A few years ago, I made sure I let my family
know that I wanted to really, truly celebrate the upcoming Mother's Day. In my
mind, I was expecting breakfast, served in bed, as a perfect start. The day
arrived, and, like any other day, breakfast was sitting on the kitchen table.
No delivery. No bed tray. Nothing special. Everyone was too busy with sports or
homework, and I was disappointed that my special request wasn’t met – until I
realized that I had never actually articulated
my desires. I had “breakfast in bed” in my head – but the request never made it
out of my mouth.
How many times do you make requests that end up
in disappointments? Or even worse, you expect something that you never even asked
for in the first place? It can be breakfast in bed, asking a co-worker for a
copy of a document (over and over again), asking for a report and getting half
of the information you needed, expecting others to know what to do without any
specific guidance, or getting advice from your boss but not really the advice
you needed to get the job done.
As the song tells us, “you can’t always get what
you want” – but here are five good tips that can tip the odds in your favor:
1- An
effective request requires a committed speaker and a committed listener.
Always ask for what you want and how you want it, rather than assuming that it
is obvious to others. Make your request clear, and make sure you get the full
attention you need. Stop making casual requests in the hallway, while
distracted looking at your screen, or “by the way” requests. How you ask for
things will determine how you will receive it in return!
2- An
effective request must include a clear and shared understanding of your
standards for satisfaction. Share
your conditions of satisfaction in order to have your request fulfilled exactly
as you expect it to be. Provide all the details you are thinking of, unless it
is a situation in which you are flexible and open to surprises. When I asked my
son to clean his room, without going into details, he did just that. Later I
learned that “clean” meant one thing to me and something totally different to
him (hiding things in the closet or under the desk). Yes, after a while, people
learn routines and they know how you like your coffee or what you need in a
daily report, but until then it is important to be as clear as you can.
3- An
effective request must include a clear deadline and a realistic agreement with
those being asked. Let others know the time frame to meet your request.
Things such as "at your earliest convenience", "as soon as
possible" or "promptly" are not precise enough. What seems
obvious to you might not be to the other person. It is always good to pre-establish
checkpoints for long-term requests to make sure things are on track.
4- An
effective request must include the right context and mood shared by all parties
involved. Make sure the right mood is set for your request. It is a fact
that the right conversation in the wrong mood is the wrong conversation. It is
preferable to wait to make a request than to just make it when the context or
the emotions are not the adequate ones. In this case is better to take a break
- this could be a request in itself - and come back for a fresh new start later
on.
5- An
effective request needs that those you are involving are capable of delivering.
Verify that those you are making the request from have the capacity to
fulfill it the way you expect. Don't just assume; check and verify with
them. This is good practice. If you are
asking someone with a broken leg, on crutches, to go to get you a coffee with
lots of milk from the busy cafeteria down the block, and bring it to you in the
next 5 minutes before your next meeting, you might end up getting a late and
cold latte!
The following Mother’s Day, I knew better.
Sitting around the table, paying full attention to each member of my family,
and in the right mood, I said, "I have a request to make for Mother's Day.
I want to have breakfast served in bed on a tray with a red rose, with fresh
squeezed orange juice, 2 scrambled eggs, 1 wheat toast with fat free butter. I
want it at 9:00 am". Then I checked that everyone's schedule would allow
for it, that they understood what I wanted and why it was important to me, and
that they were ok with it. Every year now I get my tray in bed, and unless I
want something different, I don’t need to request it anymore. The rest of the
day is filled with surprises, which is always good too.
I didn’t want to leave my requests for my
special day to chance – and now, using these five tips, you don’t have to leave
any day to chance.
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