Asking Questions

At some point you have to ask a question. No matter what you are doing, where you are going, or who you are, you have to ask a question. It is the way that you ask the question that matters. Take the other day for example. I was asked the question "what do you know about that?". Well the way it was asked was "that the hell do *you* know about that?". So of course my hackles went straight up, and I replied in a very hostile way. The questioner looked surprised, and then backed down saying "do you need any help?". What he had meant was "do you need me to answer any questions?". But that isn't what he said, and so he lost me, lost my sale, and probably lost me to the store, until such time as I forget that it was that store that I was insulted in, and go back there again. Retrospectively I feel a little sorry for the guy, he was only doing what he was told to do. That being to engage me in conversation about the product, in this case digital cameras, that I was interested in. Had he asked me if I needed help I would have told him that I already own a digicam and was only browsing while I waited for my partner to finish looking at whatever it was that she was looking at. So here is my question for the day. Who thought that an aggressively worded question was the way to open the discussion witha customer over a product that they are interested in? The answer will never be known, but I am willing to be that it was probably an American, someone who had never actually sold anything, let alone worked on a shop floor, let alone dealt with customers. Probably a young, late 20's early 30's, man who had gone straight from college to a lower management position without needing to work his way there by being good at his job. I might be biased, ok I admit that I am biased. I am where I am because I worked damned hard to get here, yet there are children working in positions of influence in society, who got the jobs that they are in simply by passing a few exams. But I digress. Back to my original point. Everyday you have to ask questions. So next time you are about to open your mouth and exercise your vocal cords, think a little bit about how you phrase the question, and then the tone or voice, and intimation that you put into the words, before you vocalise them. Then think about where I am. Passed so many exams that I know hold the highest educational award that is possible on this planet. Yet I am still waiting to hear whether or not I can live in this country, with my partner of 6 years. While I wait I am wasting time surfing the net looking for news articles to interest me, I build furniture, and I watch the squirrel eating the peanuts that I put out for her every morning. Now, ask yourself these questions. Is this a waste of education? Is there something else that I can be doing? Is there something else that I can do to make things move along a little faster? Are there questions that I *should* have asked?