Lay it out to them in ways they can understand. No judgment, criticism or putting them down, no personal attacks.  When you are doing or not doing this, this is what happens and it is not productive to the team or ministry and show them the consequences that are costing you, the ministry and the church.  So I want you to do it differently and you give them the standard to do it differently.  You are giving them one more chance to diagnose themselves to find out if they can see the light in a clear way and respond to it.  If they don’t adapt this time you don’t continue to try to correct the technical leadership term for that is if you continue to do it your way is, nagging.  You will be barking at the wind.  They are deaf to your words.  You don’t go talk to them about that problem anymore.  That’s not the problem because problems are not problems if we have wise people because with them we can solve problems. 
3. Talk to them about ignoring the problem. Why are you not hearing me or ignoring me? Why are you not responding as I asked you to?  Why no change?  Why no effort? 
4. Talk to the person about consequences. Limit responsibilities; reassign them, give them a brief sabbatical or termination. We will give you enough rope so that if this goes down bad, it will be your own fault.  That is providing you make the guidelines very clear and precise.
5. Bring two or three other leaders like Matt. 18. These people tend to blame shift and live in denial. It’s more difficult to divide 3 people then it is one. People need to be there to weigh every word especially if this becomes a formal or legal matter.  You may even have a document to sign off on to keep all on track in the future.  We love you and want you to make it but we also want to make sure you have heard us and have received exactly what it is we are asking you to do.  God never disciplines or sends people to hell without any warnings.
6.   Follow through with the consequences.   Fools like toddlers who have been disciplined can actually grow.  But sadly many of them don’t grow because no one ever did this for them from childhood up to the present.  I love you too much to let your character derail you for the rest of your life.  I will be in your face and hold you accountable until you get with it and see the light and the truth.  We can also become partners in sin according to James 4:17.

The Evil or Bad Guys: These are not good people. They are created in the image of God and they have the potential for good and have a lot of strengths and talents but what is in their hearts is the key to all of this. Division, destruction, and they are out to pull you down.  They are motivated by envy, pride, self-centeredness, greed, power etc. and they take pleasure when people fall or leadership fails.  They take pleasure in another person’s demise.  They do things to elevate themselves at the expense of other people.  This is not a good person to have on your team.  He can become infectious.   That is why Paul says in Titus 3:10 to “reject such a man after a first and second warning.”  They may take enough hits and come to their senses and repent but that is not your problem at the moment.  That is God’s issue.  You respond to the moment at hand.   But you must go into the protective mode for your church and ministry.  You are the steward that God has called and will hold you responsible for your actions.  Not just collateral damage like the fool but intentional damage is brought about by the evil person.   It manifests itself in divisiveness, church splits and a stalling of church growth.   They have an agenda and it is not God’s agenda but an agenda that stems from selfish motives and works its way out in the way of selfish behavior.  Wise we resource them, the fool with discipline and limit them but the evil person we bring upon them Lawyers, guns and money is the answer!  We are at war and we are in the protective mode and you shoot all the antibiotics you can to make the system strong enough to withstand this.   The answer is rejection and protection according to church rules and legal laws.   You go through the process to determine whether the person is wise, a fool or evil.  We are not out to nuke the person but to discover ways to get the person on board or off the board.  Do it in a way that can be defended later because part of what you are protecting is the church and ministry and testimony to the Lord.