Concept
Strategic Avoidance
Strategic avoidance is the deliberate choice to reduce or end contact with a person who persistently demeans you, by leaving, transferring or simply meeting them less, which Robert Sutton argues is often the most effective response when it is available.
Advice about difficult people usually assumes you must stay and handle them. Sutton disagrees. In his reading of the evidence and of the stories readers sent him, the people who suffered least were often those who got away, and the people who suffered most were those who stayed for years, hoping it would get better. Escape is not always possible: rent is due, the job market is thin, the person is family. So Sutton treats it as a range rather than a single move. At one end is leaving the job or the relationship. In the middle is transferring, or changing projects or reporting lines. At the near end are small acts of distance: fewer meetings, written communication instead of face-to-face, sitting farther away, shorter calls. None of this is cowardice. It is a recognition that your attention, health and work are worth protecting, and that the cheapest fight is the one you do not have to keep having.
A real-life example
Berk, a sales executive in Izmir, has a regional manager who belittles him in every Monday call. Leaving is not possible this year. He asks to move the weekly review to a written report, joins the call only for his own section, and starts applying for an internal opening in another region. The Monday dread shrinks, and six months later he transfers.
How to use it
- 1List the ways you could reduce contact with the person, from small to large.
- 2Start with one small change this week: one fewer meeting, one exchange moved to writing.
- 3If the pattern is serious and lasting, plan a realistic exit with a date.