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Tag Archive for: don’t tell people they’re wrong
The Best Thing I Can Do For You….
….is to give you my recommendation. It’s not to pay you, it’s not to hire you, it’s not to give you an A+ on an assignment, it’s to tell someone in my life how I honestly feel about you.
Isn’t that the best thing anyone can do for us? Give their recommendation of us to someone they know?
Think about it. An old Manager talking to a business owner who offers you your dream job? An interview while in school for a co-op placement and your Volleyball coach give you a rave reference? (This happened! Jeremy who worked with us for a little while and who I coached with for a couple years had me as a reference for a job placement over the Summer, I had so many positive stories about that boy they HAD to hire him after talking to me).
The best thing anyone can do for you is to give an honest recommendation of you to a peer or colleague. There’s no higher honour than someone saying, “oh, you want good cupcakes? You MUST talk to Jeph, he makes the BEST cupcakes!”. No advertising could ever be better than honest word-of-mouth. Read more
Want To Really Annoy People? Play the Devil’s Advocate
To the devil’s advocate: STOP IT! The devil is doing fine on his own, he does not need your help.
Do you ever find argumentative people love to talk about the exception to the rule? Finding the one in a millionth chance and using it as “evidence” for what could happen. It’s a great way to stress yourself out. Also a good way to determine if one is a know-it-all. Do they like proving someone wrong by arguing the exception to the rule?
Why do we do it though? Why do we cause this undue harm on our minds always trying to determine “what’s the worst that could happen?” Sure it’s good to understand what’s the worst that can happen, but to act upon it, or be planning based on it is silly. If we’re constantly worried about what’s the worst that can happen we never look at what’s the best thing that can happen! Ever bring that up in a planning session? Probably not because optimism isn’t generally looked fondly on in the business community (until lately!)
What’s the WORST that could happen? What’s the BEST that could happen?
A part of our brains are built to do this, to protect us. But that same part of your brain telling you to run from danger in a dark alley is the same part that’s holding you back from doing something amazing. In ancient times running away from what scared us was a smart tactic but in today’s world we need to seek out what scares us and push through it. Playing devils’ advocate is a way to assess what’s the worst that could happen. They problem with this is that the “worst” rarely ever happens, but our brains love to focus on the smallest negative piece of feedback. So instead of finding a solution to the obstacle in the way we think about how bad the feedback was and we never move on.
Nobody Likes a Know-It-All
Nobody likes a know-it-all. -Julien Smith
1. Stop trying to be ‘right’.
In 1936 Dale Carnegie wrote in one of the most widely read business books How to Win Friends and Influence People that you should never tell someone that “they are wrong”. When you prove someone wrong you may have convinced them of the facts but they don’t believe you. Do you like being proved wrong? The last time someone blatantly proved you wrong how did you feel? Did you feel you still had that same level of respect for them?
You may have proved them wrong but that doesn’t matter, they don’t like talking around you anymore because you’re a know-it-all who always has to be right. People don’t like associating with people who always have to be right. A willingness to be wrong makes you easy to talk to and makes the other person feel comfortable to share information with you.
I love the quote from Mark Twain:
“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble, it’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” Read more