The English language is a wonderful thing. If you use words, properly, you can convey any thought you have. If, however, you use words incorrectly, you will be condemning yourself to a lifetime of misery – and never know why.
Every day, people will ask questions that don’t actually mean what they think:
‘Do you have the right time?’
This is a question that should only be answered with ‘yes’, or ‘no’.
The question people think they are asking is ‘can you tell me the right time?’Â The answer to this, of course, is exactly the same.
The question people should ask is ‘what is the right time, please?’
This misunderstanding is exacerbated when you want something tangible. Here are a few examples of the same ‘question’ – with appropriate responses:
‘Question’Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Response
‘I’d love a cup of tea…’Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â ‘Oooh, me too…’
‘Any chance of a cup of tea?’Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â ‘Probably – the kettle is right there, and cafes do exist…’
‘Would you make me a cup of tea?’Â Â Â Â Â Â ‘Maybe, if you asked.’
‘Can you make a cup of tea?’Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â ‘It is one of my abilities, yes.’
The common theme here is that none of these is actually asking anybody to make a cup of tea. The first is simply a statement of opinion; the second is a question about probability; the third is attempting to find out what the answer is before you ask it, and the fourth is simply asking if the responder can make a cup of tea.
‘Will you make me a cup of tea, please’ is, actually, the most direct and grammatically correct way of asking the question – any other phrasing (or variation of the examples above) relies on the person being asked guessing what question you meant to ask, or reading your mind.
Now, you can live with others guessing what you want – assuming they get it right, every time (and just imagine what could go wrong if your doctor guesses whether you want your leg amputated) – or you can say what you want.
Guess which one will succeed more often!
So, how do you do it?
Step 1.
Work out what it is that you actually want.
Step 2.
Ask for it.
That’s it. Simple.
Oh… You want more.
Step 1 (revisited).
Work out what you want. If you want somebody to make you a cup of tea, then you should be asking them to make you a cup of tea. If you want to know if they can make a cup of tea, then that is what to ask them…
If you want your partner to take you to a nearby town, so you can visit a shop, then what you should be asking, obviously, is if they would be willing to take you to a nearby town. Asking if they were planning to do something that you wanted to do, in the forlorn hope that they had correctly interpreted some random comment made hours earlier and had immediately arranged the universe around your wishes without your needing to actually ask for it, so you can accept the offer without needing to feel grateful…. (Wow, long sentence…)
Stating that you want to go to M&S, in the hope that the listener will think ‘oh, I must immediately make plans to take them there’ ignores a very basic alternative which could easily be the listeners guess – i.e. You could mean that you were planning to go alone, on the bus, and meet a friend.
Until the point at which you ask ‘were you planning to take me?’ both options were equally valid – as were, potentially, dozens more, to a greater or lesser degree.
Use the fewest words possible to encapsulate what you want, in the form of a request. But ensure you actually state exactly what it is you want.
Step 2 (revisited).
Ask for it.
That is, ask for what it is you actually want.
Say, ‘will you make me a cup of tea?’ if a cup of tea is what you want.  Note, there is no ‘please’ in there. A ‘please’ would be nice, but it’s not essential.
Or. If you want to be taken somewhere, as in Step 1, ask for that:
‘Will you take me to the M&S store in [insert town here] tomorrow, please.’Â THAT IS ALL YOU NEED.
Work out what you want, and ask for it. Don’t expect others to guess what you want; don’t ask if they were planning to fit in with your plans without even the pretence of a request; don’t try to come up with some clever way of planting a seed in somebody’s head in the hope that it takes root, grows, and bears the fruit you want it to bear.
All of those leave far too much room for error. All of those require the person you ask to do some ‘working out’ – and if you rely on others to work things out, they’ll get it wrong.
If you ask for what you want, the possible answers are ‘yes’, ‘no’, or ‘can we discuss this.’
(‘Can we discuss this’ covers ‘would another town/day/store be okay?’, ‘do you really need to go?’, and ‘How much?!’)
Dropping a hint, waiting a while, and then asking, will damage your case, of course. What you are actually saying, then, is ‘You were obviously too stupid to guess correctly what I wanted, so I’m going to give you another hint.’
Telling somebody you would like to go somewhere, then asking if they were planning to take you? In what reality would anybody answer ‘yes’ to that?
