4-4 Ask questions instead of giving direct orders

No one likes to take orders. Chapter 4 from How To Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.

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I once had the pleasure of dining with Miss Ida Tarbell, the dean of American biographers. When I told her I was writing this book, we began discussing this all-important subject of getting along with people, and she told me that while she was writing her biography of Owen D. Young, she interviewed a man who had sat for three years in the same office with Mr. Young. This man declared that during all that time he had never heard Owen D. Young give a direct order to anyone. He always gave suggestions, not orders. Owen D. Young never said, for example, "Do this or do that," or "Don't do this or don't do that." He would say, "You might consider this," or "Do you think that would work?" Frequently he would say, after he had dictated a letter, "What do you think of this?" In looking over a letter of one of his assistants, he would say, "Maybe if we were to phrase it this way it would be better." He always gave people the opportunity to do things themselves; he never told his assistants to do things; he let them do them, let them learn from their mistakes. A technique like that makes it easy for a person to correct errors. A technique like that saves a person's pride and gives him or her a feeling of importance. It encourages cooperation instead of rebellion. Resentment caused by a brash order may last a long time -even if the order was given to correct an obviously bad situation. Dan Santarelli, a teacher at a vocational school in Wyoming, Pennsylvania, told one of our classes how one of his students had blocked the entrance way to one of the school's shops by illegally parking his car in it. One of the other instructors stormed into the classroom and asked in an arrogant tone, "Whose car is blocking the driveway?" When the student who owned the car responded, the instructor screamed: "Move that car and move it right now or I'll wrap a chain around it and drag it out of there." Now that student was wrong. The car should not have been parked there.

But from that day on, not only did that student resent the instructor's action, but all the students in the class did everything they could to give the instructor a hard time and make his job unpleasant. more

Chapter 4: 9 (nine) ways to Change people without giving offence or arousing resentment

4.1.

Begin with praise and honest appreciation. If you must find fault this is the way to begin.

4.2.

Call attention to people's mistakes indirectly. How to criticize and not be hated for it.

4.3.

Talk about your own mistakes before criticizing the other person. Talk about your own mistakes first.

4.4.

Ask questions instead of giving direct orders. No one likes to take orders.

4.5.

Let the other person save face. Let the other man save his face.

4.6.

Praise the slightest improvement and praise every improvement. How to spur men on to success.

4.7.

Give the other person a fine reputation to live up to. Give the dog a good name.

4.8.

Use encouragement; make the fault seem easy to correct. Make the fault seem easy to correct.

4.9.

Make the other person happy about doing the thing you suggest. Making people glad to do what you want.