How many times have you asked someone a question and received some convoluted, non-sensical, off-the-subject answer? Did you ever ask someone a question and get Lincoln's Gettysburg Address for an answer? Or just had someone answer your question with another question? Whatever happened to answering a "yes/no" question with a "yes" or "no" answer? I'm going out on a limb here, and based on my own direct experience --- I'm guessing this happens to you often. You may not even be realizing it!
I did an experiment recently on some unaware business colleagues, family members, and friends. The result --- 2 out of 10 questions posed to them were either directly answered or answered with any sort of confidence. Yikes!
Some red flags answers included:
"I've heard...."
"They say..."
"I think..."
Or the famous..."I would..."
The challenge for me was that most of these questions were simple "no" or "yes" answers.
What am I ultimately saying here? Be careful who you take advice from. We've all heard the famous phrase about "the blind leading the blind!"
By analyzing these people over time, they all shared the same characteristics:
- Low self-confidence
- Wanted to appear smarter than they were on the subjects broached
- Felt the need to say something
- Did not want to feel stupid
- Actually believed what they said was helpful
- Were afraid of making mistakes
- Terrible, slow, decision makers (By the way...if your slow to make decisions...chances are you're not qualified to make it in the first place. Get a clue! If you can't tell, this is a huge pet peeve for me.)
Asking for advice is a true buying experience - even though money may not be what is being exchanged. Your trading your time and vulnerabilty for solid advice that you may base part of your future against.
I'll leave you with one of my favorite pessimistic/realistic phrases --- "BUYER BEWARE!"
Until next time...
Peter
http://www.peterwink.com/
PS...I've already taped my first video blog and its available here.
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