I’d like to go on a cruise of the Norwegian Fjords, are you planning to take me?
I’d like to travel across America on a motorbike, are you planning to take me?
I’d like to walk along the river tomorrow, are you planning to go with me?
The answer to all of those has to be the same: “Until you asked, the thought never entered my head! Now, I need time to actually think about it, while feeling ambushed by the unexpected demand.”
Ask for what you want. I guarantee you will notice an increase in the number of ‘yes’ answers you get – if only because the person you ask will know what you are asking for, so they don’t guess wrong.
Something has gone wrong, somewhere…
As my (possibly now long gone) regular readers know, I have tried very hard to moan about everything. I have gone out of my way to be unpleasant, and I have never cared about popularity.
I took pride in it!
Three and three-quarter years ago, my world changed completely. My partner of three decades passed away. (And I still tear up a little when I write that…)
I’m proud of the way I recovered from that blow. I can honestly say the months that followed it were the darkest I’ve ever known – and the fact that I’m still here can be attributed entirely to my little dog: he made me eat, he made me go to bed, and he made me get out of the house every day.
Hmmm… this is going in entirely the wrong direction…
OK. When I started to live again, I got a job. At a supermarket. (Yep, goes against most of what I’ve said on here in the past.)
The job was making deliveries in a van, and I loved it for two and a half years. But I was too good at it, and they took me off the road. (True, in fact I was SO good, I did a five hour shift in three hours. Pity they were tracking my speed, really…)
For the last year (roughly) I’ve worked IN the store – stacking the shelves, officially. During this time, I’ve volunteered to learn, and become qualified as, a picker, checkout operator, and petrol station attendant.
Very useful, that – it means I can get overtime in any one of four departments!
Our company has an awards scheme – the service superstars. If you creep enough with a customer, and the customer makes it official by writing or emailing their praise, you can get a ‘wow’ comment on your record. A ‘wow’ will probably mean you get the bronze service superstar award, which is supposed to be a badge, but I’ve never seen anybody with one.
Once you have a bronze, you can be considered for Silver. To get silver, you have to be the best in the month. You either get more ‘wows’ than anybody else, or get special notice for some reason.
For Silver, you get a certificate and a badge.
Twice a year, all those who got Silver (since the last Gold award) are eligible for the Gold Service Superstar award. Now this is the biggie. To get the Gold, you do not have to be nice to customers, you do not have to creep around management… No, all you have to do is be liked. Period.
Every member of staff in the store gets a vote, and the one with the most votes wins.
When you win, you get a special badge. Yay! Oh, and you get presented with the badge at a Social event along with every other Gold winner in the region. As I understand it (I could be a little wrong) the last awards were given in a box at a football match, at Manchester United’s ground, after dinner.
Oh, and once you have the Gold, you cannot ever be considered for Silver or Gold again – you have reached the highest pinnacle in customer service.
All sounds grand, right.
Well I hope so. Because I just got Gold.
Yep.
To my recall, I never got a ‘Wow’ comment from a customer. I do not recall ever getting the Bronze – I certainly never got a badge.
I got the Silver because a Manager nominated me for it. Apparently, the fact that I always said ‘OK’ when they gave me a job to do was exceptional. Seems that many of my colleagues prefer to argue, or find reasons why they cannot do the job. But… I’m paid to be there, I’m paid to work, so I work. And I smile while I do it.
(I had around twenty years where I wanted to go to work, and was unable to – so I’m really happy to be working!)
The last few weeks, my colleagues have been voting, and I found out yesterday that they had voted for me. I won by a comfortable margin – in fact, the person I really wanted to beat got half as many votes, in total, as the difference between me and the nearest competitor! (e.g. If they got ten votes, then I got twenty votes more than the second placed colleague. Those are not the real numbers, but give you an idea.)
I’m now waiting to find out when and where the award will be made. But in the meantime, I’m making the most of my position:
The store manager complained to me yesterday that he now had to find something nice to say about me, but he relaxed when I gave him permission to lie.
Two other managers yesterday gave me a job, and I said ‘no.’ When they got annoyed, I reminded them that I was now at the top, and didn’t have to try any more! They agreed, and went off to annoy somebody else.
The thing is… How on earth did I become popular? I’ve tried so very, very hard to be annoying!
Something, somewhere, is very, very wrong!
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Posted in Corporate greed, General