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Ask vs. Guess Culture

jeanhsu.substack.com

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Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#221

Post by dahfizz »

linuxdude314 wrote: post #90
retrac wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That may work relatively well with consumables like food. But it extends in many directions. I have fans and a space heater and extra blankets and etc. All of them are available for a houseguest to use. Many of them are stored in the guest room. I've had "guess culture" people stay over. Really, in my mind they don't even need to ask. They're already welcome to take an extra blanket. But they won't even ask, and they…

Are they supposed to just know the blankets are in your closet?

They're supposed to ask

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#222

Post by carabiner »

caminante wrote: post #212
IshKebab wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's definitely bad in a work context where clear and effective communication is important. You're probably thinking "but implicit communication is just as effective!" but it definitely isn't. It's all about hints and guessing motivations which is inevitably unreliable.

These are always fun "pop-sci" discussions, but the wiki says this whole dichotomy has been debunked [0]. I can't think of any company that doesn't have some low-context interfaces. It can be expensive for top executives to constantly address every question with "clear and effective communication." Some people make it look easy, but it's hard! [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-context_and_low-context...

I worked at an Indian tech consulting firm. Even though India is considered a high context culture, our working environment felt fully low context with endless meetings trying to get all stakeholders on the same page, clearing out assumptions, nailing down timelines and aligning resources. When I moved to a normal US company it felt like downright mind reading how we got shit done much faster because we did have a much larger shared context. So it's all relative and I bet American culture feels like high context to others, and those guys are astonished we can work without more hashing out than we do.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#223

Post by darkwater »

How questions/requests work in the Mediterranean Europe:

- Hey can you do $WHATEVER for me? - Sure! - Really? Can you really do this for me? - Well, actually I'm busy tonight so I can't do it, sorry

Not answering "sure" the first time? Rude. Not asking for confirmation? Rude.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#224

Post by ddbb33 »

jzb wrote: post #131
chromoblob wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And miss out a lot...

I can honestly say I don't regret a policy of not asking people for things in general. If somebody wants me to have some of their cake, or whatever, then I'm usually happy to accept. But I can't think of a time when I am like "gee, I missed out by not asking for that thing."

The cake could also be asking for a raise, or a discount, really any other any opportunity that’s not as low-stakes as an item of food

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#225

Post by tempestn »

jzb wrote: post #12

"It’s rude to put someone in a position where they have to say no to you" I feel this in my bones. When I was a kid my dad went off on me after we visited someone's house and I saw cake on the counter and asked for a slice. That was just unacceptable. (Context: He was raised by people who lived through the depression. Food scarcity was a real thing in living memory.) Even though his reaction was way overboard, I stil…

And a polite way to do this is to suggest the thing you want, rather than directly asking for it. You could complement the cake - oh, that looks delicious; what's the occasion? Or, "I'm moving next weekend - looking forward to the new place, but it's going to be a big job!" It is uncomfortable being asked something that you have to say no to, but that doesn't mean we have to just hope people will guess our needs unassisted.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#226

Post by opportune »

noahlt wrote: post #2

The "Ask vs Guess" name rhetorically frames it in favor of the Askers. Asking sounds reasonable, guessing does not! But really it's not about "Guessing", it's about understanding. It's about community, and relationship, and trust. What this culture really wants is for you to pay attention and understand the people around you, rather than treating everything as a transaction.

Asking isn’t necessarily transactional.

If I go to your house and ask for a glass of water, it’s because I’m thirsty and I know it’s NBD for you to get a glass and put water in it. I’m not expecting to give or get anything else in return, nor am I trying to be rude by insinuating you should have given me a glass of water. The thought process goes:

1. I am thirsty.

2. I don’t think it’s rude to ask for water since it’s effectively free and only requires you to have a clean glass to serve it in.

3. I ask for water.

Community and trust is all well and good, but most of my social circle are transplants from all over the country/world which all have different social mores. There is no common or universal social dance about how to behave when you want something from someone else or how you should be polite when you go hang out with someone in this kind of setting. And if someone does try to fit their specific background culture into such a setting in a way that makes it so they’re offended when I ask for water or a favor, it’s on them.

That’s not say I think Asking is “superior” but just that it’s not transactional so much as it is pragmatic (but potentially impolite) especially in certain situations, like socialization within a highly diverse-background group.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#227

Post by njharman »

jzb wrote: post #12

"It’s rude to put someone in a position where they have to say no to you" I feel this in my bones. When I was a kid my dad went off on me after we visited someone's house and I saw cake on the counter and asked for a slice. That was just unacceptable. (Context: He was raised by people who lived through the depression. Food scarcity was a real thing in living memory.) Even though his reaction was way overboard, I stil…

I'm not spending game night constantly asking all my guests all the possible things (water, caffeine, booze, food, bathroom, chair, cushion, warmer, colder, more light, less light, music, different music, louder music, quieter music, pet my dog, etc, etc, fucking etc). If you want something, YOU ask for it, which is polite.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#228

Post by grammers »

People really should learn to say what they want - and also say no. Otherwise they'll just end up being unhappy because, whether they like it or not, there will always be people that are ignorant (and most of the times it won't even be on purpose).

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#229

Post by opportune »

IshKebab wrote: post #28
jedberg wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it's just another name for that. But this article paints high-context as bad and low-context as good, when they're really just different (and opposite ends of a spectrum, not a black or white one or another).

It's definitely bad in a work context where clear and effective communication is important. You're probably thinking "but implicit communication is just as effective!" but it definitely isn't. It's all about hints and guessing motivations which is inevitably unreliable.

Mm, not necessarily all work contexts IMO, I just think it’s particularly helpful in software because software itself is highly semantic and software teams tend to not all come from the same exact background.

If you were doing something like sales, where both all your salesmen and clients were locals with the same social expectations on how to communicate implicitly, there wouldn’t be any direct benefits to trying to communicate explicitly, and doing so may come across as rude or offensive.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#230

Post by [deleted] »

JadeNB wrote: post #81
sneak wrote: post #51

> Deciding what to eat for dinner with guess-culture people isn’t as simple as asking people what they want to eat for dinner, because they will not tell you what they actually want to want to eat for dinner. They will say “oh, whatever you want,” or “whatever is easiest.” And when you insist that you really really want to know what they want to eat for dinner, and if it’s too much work, you’ll do something else inst…

> Man, people are so bad at communicating. I don't mean to say anything about you, but, as a saying with a different word in it goes, if you meet one person who's bad at communicating, then they're bad at communicating; but if everyone you meet is bad at communicating …. (I also wish people would communicate more clearly, but I have to admit that what I really want is that people would communicate in the way that's e…

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