I Just Need To Say Something

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I completely agree with this sentiment. I get really frustrated when people use "excuse" as a negative connotation when you're just trying to explain what you did or said.



I really don't understand what's in bold. It seems very counterintuitive to me.

Gotcha..

In some ways this should depersonalise things if you see it as a business. If your aim is to increase membership and traffic, then it doesn't matter what the members think of you, as long as you don't offend them and chase then away faster than you can attract new ones.

The other thing, to reenforce your authority, is to take charge of the solution. Even if that solution is for you to "back down", by making that decision yourself on your own terms, you're showing you're still in charge.

e.g.

"Notice to members. A number of users have approached me and expressed their upset over some of my posts. Although the posts concerned were never intended to offend, I appreciate that others may not share my sense of humour.

As administrator of this site, my first priority is our members and strengthening the community we have built and therefore I have decided to refrain from posting certain material in future.

All the best, and thank you to those members that brought this to my attention."

See how that reads? Responsive, polite and respectful, but no explanations or "excuses" and leaving no doubt as to who's in charge.

It can be hard to resist the temptation, but after a while you notice you have more credibility if you don't try to defend your actions or position.[/quote]

I really don't understand what's in bold. It seems very counterintuitive to me.[/quote]



It is counterintuitive. But I think that back-ups and explanation of your info can make it appear as if you're being "defensive" ~ you know, in the bad way.

I would not have been able to distill the advice in two sentences, but it's good to read it now. I finally came to the conclusion earlier today that this might be the case.

On the facebook someone posted something about an interest that we have in common, and immediately it reminded me of the link between that interest, and another interest we have in common. So I wrote a comment about that link, and at the end, I explained how I know about the link.

But that just looked stupid, and I tried to reword it to not seem stupid, and it still looked wrong. I deleted the "explanation" part and sent the comment. No one (of course!) questioned the truth of my statement, actually, several people "liked" it almost immediately.


See, I wish I had known that all this time. I've made up rules for myself over the years (mostly starting around 30ish, when I figured out .... something, the need for them I guess?) ~ rules based on lessons learned from mistakes I made (either repeatedly or just enormous) and I've been able to stick to them pretty well (considering). And have been happier for it, I'm sure.

This is a good concept to keep in mind. I've always wondered why my credibility would be a problem, ever ~ even when I presented proof pre-emptively, WOW I just realized something, why a certain thing went the way it went, oh I guess it's about, 8 years ago.....

[wow., how slow am I? is there even any hope. geeze. it was important, too. there were probably other factors involved, this isn't the first revelation I've had over that situation, way way too late to be of any use.]

I really don't understand what's in bold. It seems very counterintuitive to me.[/quote]

It does seem that way, but when you think about it, it taps into the very real need for the security that strong leadership provides. Parents don't reason with young children, they state the rules and stick to them. Business leaders explain the company strategy, but don't waste time justifying it to every doubter.

That's not to say you don't care what people think... it's just that you don't care what they think about you. Listen to people, get their input, ask questions and try to understand their point of view, but then assimilate it all yourself, come to your own conclusions in your own time, and then do / say what you believe is right.

Oh, how I hate it when people do that to me. It's SO IRRITATING!! !!

Thing was for the next step of our site. Was to expand it. And I wanted to make it a place that people on the spectrum could also feel safe. Because I know the isolation that comes with it. I am trying to prepare my members.

I'm sure you are a good person...if you weren't you wouldn't even try to be, or want to be. But it's really not up to me or anyone else to judge that anyway. You can be a wonderful person and do all the right things and someone will still get pissed off or try to lay a guilt trip on you. You don't have to explain yourself to people like that.

Sometimes I forget this. I guess that what happens when you have years of being judge.

I got that a lot in high school. It drove me nuts! A teacher or principal would ask me why I was late (that's usually what it was about), and when I would explain it, they would say that I was making excuses. You asked! If you're not going to accept any explanation I give you, then don't ask!

Sry, I missed that. It could be more then one thing. It might just be a person who has it out for you for some reason. Or a case of jumping first and looking afterwards.

If you want to participate in a group, be social, you do have to go along with some of the basic group protocols. So when you do something you do have to consider the impact or response. Not in everything of course, but anything that might be significant in some way.

Letting things fly just as you think them might be easiest, and might seem honest, but it can be problematic socially. And there is no guarrentee that what comes out of your brain raw is a good idea.

Generally people will accept an explanation of an offense one time, but then expect a change in behavior. If the same thing happens repeatedly, the explanation has become an excuse, as in excuse my behavior for it will not change.

Good points Toy_Soldier.

Another thing I thought of.. When people say "you're making excuses", what they're often really saying is "you should apologise".

It's not that they care why you were late, so they label the reason/explanation as an excuse because it appears you're excusing yourself from the need to apologise.

So if someone says "why are you late?", Instead of saying "I got stuck in traffic", the better response may be to say "I'm sorry, it's my fault. I should have allowed more time for traffic"

In your case, it could be. "I'm sorry, I should have run the changes / policy past you first" or whatever is appropriate.

Part of authority is always being responsible when things go wrong, so it doesn't diminish that authority when you apologise.

But I did apologize. Literally I'll paraphrase:

After the Joke was told to me as being inappropriate

I said, Sorry and that I'd change the content of the post

I edited the post

And people STILL continued to argue it with me. Even though I already said sorry, I already changed the content and I'm still the bad guy even the next day.