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Ask nicely: Difference between revisions
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{{a|be|}}It | {{a|be| | ||
[[File:Coronavirus emoji.jpg|450px|thumb|center|Step this way, madam]] | |||
}}It doesn’t take much time listening to Dale Carnegie, Robert Cialdini or or Rory Sutherland to grasp that ''how'' you say something can be be just as important as ''what'' you say. Nor is this exactly news: {{br|How to Win Friends and Influence People}} was published 85 years ago. | |||
But it | But nor does it take much time reading modern commercial contracts to see that they proven stoutly resistant to its charms. Legal drafting is habitually fastidious, over-particularised and ''logical'' at the expense of being what Sutherland calls ''psycho''-logical. | ||
===the Coronavirus mask example=== | |||
A simple example: say you want to ensure all customers in your shop wear face masks. | A simple example: say you want to ensure all customers in your shop wear face masks. | ||
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“'''Please put on a face mask before entering this store.'''” | “'''Please put on a face mask before entering this store.'''” | ||
This is bossy, and it assumes the reader is in non compliance with the instructions. It sets up a tone if shpokeeperism and, in chiding, resentment, as if the customers arrival is some kind of necessary evil and will only be reluctantly tolerated under certain circumstances. | This is bossy, and it assumes the reader is in non compliance with the instructions. It sets up a tone if shpokeeperism and, in chiding, resentment, as if the customers arrival is some kind of necessary evil and will only be reluctantly tolerated under certain circumstances. | ||
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“'''Please do not remove your mask when in the store.'''” | “'''Please do not remove your mask when in the store.'''” | ||
This has all the advantages of of the the example above: it assumes compliance, imposes no condition on entry, and and allows the customer to make its own decision to put on a mask if it is not wearing one. Additionally, it phrases the requirement to keep the mask as a negative, thereby not compelling the customer to take mandatory action, but rather ruling just one action, of of a multitude of possibilities, out. This way the customer feels maximally empowered and welcomed into the shop whilst getting exactly the same message. | |||
{{skunkworks}} | |||