
Ask for Advice, Not Permission (2015) - admp
http://boz.com/articles/advice-not-permission.html
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tresil
>The problem with permission is that you are implicitly asking someone else to
take some responsibility for your decision.

That’s a good observation. There are times when permission is truly required,
but in most cases asking for advice should be a smart way to at least start
the conversation.

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gricardo99
Conversely, give advice not permission.

If someone comes to you asking if you’ll be on board with their plan, you can
turn it around and say “ultimately you need to make the call on this, but
here’s my advise”.

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bonniemuffin
Similarly, when I'm giving advice, I usually phrase it like "if I were doing
this, I'd do X" rather than "you should do X", to make it clear I'm just
presenting a point of view rather than telling someone what to do.

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DoreenMichele
I'm not crazy about either. Asking advice assumes they know enough to advise.
If possible, I want constructive feedback. Maybe they see something I
completely missed. But people giving advice often are trying to tell you how
to do the whole thing rather than saying "I know nothing about 90 percent of
that. But this 10 percent here, I can talk about that for the next hour and
you would probably learn a few things."

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ronilan
I’d ask for neither. I’d ask for help instead.

I’d say: “ _This_ is what I have done towards goal X. Will you be willing to
do _that_ towards the same goal.”

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lkrubner
The other approach, which was popular in some parts of Europe during the mid
20th century, is a practice that grew out of various Socialist and Communist
movements and which is often given the umbrella term "democratic centralism".
That term covers a wide variety of practices, but in places like Germany and
Sweden it was understood to consist of "Get everyone together and allow them
to argue an idea as fiercely as they can, but then once a decision is made,
everyone needs to commit to it and take full responsibility for it."

And that method had various successes, especially in industrial settings.

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daveFNbuck
I had a manager try to do this. After we all argued, he would make the
decision of which idea we all had to commit fully to.

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ericzawo
This is a great read, even if he did quote Pitbull.

~~~
stevew20
Pitbull, surprisingly enough, seems to be quite the business person. If you'd
like evidence of this, and you, like me, think his music is aweful and his
voice grating, take a look at how well he's done. He is more of an entertainer
by trade, and he has performed in front of some very illustrious bodies, and
invested his time in lucrative ventures. He's overcome a lack of musical
talent with really good business moves... In some ways it reminds of Taylor
Swift, who, going against her public image, seems to be incredibly shrewd and
activistic in business matters, and has repeatedly given big tech companies
the bird.

