On Wed, 30 Jul 2008 08:47:36 -0400, Tom Austin wrote:

> Tom Galvin wrote:
>> Invisible wrote:
>>> Just how *do* you tell somebody that there ideas are completely stupid
>>> in a tactful way?
>>>
>>>
>> Try to understand where they are coming from.  Empathy is underrated.
> 
> 
> Yeah, what he said.
> 
> 
> 
> Think about it for a moment - how would you like people to respond to
> something that you worked hard to put together and asked for feedback
> on.
> 
> If you reject their plan and submit a new one, your input will likely
> get tossed.
> 
> If you make some good suggestions with supporting info, then some may
> actually get incorporated.  You may even be asked for more information.
> 
> The trick is in getting someone to see their own error and make their
> own change on their own - something I am not good at.  For some reason
> people take things better that way.

And this is more or less what I mean by "present better ideas" - Tom, 
Tom, and Darren all three hit on a key part of this, which is to make 
sure that you're not tearing down their ideas, but instead getting them 
to see something that'll work better.  It always works out better if 
others can see that they've made a mistake rather than being told "dude, 
you're just wrong on this".  Sometimes the "you're just wrong" approach 
is called for, but those times are not as frequent as most people think.

"Your baby's ugly" doesn't win friends and influence people. :-)

Jim

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