Something I found out about myself today
Posted 05-11-2008 at 11:35 PM by Georginna Torres
First, let me explain a little bit about myself. Like most people I pay attention to detail in things that matter most to me. One of those is horses, training horses, breeding horses, grooming horses, showing horses, teaching people how to ride, how to ride better and how the horse should feel under them when they are riding.
Another is my job, what I do at work… At the beginning of my tour with this company, I worked on perfecting myself at what I did. Talking with people on the phone, helping them with their accounts and doing it in a manner that kept them happy and still got the company paid. This meant paying attention to not only what I said, but also how I said it. Moving through several positions in the company I learned even more about how aspects of the company works and how to pay attention to the nuances of written and spoken word. Since I have written other things (not company related) for years this just fine-tuned the ear in my mind to the words on the screen. I learned how to apply things such as my Yoga training to something as simple as talking on the phone. (For instance, smiling raises your palate and makes your voice more approachable.) Now, after spending time just coaching my own team about their calls, I now coach other teams and help their managers to coach their teams.
I coach people on their use of simple words such as you, your, but, can’t. I coach people about using phrases such as “no problem” and “you did it.” I coach about how use of these words and phrases can have negative impact on the person hearing them and what they should say instead to explain things that may be inflammatory or irritating to a person that cannot see what we see in the information systems we use.
So what does all of this have to do with what I discovered today? A ton. Here it is; I hold my friends to a higher standard. I had not been aware of this until today when I jumped to the conclusion of a friend being rude about something they said. This person thinks that anything they say will make me feel like I am being slammed and that was the furthest thing from my mind. Of course, since this is a person that I consider a friend, I didn’t approach the issue gently, I jumped in with both feet. Was it fair? Not at all. Does my friend think I am psychotic now? Probably… I hope not. I am human though. Now that I am aware of what I do, will I be more careful of what I say? I don’t know, can’t answer that right now. Is it fair to my friends that I stop to think about how I am going to say something? Political correctness can only be taken so far and in fairness to my friend, I think I over stepped that one.
I am not perfect and I need to not expect everyone in my life to be so… and by the way, I use “no problem” all the time.
Another is my job, what I do at work… At the beginning of my tour with this company, I worked on perfecting myself at what I did. Talking with people on the phone, helping them with their accounts and doing it in a manner that kept them happy and still got the company paid. This meant paying attention to not only what I said, but also how I said it. Moving through several positions in the company I learned even more about how aspects of the company works and how to pay attention to the nuances of written and spoken word. Since I have written other things (not company related) for years this just fine-tuned the ear in my mind to the words on the screen. I learned how to apply things such as my Yoga training to something as simple as talking on the phone. (For instance, smiling raises your palate and makes your voice more approachable.) Now, after spending time just coaching my own team about their calls, I now coach other teams and help their managers to coach their teams.
I coach people on their use of simple words such as you, your, but, can’t. I coach people about using phrases such as “no problem” and “you did it.” I coach about how use of these words and phrases can have negative impact on the person hearing them and what they should say instead to explain things that may be inflammatory or irritating to a person that cannot see what we see in the information systems we use.
So what does all of this have to do with what I discovered today? A ton. Here it is; I hold my friends to a higher standard. I had not been aware of this until today when I jumped to the conclusion of a friend being rude about something they said. This person thinks that anything they say will make me feel like I am being slammed and that was the furthest thing from my mind. Of course, since this is a person that I consider a friend, I didn’t approach the issue gently, I jumped in with both feet. Was it fair? Not at all. Does my friend think I am psychotic now? Probably… I hope not. I am human though. Now that I am aware of what I do, will I be more careful of what I say? I don’t know, can’t answer that right now. Is it fair to my friends that I stop to think about how I am going to say something? Political correctness can only be taken so far and in fairness to my friend, I think I over stepped that one.
I am not perfect and I need to not expect everyone in my life to be so… and by the way, I use “no problem” all the time.
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Recent Blog Entries by Georginna Torres
- Something I found out about myself today (05-11-2008)
- How do you define a hero? (04-25-2008)
- Someone special died. (03-09-2008)
