Dealing with ‘difficult’ or ‘problematic’ colleagues, whether they are your direct reports, peers, or even your boss, is draining and exhausting. As leaders, it can feel like the majority of our time is spent on just a few people. And typically it is the staff/projects that we don’t want to spend time which makes the whole thing even more draining. What if I told you that if we invest a small amount of time upfront, this problem can be removed? If instead of managing performance you managed motivation you could remove the burden of dealing with that ‘difficult’ person and instead have them show up as yet another great employee? This is possible – we just need to approach the issue differently.