De-Escalating Angry People: A Critical Safety Skill in Education and Healthcare

These five de-escalation disciplines will help you effectively deal with angry students, family members, visitors, and patients.
Published: October 15, 2024

If you’ve ever spent any amount of time working in a school or hospital, you have most likely encountered a fast-paced, ever changing, wonderfully challenging environment that requires you to constantly “roll with the punches” of everyday work life. One of those challenges is how to deal with and de-escalate situations with angry people. Working in education and healthcare, you certainly have to deal with your fair share of irate individuals, especially if you are the front office secretary or receptionist. You are basically the front-line defense in a lot of ways if your role is visitor management in the main office area of a campus.

Although school and hospital staff are no strangers to encounters with angry people (whether it be parents, family members, students, patients, or sometimes their own staff members), handling these situations successfully is not something campuses signed up for. It’s complicated and messy, and school districts generally don’t provide standardized training for their employees on how they can effectively deal with situations like these.

Adopt These 5 De-escalation Disciplines

In this article, we are going to demystify this subject, and lay a solid foundation for the mindset and skill set of a de-escalator to set us on a path to master this skill.

But before we dive into de-escalation itself. It’s crucial to remember that no matter the situation, your primary goal should always be safety, then de-escalation. If you don’t feel safe attempting to de-escalate someone, then don’t. But if you feel that you are in a situation where de-escalation can be attempted, carry on. Now that being said, let’s get into it.

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1. Forget About Fear

The first step in putting on the hat of a de-escalator and developing the skill set and mindset of someone who can de-escalate in any situation is to first of all, forget about your fear! Whether you’ve successfully turned down the temperature of a fraught situation, or it’s your first time, attempting to de-escalate someone is scary. But fear not: There’s a way out of that fear. It’s through a few tricks of the mind.

Start gearing your mind to focus on the problem at hand, rather than yourself. Think of it as being safety conscious, instead of self-conscious. Next, start taking control of your own safety in everyday life. Run through scenarios in your mind, brainstorm, visualize solutions, and become more situationally aware by taking moments to observe the things around you.

After that, practice. Run through scenarios with your co-workers, and start practicing your responses to situations with angry people who you or someone else has experienced. By taking this leap towards actively preparing, you start to combat fear, by being prepared, not scared. Preparation beats stress overtime, and through prep, you will start to dismantle the chains of fear in your mind.

2. Tame Your Temper

Before you can de-escalate the anger of others, you must first de-escalate yourself. You have to learn how to tame your temper, and then you can tame theirs.

So let’s talk about that temper of yours. I hate to break it to you, bit your anger is not unique. We all struggle with being undisciplined with our own anger at times. It’s a lifelong struggle and learning curve. And it takes real humility and sincerity to know and admit what ticks you off. But once you’ve done this, congrats! You’ve taken a crucial step in taming your temper!

Related Article: Constantly Misunderstood and Under Verbal Attack? You Might Be the Problem.

When dealing with angry people, you can be sure that at some point they will try to press your buttons. But if you know what presses your buttons and have started working on a tolerance to that, you will be well equipped for any insults that may come your way.

Ask yourself, what ticks you off? Is it insults about you? Maybe insults about your family? Or maybe being interrupted? Learn what things set off your anger faster than others. Self-awareness is key. By taming your tempering, you learn to defend against verbal attacks and insults, which will give de-escalation room to work.

3. Clear Your Core

Calming, confident, and controlled communication is essential in de-escalating conflicts. How you communicate with another human comes through in three forms, always. They are:

What you say, how you say it, and what you do. In other words… your words, your tone, and your body language really matter. Out of these three forms of communication, tone of voice is the most important, because it is the words unspoken. What you mean and how you feel gets communicated mostly through your tone of voice. No matter what you say or do, your tone of voice tells the truth. So make sure it lines up with the words you say, and the things you do (your mannerisms).”

Related Article: How to Care for Patients with Autism

In order to align these three forms of communication within your core in a way that conveys calmness, confidence, and control, you must reframe how you view yourself and how you view the angry person. I want you to think of yourself not as the victim (which is how you will most likely want to view yourself), or the villain (which is how an angry person will most likely want to view you), but as the NARRATOR. Why? Because the narrator is outside of the situation, and they decide where the story goes next.

When you make this shift in your mind, you will subconsciously and consciously change the way you view the entire situation, leading to a calming mental effect, a boost of self-confidence, and a feeling of control. This will not only be felt by you, but it will be felt by the other person as well. The feeling of calmness will start to rub off on the angry person.

4. Win with “We”

Win them over with authentic sympathy, by making them feel not only heard, but understood. Because after all, that’s really what an angry person wants… is to feel understood.

Do this through acknowledging their feelings (after they have shared their feelings with you) by saying something like: “Wow, that sounds super frustrating, I’m so sorry you had to deal with that.” Whatever the situation, whatever the information they give you, find a way to validate their feelings as a fellow human. There will be a way to do that, however small or subtle it may be overall.

Related Article: Handcuffing Students and Physical Restraint on School Grounds

Whenever you talk, find ways to use inclusive language. This will foster a sense of teamwork, like: “We’ll figure this out” or “Let’s look at what we can do about this.” This subtle shift in language allows you both to focus on the problem and move towards a solution, together. This will in turn, make the person feel valued, heard, and ultimately, understood.

5. Learn the Do’s and Don’ts of De-escalation

It goes without saying that there are things we should do as well as things we should never do when faced with a de-escalation situation. In order to give ourselves the best possible chance to de-escalate someone, it’s best to commit these things to memory.

Some of these will seem very basic. They may even seem like common sense, but we must remember that common sense is not common practice. When tensions are high, reasoning and common sense are low.

Commit these Do’s and Don’ts to memory:

  • Don’t say “Calm down.” The angry person you’re talking to will immediately respond to you by saying one of these things: “I am calm,” “Don’t tell me what to do,” or “You calm down!” Do ask what the problem is. Focus on the tangible issues and info.
  • Don’t talk a lot and DON’T argue (the arguing part goes without saying, but just in case you need to be reminded). Let them vent. This will allow their anger to dissipate naturally. Do Follow the ABC’s of communication: When you talk, be Accurate, Brief, and C
  • Don’t answer abusive questions like: “Why do you suck at your job?”. But do answer informational questions, even if they’re asked rudely like: “Why do you have such a stupid policy?”

Put these disciplines into practice, and you will make the leap from common sense to common practice. You will start to master and sharpen your de-escalation skills. Most importantly, you will equip yourself with the mindset and skill set needed to defuse anger.


Jacob Milner is a school safety and security analyst for the Idaho State Board of Education.

Note: The views expressed by guest bloggers and contributors are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, Campus Safety magazine.

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