Giving Advice, But Does Anyone Listen To You?

"We have to learn how to control the monster, which is our thirst to give advice," says Bunai Stanker. "Too often we think that our opinion can be of use to someone without even being aware of all the facts surrounding the situation that he commented. Then, however, we remain surprised when our unsolicited advice is completely ignored ", he adds.

According to Rebel Stanley, there are three main reasons why others will not listen to our advice:

Trying to resolve the wrong problem

When a person comes to you and tells you "I have a problem", the first thing that comes out of his mouth, is almost never the actual problem that needs to be resolved, says Rebel Stanker

"When someone shares with you that he is facing a challenge, he does not tell you everything. The problem is that in our desire to give advice on resolving this problem we ignore the real challenge ", he adds.

If you take the necessary time to uncover the real problem, you will understand that it is deeper and more specific than the superficial difficulties that people usually share. For example, if someone tells you that they are failing to perform their tasks on time when working from home, you would advise them to do so earlier and set aside more time for important projects.

"You might think that this guy is lazy or he's acting like a diva. If you dig deeper into things, however, you may find that the real challenge comes from the fact that he has two young children to care about and that they do not stop distracting him while working from home. This problem is not related to early getting up and setting aside time, so your tips for increasing productivity will not be particularly useful. "says Rebel Stanley.

 The solution you are proposing is a mediocre

Another problem in giving advice is the fact that we often overestimate our own ideas.

"We are subject to a number of cognitive biases and prejudices, and we think our idea is the smartest, the best, and the right one for the particular case, just because it lives in our head," says Rebel Stanley. "We all have a personal interest in believing that our ideas are great. We are programmed to defend our ego ", he adds.

Unfortunately, these tips are not always as good as we think.

Giving advice costs too much energy to all participants in the discussion

While the first two reasons your opinion to be neglected are related to wasting time and resources, this is far from the worst thing that can be said about unsolicited advice.

"Resolving foreign problems, without being asked by the respondent, can be degrading and limiting both to the person who receives the counsel and to the one who gives it," says Bungai Stanker.

This is due to the fact that the giving of unwanted advice relies on the presumption that the other person is not sufficiently experienced or competent to solve his problem alone.

 Giving such advice is bad for the person who shares his opinion as he is burdened with the problems of others.

"When you take that burden on your shoulders, everyone loses," says Rebel Stanker.

What can you do?

However, what has been said here as a call not to help others or to keep your mouth shut. Instead, you just have to change your behavior slightly.

"I'm not saying don't give advice or that all the tips are bad, but rather that you don't have to automatically enter the advice mode," says Bungay Stanker.

Can you listen to your interlocutor and wait for a little while giving advice, he asks. At work, managers and leaders need to change their thinking and be transformed by the person who offers a fast but often wrong decision in the one who tries to find the real problem before giving advice.

As Einstein said, "If I have an hour to solve a problem, I would spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and five minutes thinking about its solution."

"Everything will change if people create a habit of listening and asking questions in the first 60 seconds of conversation with someone else. Then they can say, "Do you want to hear my opinion on the matter? Or "How do you plan to solve this problem?" This approach will help you focus on the real problems, "says Rebel Stanley.