How many times have you arrived just too late because you put off taking a key step assuming that you had the time to get it done? Happens more often than you might think.
Lawyers have the right idea, never ask a question to which you do not have the answer, it may trip you up at the worst possible moment. In a high level business meeting, asking your counterpart questions about his company will usually only demonstrate your lack of research, and sometimes your lack of sense. For example, asking an Italian if the proghetti in his company name comes from the Proghetti family business. He will be forced to stifle a laugh and reply that it means projects, just as in English the name manufactturing at the end of your company name does not come from the Manufacturing family. This happened and it underscores that using research in advance of meetings is crucial.
But what if, as Basil the cat points out, you are caught napping. How do you go from dead stop to full alert quickly enough to counter you rmistake. In his case a swift claw takes care of many things, in our case deflection works better. And humor of course, instead of looking silly, accentuate to the ridiculous to avert further damage. With the Proghetti situation the senior executive could simply have said that he missed that lesson in his language course, anything but hanging his head and as they say in Holland he stood there with his mouth full of teeth.
Of course, sometimes a catnap is just the thing you need to sharpen up for the next test.
No comments:
Post a Comment