If you’re a community leader or teacher in any capacity, you will eventually run across a student or attendee that exhausts you. In my experience, this is not about their skill level, ability, or financial situation – it is their attitude or behaviour.
While a few people’s behaviour may reach the threshold of needing a ban, typically the individuals we are talking about today haven’t done anything ban-worthy; they’re simply… difficult. And sometimes, the difficulty in dealing with them means that it may not be worth it trying to retain them as a student or attendee.
Here’s the three general types of individuals that I’ve encountered that have made me say “it’s just not worth it.”
The Hard Negotiator
I run scholarship programs and volunteer programs for people with financial difficulties. There are times I’m more than happy to extend a discount because a person has a valid reason why they need an exception. These people are not Hard Negotiators.
Rather, the Hard Negotiator is someone who finds every excuse possible for a discount or free service – often paired with a criticism:
- “You’re overpriced”
- “The other students are too low-level for me”
- “You’re short leads/follows, so you should be grateful to have me there”
- “I don’t like those teachers as much as some of your other teachers”
- “I don’t actually want to be here; I’m just here for XYZ”
Or, my personal favourite:
- “You should be happy to have some money as a business owner rather than no money from me”.
Internally, I question why they want to participate if they do not see value in the offering. And yes, there are situations where critiques are reasonable – but that’s not what the hard negotiators do. The difference is that hard negotiators devalue what you offer to get a discount, not to help you improve.
Dealing with the Hard Negotiator
With hard negotiators, my advice is don’t give them the discount. If they don’t value what you offer, they likely never will.
In my experience, even when I have provided a discount to a hard negotiator, it typically never ends with a satisfied customer. Rather, the cycle repeats: they always have a “reason” why your services are not worth the full fee.
The Never-Satisfied
There are people who just… don’t enjoy things. And, within that group, there’s a difference between people who are struggling and recognize it’s their issue, and the ones that make their dissatisfaction everyone else’s problem:
- “I can’t dance with anyone except advanced dancers because they’re bad and I NEED good technique in my partners”
- “Everyone else is painful to dance with except for [professionals]”
- “XYZ are why I’ve had a terrible night (nearly every night)”
- “Everyone’s unfriendly (because I make no effort to connect)”
Note: everyone has bad nights, bad experiences, and pet peeves. Most people recognize these, and may complain about them to a normal extent. There are also stages in dancer development where they may externalize a lot of issues and have poor insight into their own level. This normal range of response is not what I’m talking about here.
I’m talking about outliers that will almost always be unhappy unless their experience is everyone else’s focus. And typically, people who also need constant validation and emotional support to work through those perceived negative experiences.
Very often, these people are the same ones that rely on heavy doses of external validation by dancing with professionals (and being told the dance was good) or other accolades. Very rarely do they do the reverse and give validation to others – and when they do, it needs to be acknowledged.
Managing the Never Satisfied
I absolutely would not ban someone from the community for this reason, or even discourage them from attending or participating in events, unless the behaviour becomes abusive. But, I have limited emotional bandwidth both personally and professionally – as do you. We cannot be an endless fountain of personal emotional support.
At some point, it’s more healthy to recognize that these people need to choose to think about how they engage, and need to take some responsibility for having a positive experience. If you’re close to them… recommend therapy?
You may find that without someone to enable the behaviour or be a constant source of emotional support, they may fade from the community organically. But, there may be times where you need to talk to these people about their behaviour because it can affect the experience of others – especially if it crosses into bullying.
For example, you may need to have a conversation about their behaviour if:
- They are criticizing newer or less-secure dancers for normal difficulties in the learning process;
- They are complaining publicly about other (non-abusive) community members in a way that is likely to hurt the subject of the complaint or develop a hostile community environment;
- They are taking on the role of “teacher” while being a student, or on the social floor; or,
- They are bullying others.
Sometimes, the recipient of feedback will act as if they are being persecuted. Ultimately, if their behaviour is creating a hostile environment and they refuse to examine or work on the behaviour, it’s better to let them leave as opposed to providing space for their behaviour. Plus, the people you’ll often lose by allowing these people to be unaccountable for their behaviour are the healthier, more constructive members of your community because they won’t return to a hostile or unwelcoming environment.
The Support Vampire
The third and final type is the Support Vampire. They may not ask for discounts (though sometimes they overlap with the Hard Negotiator or the Never Satisfied), but they will ask for an ever-lengthening list of exceptions to established norms and demand a far higher than normal amount of administrative support. I even joke that 2% of my festival attendees require 80% of the support; this is not an exaggeration.
While some people who need extra support may have a reasonable reason (for example, accessibility issues, disability, or just… horrible administrative luck), there are some who just take it for granted that you are there to serve their needs because they “pay you”.
For example, they may:
- Call or email you constantly for very basic support
- Refuse to use self-help tools, like website information or automatic processes
- Demand exceptions to established norms, generally for their convenience
- Require focus on them and their needs over the needs of other students or attendees
- Ask multiple, involved questions outside of class time that are not appropriate when a teacher is “off the clock”
For clarity about the last point, I’m not talking about engaged students who have legitimate, straightforward questions and enjoy talking about dance with their teacher. Here’s a comparison between a question that I’d have no issue answering in the course of normal support, versus one that should be confined to a teaching relationship:
- Reasonable: “I’ve noticed that I’m trying to do what we learned in class last week, but now I’m feeling like my dancing is ‘off’. Is this normal?”
- Unreasonable: “I missed class last week, please teach me the pattern during our dance so that I don’t miss out on the content I paid for.”
Sometimes, requests are in the grey zone (for example, “can we quickly try this? Something’s not working and I’d love to know where it’s going wrong.”) The delivery and context often determines whether this is a reasonable request for support, or whether this is someone who is overtaxing the relationship. Only you can decide where that line is.
Dealing with the Support Vampire
Remember that when you have to spend hours more time on one person, you’re also shortening the time that you can spend helping others who may need support. People who could blossom into amazing community members may quietly leave because there’s no “space” for them.
You need to set boundaries on your time and support to mitigate the effect of these individuals. This may include directing them to private lessons instead of spending lots of class time on their specific needs, or pausing a question when it will force the rest of a class off schedule. It may also mean setting limits on availability and response times.
Sometimes, these people will leave when you set these boundaries. It’s important to be okay with that. It’s not worth the money they’ll bring in if they cost you other students and a balanced community.
In Conclusion
Ultimately, the people who speak and behave like this are often extremely exhausting. Even if you give the discount, support, or validation, they’ll probably still find a reason to be unhappy. I won’t ban people for these behaviours (as long as they’re not abusive), but after a decade, I’m comfortable not trying to keep them happy.
Ultimately, if they’re not happy with the level of service, the community, or the cost that I can provide without sacrificing my sanity, boundaries, and finances, I’m okay with them leaving the community. While this can be scary – especially if you are newer – often it’s a healthier long-term approach.
