What Behavior “Tells” You About a Person
Some of you may have seen the video I shared over last weekend of an unsettling interaction I had with a SFMTA Parking Control Officer/Meter Maid. To briefly summarize, I was stopped and yelled at by this officer who threatened to call the police on me - which is why I recorded the incident for my own safety. He took photos of my car while driving, which I later discovered was not his role to do. You can hear him telling me that I am parked in the middle of the street, while he is ACTUALLY parked in the middle of the street blocking traffic.
After settling my own jarred energy, I thought about this officer of the city. What would have this man choose to use his position the way he did? What does his behavior signal about his work environment and the people who are managing him? Here’s what the officer’s behavior told me about him:
Yelling at me for making a mistake that was outside of his job duties to correct:
This “tell” informs me that this is a man seeking to have more responsibility and social clout in his job. It is likely that this man could use more income and sees demonstrating extra effort could promote him. This tell also informs, that this man believes power is exercised with intimidation and by punishment. Signals to how he was raised and the management style he is under.
Creating a false narrative that I was blocking traffic when he was the actual perpetrator:
This “tell” signals a resistance to accountability. Those who cannot be held accountable predictably also possess a low sense of personal responsibility and integrity. When a person resists accountability they demonstrate a misunderstanding that accountability is punishment for performance, rather than knowing that accountability truly is a metric of how one is performing. Unfortunately, this officer was attempting to be right rather, than to do his actual job and refused to be held accountable for it.
The officer accuses me of harassment after using his professional position to unnecessarily impose himself:
This is the toughest “tell” to identify because it signals that this officer of the city understands how he can leverage and abuse the power of his professional position. The officer demonstrates an attempt to thuggishly intimidate, belittle, and then contrive against me as a driver - his job is parking. When the officer characterizes me as “entitled” this signals one, his resentment of my social standing, and two, that he believes his behavior is valid and will be using this logic in his reporting. This is dangerous and speaks to a lack of leadership development in his place of work and/or a work culture which cultivates this officer’s brute-like conduct.
Why does all this matter? The first step in the INSPIRED™ Framework is to identify. Why do we do this? The tells from the officer are what motivated the necessary next steps for me to take to remain in MY OWN power. Also, identifying the tells from the officer allowed me to continue to see him as a human being, rather than solely a punk-wannabe. There is a real story behind this man’s behavior with me. My interest in the officer’s story is what can make this interaction transformative and even began to. I hope that people notice in the video how the officer begins to compose himself after witnessing my composure. The officer’s last words were actually, “Have a nice day ma’am,” it wasn’t nicely stated AND it got with the human decency program! That’s a win for me.
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