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In today’s exercise, we are going to look at the shift from fight to flight in a confrontation while skiing.

– Video Source: YouTube – Thanks to B.P. (a subscriber) for sharing this with us! –

Click the “More” button to view the exercise.

The Workout

  • Watch the video in its entirety before completing the following tasks.
  • Task 1: List the ways the skier in the red hat/pink jacket displays dominance (the fight response) during the first conversation in the video (with the man who was sprayed)
  • Task 2: How does the skier display the Uncomfortable Cluster (the flight response) once confronted by ski safety?
  • Task 3: What is the final “trigger” that causes the skier to try and flee one more time?
  • Write your answers on a sheet of paper before viewing our answers

[expand title=”View Our Answers”]

  • Task 1: The Displays of Dominance
    • States the rules and customs of skiing (saying the guy should have been off on the side of the trail).
    • Argues with the man, saying to “stop lying”
    • Patronizes the man by saying “Yeah I know I’m an asshole.”
    • Note: there is a lack of many meaningful non-verbal behaviors at this point as the skier is in that posture before he is confronted and doesn’t change behavior once confronted, forcing us to rely a bit more on the verbal elements of the clusters.
  • Task 2: The Indicators From The Uncomfortable Cluster
    • Slips underneath the red bar to try and get on the next chair on the lift before the ski safety man can catch him
    •  Moves away from ski safety sliding to the right
    • Says “what are you talking about?” to create distance in time to think about the question.
    • Pulls his poles out from between his legs right before he flees (indicating he isn’t about to sit down).
  • Task 3: The Final “Trigger” To Cause the Person To Flee
    • The ski safety man says “call patrol (ski patrol) to meet us at the top” to the lift operator so that the people who have the authority to remove him from the property are involved.
    • As soon as he says this and the skier realizes he will be caught, he tries to flee one more time (successfully)
  • Add a comment with the assessments that you made, but that we didn’t make, so that we can check for those assessments and provide feedback on those specific observations.  We will add them to our answers in the post itself for future viewings of the exercise.[/expand]

Enhance The Workout

  • Repeat
    • As you watch the video a second time to see each of the indicators listed above, watch how quickly the skier makes the final escape attempt after he realizes he will be caught.
    • It is just about immediate.
    • One of the goals for this exercise is to think about what actions the person you are dealing with or talking to MIGHT do as you confront them. Everything leading up to the final flight attempt showed one level of intent to get away, but adding in one more stressor, without being able to fully control the situation may have caused the final flight attempt.
  • Reflect
    • Think about the ways you can add stress into the lives of the people you interact with each day (whether you are an authority figure, a business person or a parent).
    • I’m not saying that you want to add stress, but you may be in a position where what you say, how you act and what you do is perceived as stressful or threatening.
    • You want to make note of the ways that you can do this so you can control when and how you up the stress level for a person you are dealing with, or how you can maintain the current stress level by not upping the perceived threat so that you can influence the outcomes of different events.
    • Take a moment and write down the ways you can reward and punish.  Write the factors you have at your disposal that mean something to the people you talk to.
    • This will help you determine whether the situation you are in requires an escalation, de-escalation or maintenance of the status quo.
  • Act
    • At work this week, go through the same reflection steps for someone that you work for to see what factors they can use to increase or decrease stress and observe how they use them and how co-workers respond when those factors are used.

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