I was delighted when I walked outside my flat in Durban, South Africa, on my recent speaking tour in that country. Cute little monkeys, playing up in the trees just outside my door, caught my attention. Wow! I talked baby talk to them, trying to coax them to come closer. They ignored me and jumped about from limb to limb. Bananas, I thought! I had some inside. Maybe if I held out some, I could get them to come nearer. About that time my driver arrived and I told him what I was about to do, pointing out the adorable little furry creatures. "Don't feed the monkeys!" he exclaimed. "Why not?" I asked. "They might be hungry, plus they'd probably come closer, and I could play with them." "No way," he countered. "First of all, those cute little monkeys carry disease. Furthermore, if you feed them, the owner of this house will never forgive you. They will never leave, and pretty soon they'll take over. In fact, if you feed them, they will begin to open the windows of the house and come inside to get food. We had a mango tree, and the monkeys were constantly eating all the mangos. When we came out of our house, the monkeys would actually throw the mangos and hit us in the head. "So whatever you do, don't feed the monkeys." As I reflected on this experience, I couldn't help comparing the cute little monkeys to the insidious way that negative interpersonal habits can sneak up on any of us in healthcare. It starts out innocently enough. Occasionally, you may be demanding when communicating with staff. Sometimes, your attitude with staff or patients seems condescending. On a busy day, you can treat patients like "cases" instead of people. After all, who has time to be so very careful about everyone else's feelings? You have work to do! They just need to understand the system, do their jobs, or be glad they're getting competent treatment. Anyway, everyone has a bad day every now and then, don't they? No real harm, you tell yourself. Over time, you "feed the monkeys." You allow yourself to become more and more frustrated, more self-absorbed. You justify your actions by blaming them on others. You tell yourself that you have a right to be ticked off. You become even more irritable and sarcastic. If others would just do what they were supposed to do, you wouldn't have to be this way. Gradually, the monkeys take over. Hostile and condescending attitudes and actions, repeated, become habits. Bad moments turn into bad days, and bad days become bad weeks and months. Like the South African monkeys, the destructive habits in your life can begin to rule the "personal property" of your life. They begin to open windows and gain access to other important areas, affecting not only your work, but all of your relationships, your emotional and spiritual life, and your business success. They come in and rob you of your "food," that which you need to sustain a healthy business. Those activities that seemed so justifiable and appealing at first begin to "throw mangos" and create big knots on your head. Have you allowed negative attitudes and overbearing behavior to rob you of your effectiveness as a leader? Have you unwittingly developed a "reputation?" When others view you as egotistical and difficult, there's a price to pay. · You lose the cooperation of staff and the willingness to go the extra mile; · You lose staff, period; · Patients and families who have a negative experience decide to take their business elsewhere; · You get word-of-mouth advertising, all right — but the kind you would never want. Bad habits are best broken by deliberately substituting competing positive actions. Today, begin the change. Go out of your way to interact with all the people you meet — team members or patients — in a way that makes them feel better than they did before you came along. Take the time to show interest by asking questions and listening to the answers. Make every individual feel like a valuable person. Remember, almost anything in life is easier to get into than to get out of, and negative habits are no exception. Don't feed those monkeys!