How To Make The Ask
Happy Mother's Day Too
Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers on my list and to us who come from a woman.
As you know I am currently deported in Africa. Actually Djibouti, Africa to be exact. Every time we go on a mission we bring a linguist with us.
Djibouti was colonized by the French and about 40% of the world’s traded goods come stops in this country’s port before going elsewhere in the world. This place has some huge strategic advantages for all countries in the world.
That is why every COUNTRY wants to come here and the only Chinese base in the world is located here because of the port and the strategic location of this country.
Military & History lesson is over and back to the lesson today…
I have built a great relationship with all my linguists because we both speak French and are African. I am so curious about their culture as much as they are curious about American culture too.
So we have an understanding that they can ask me ANYTHING and I take no offense to those questions as I do the same. It allows for much easier discussion and knowledge exchange.
However tomorrow I asked one of my linguists to pick up another linguist for me. She asked me to pick her up some coffee and a pastry for the morning. I asked her if she wanted milk or sugar. She said that and then immediately said, “Sorry for asking for so much.”
I said “You are not asking too much. Tell me what you want specifically and we can make it happen.”
We do the same in our lives. Someone asks us for a favor and we feel bad asking for a favor in return. In reality, even if the ask is big or small let the person say yes or no if it is possible for them to do it.
When you make an ask, be direct and ask for specifically what you want. Many times we feel bad asking because we believe it is too much or we are overextending our ask.
Your responsibility when making an ask is to make the request directly and specifically.
The responsibility of whom you are asking is to assess if they can do what you are asking for.
If our linguist would have asked for more than I could do and I said yes that is on me not on her. But her ask for a coffee with a little sugar and milk and a pastry is not BIG at all.
Now yes there are people that will ask for more and always try to get over but a LARGE majority will not do so. Focus on the LARGE majority, not the outliers.