Passive-Aggressive Leadership

One area of my leadership (and life in general) that I am working to develop is the ability to confront issues with other people head on instead of taking out my frustration and anger in a passive-aggressive way. If you’re not familiar with the concept of being passive-aggressive let me illustrate with some examples…

• When an employee is not performing and meeting expectations, instead of sitting down and discussing it, you simply schedule him less hours.
• When a friendship is not going the way you anticipated it to, instead of getting together for coffee and sharing honest feelings, you simply stop calling him.
• When you don’t think your spouse is holding up their end of the cleaning bargain, instead of talking it through, you simply leave the dirty wine glasses on the counter and silently count the days until they get washed.

As you read the example above you might be tempted to think, “How childish is that behavior?,” and you’d be right. It is childish. It reminds me of what the Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corninthians 13:11,

“When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.”

Becoming a man doesn’t happen just because we get older in years. For me personally becoming a man is about becoming a different kind of person. The kind of person who responds to frustrating situations with levelheadedness, courage and maturity not passive-aggressiveness.

How are you doing? In what areas of your life are you still behaving in childish ways? A great way to find out would be to ask your spouse or a close friend where they see childish tendencies in you. I would also recommend praying and asking Jesus to reveal to you any of the areas in your life where he wants to do a maturing act in you.