The work of flight attendants goes beyond the tasks assigned to them, but sometimes they even have to deal face to face with passengers who may be experiencing a crisis on board.
But in these cases, the cabin crew has been trained to implement a psychological negotiation technique to calm persistently problematic passengers.
The former Emirates airline stewardess Marika Mikusovawho has written a book titled Diary of a stewardess about the five years he spent working at 38,000 feet, he explains to Daily Mail The technique is known by the acronym LEAP. These letters denote the four stages of the method: “listening, empathizing, asking, and paraphrasing.”
During the first stage, the flight attendant is all ears. Mikusova, 35, explains: “First of allwe listen carefully to the passenger without interrupting him. If the passenger is seated, it is a good idea to crouch down so that they do not feel that we have a psychological advantage by standing and looking at them as if we were their parent, their teacher or any authority figure.
“So if you see a flight attendant kneeling in the aisle who is not smiling but simply listening attentively to the passenger and nodding occasionally, you know what it’s about“he continues.
Stage two is empathy: “Is it important to agree? Yes, show empathy” says Mikusova. “By nodding, we let the passenger know that we understand their anger and that we are willing to solve the problem, she adds.
Body language is also crucial: “It is difficult for the passenger to believe that we are trying to find a solution if, for example, We keep our arms crossed.”
“By the way, it is often enough to listen and not interrupt so that the passenger can express his frustration and not aggravate it further,” says the flight attendant. What if the passenger is still angry? It’s time to move on to the next stage: asking.
Marika Mikusova says: “We can ask the passenger open questions for example, ‘what?’, ‘where?’ or ‘when?’ to get to the root of the problem. This has the advantage of giving the complainant the opportunity to fully express your feelings“.
“In the end, we play the role of a kindergarten teacher,” explains Marika. “So we’re summarizing the information the passenger gave us to let him know that we’ve been listening all along and we understand his point of view. In the meantime, the passenger nods or corrects us as appropriate“says the stewardess, of Czech nationality.
“Most people are feeling incredibly relieved right now. The passenger feels like a winner. Although we are totally exhausted. However, at least we could have avoided something worse: insults, physical attacks, destruction of the plane. You never know,” he says.
What if the passenger is really aggressive? “For those who are aggressive, we have no words, but useful acts and equipment in our containment kit,” concludes Marika Mikusova.
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