I have worked with a few Zappers over the last 30 years but my god have I met thousands of Sappers; people who want to suck every last morsel of positive energy from your body.
What is a Zapper??
A person full of energy, full of can do, a builder of others, a positive helper, a solution seeker, a grower of themselves and others, a glass half full person, a person who takes pride is seeing others grow.
What is a Sapper??
A can’t doer, a person who blames everyone and everything for their situation, a destroyer of people’s hope, a controller, a glass half empty person.
Zapp! is a modern-day fable exploring the concept of empowerment for workers. It shows what managers and organisations have to do to build and manage an empowered work force. Most managers have to understand how to generate enthusiasm in their employees without applying the kind of pressure that makes them even less productive? Zapp! shows how to encourage responsibility, and creativity so that people feel they “own” their jobs. Zapp! has inspired people worldwide for more than a decade, selling 4.5 million copies in 10 languages.
This book is available from Amazon in hard back and paperback.
Is there a scale?
Yes of course and both extremes are bad news and an irritation to everyone. You will know both extremes. Moderate Zappers are super people and generally ones we want to be around. Sappers will run for the hills when they meet a moderate to high Zapper. Likewise Zappers will stay clear of the majority of Sappers. Moderate Zappers and moderate Sappers can coexist but it’s not always ideal.
What Am I??
Most Zapper are obvious and tend to congregate with other Zappers. Likewise, Sappers will sit at the back of the room to moan about everything and anyone.
Interestingly humans often are not reflective and do not when looking in the mirror see the person they really are staring back at them. So, when you confront a Sapper, they quickly go into denial mode and in some instances, but not all, don’t even realise they are behaving in a negative, debilitating manner. They will suck the energy out of someone, sometimes it’s a deliberate tactic and other times they just don’t realise how negatively destructive they are.
What happens when you get a room full of Zappers?
Well, if they’re extreme Zappers, nothing is achieved!! If they’re moderate Zappers, you’ll get fantastic results and great innovation.
What happens when you get a room full of Sappers?
Not a lot!
My boss is a sapper how do I overcome this?
Bosses are easy to spot. Many suffer with internal self confidence and this manifests itself in over controlling and deliberately spiking innovation and intuitiveness. Buy them the book or say this is how you feel every time they interact at your annual review. In many instances, especially if they are big bosses or Directors nobody has ever told them they are that way.
My parents or partner are Sappers
This is often where zapping and sapping starts, Its usually in the DNA. Sometimes you might get a Zapper and Sapper parent which leads to some interesting family gatherings.
The problem is Sapper parents will stifle Zapper children often making excuses for them, such as they are over excitable or fantasists or too enthusiastic. Find yourself Zappers to chat with and eventually have a Zapper circle of friends.
Social Media is crawling with Sappers
There are thousands of Sappers on social media waiting to burst the bubbles of Zappers. A Zapper posts something interesting or positive and there is always a Sapper waiting to knock it or try to rubbish it just because they can. Trolls are extreme Sappers. They tend to have internal conflict and are sour souls hating Zappers and positive people.
Are Zappers bombproof?
No not at all. On social media channels you see messages talking about the inner positiveness of a person and remaining calm and pushing away negative thoughts. That’s fine until you step outside or go online; the Sapper community are waiting to hunt you down and bombard your positive forcefield with negative messages and comments.
Are the General Media Zappers or Sappers
Sadly, I see no evidence whatsover of any journalist been Zappers. By nature of how they report, their style and approach make them very negative and cynical people. They hunt Zappers to attempt to undermine them and their half cup empty reporting always paints the wrong impression. Journalists tend to try to take the moral high ground by saying they are the voice of the public and asking challenging questions is their job. The reality is they know positive headlines don’t sell newspapers.
Is there an antidote against Sappers?
No not really; you cannot put in what God left out so to speak. Once a Sapper always a Sapper. But they can learn to stop been an extreme Sapper. So buy them the book and tell them to look in the mirror.
William Byham wrote ZAPP in 1988 and it’s even more relevant today than it was back in 1988. Everywhere we look we have Sappers desperate to burst our positive bubble.
One of the best short books ever is ZAPP. It’s so simple and relates to two things – what type of character we are and how we interact with people around us.
This book describes empowerment in health care, and how to improve patient care, increase employee job satisfaction, and lower health care costs.
YouDrive thinks…
This is a fun way of looking at different attitudes. Quite true too!
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