Dealing with obnoxious people at work requires steadfast application of your emotional intelligence.
People who are behaving in a way you think obnoxious are probably in a state of emotional hijack - cognitively disabled and run by impulse. Three ways to deal with them:
1. Don't join them! Don't let yourself be hijacked too. Connect with your sense of purpose. Breathe, count do what you must but stay present and positive.
2. Try to validate their emotional experience. EG "I understand how you might be angry (or anxious or frustrated etc) about this." This doesn't always work but frequently helps defuse emotional hijack.
3. Don't make it personal. Don't attribute malicious intent towards you. Tell yourself "this is not about me." Because, it isn't. They may be being insensitive and ignorant but it's because of their emotional blinds spots - not about you.
Here's what Daniel Goleman recently wrote about civility.
Link: Civility at Work at Daniel Goleman - Author of Emotional Intelligence and Social Intelligence.
In the emotional intelligence model, self-awareness and managing our emotions well are the keys to self-mastery. Once we stabilize in a positive state, we can become senders of that positivity to others. And that suggests one strategy for dealing with an obnoxious encounter – stay calm and clear, be firm but friendly. Because every interaction is a system, this can have a positive impact on the other person. And even if they do not change how they are acting, we can leave their negativity behind as we go on to the next encounter.
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