In this article the author suggests strategies that enable employees and, ultimately, the entire organization to work people-smart. In our fast-paced, results-driven work worlds, every day poses tensions with challenging customers and colleagues. Individuals who possess strong people skills are especially valuable in these times of greater complexity and diversity, but fewer resources. When people at work engage in unpleasant behavior, it's only human to get annoyed, even furious. When a challenging person at work frustrates you, don't get upset. If you fail to consider the needs of the listener, you end up transmitting noise instead of communicating information. People-smart individuals know that the listener is their "communication partner."