Communication makes you more charming.

Author: Hong Xiufu
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2003-01-01
Features: One day, due to the tight deadline, to save time, and to keep my promise of meeting the schedule, I went to the office after 12:00 noon and handed a stack of manuscripts to my assistant, telling her: "These manuscripts need to be copied for records and should be sent to the publisher as soon as possible—'first.' Before I arrive at the airport tomorrow morning, the car passing by the office will notify you to come downstairs to pick up another batch of manuscripts to send out." To avoid "selective listening," near the end of the workday, I asked the assistant: "Have the manuscripts sent to the publisher via express delivery?" She looked suspicious: "Didn’t you say there would be another batch to send out tomorrow morning?" It turned out that her focus was on the key points— "tomorrow" and "send out again," while she missed the earlier instructions—"as soon as possible" and "send out first." When listening, if one only hears the latter part and uses it as a basis for judgment, they may misunderstand the complete meaning of the message. This is a common problem among people, usually falling into the traps of "selective listening," "prioritizing the latter part over the former," or "prioritizing the former over the latter," which leads to biased and incomplete comprehension, making it easy to generalize based on partial information.