Are you giving goodvice or badvice advice?
With Thanksgiving upcoming, it might be a really good time to think about it!
Good advice is goodvice. Here are a few characteristics it has:
- It’s solicited (asked for!). Sounds simple, but most of us don’t consider that before we open our mouths.
- You’re qualified (in some way at least) to offer an opinion.
- Like your mom said, “if you can’t say it nicely, don’t say it at all!”
- You take no offense if it’s completely discarded.
Sometimes people don’t actually want advice (even goodvice) at all. They just want to vent. Or to be heard. Admit it, we all do it from time to time (some more than others, myself included).
- Rarely do we open the conversation with “Can you please just listen and shut up?”
- Or we’re actually just looking to build an ally or get positive reinforcement
- Or (quite tricky to detect) we cloak it as “I want to run something by you” or “Can I get your opinion on…?” when we really don’t want advice in the first place. Not sure why we do that, but we do!
Rather than give badvice, keep it simple & don’t guess. Ask (don’t guess):
- “Do you really want my opinion?”
- “Do you just want to be heard?”
It’s surprising how often the answer to the two questions above are respectively “no” and “yes.” It’s also interesting to realize how often we don’t ask the questions when seemingly asked for “advice.”
Curious to know what you think …and if you want to catch these little nuggets, please follow me, and/or You Are Possible, and/or Transformational Change on Linked in.
Anna Minto
Founder & Managing Partner, Transformational Change
Founder, Coach & Collaborator, You Are Possible
Email: AMinto@trchange.com
Linked-In: LinkedIn.com/in/annamintoBlog: www.annaminto.com
Anna Minto - Transformational Change 