We are all judgemental

Are you a good judge of character?

People are a puzzle, I think we all know that. Some say we shouldn’t judge people but those same people may have well been stung as a result in the past. It’s hard to avoid being judgemental, and to be honest it’s hard to imagine anyone’s survival by not being judgemental. And thats why we have the saying “ Once stung, twice shy” it came about for a reason and that reason probably was that someone had trusted someone when perhaps they should have been a bit more wary. I direct you to an earlier post I wrote: Trust

Being judgemental does not mean you are nastily caging someone and instantly putting them into a “bucket” as they say. Not one person can honestly say they do not judge people, do you not have someone turn up at your door and think “What do they want?” Do you not see a customer and ask “Why are they here?” This is judgement in its most basic, every day use. Now, when you instantly start labelling people all wrongly when you don’t know them, calling them all kinds of nasty things, this is very wrong, and you’d be a wise person to avoid this kind of behaviour. This is poisonous judgement of someone.

We all get judged, we go for work interviews and are judged, on a regular basis at work my superiors regularly check my competencies to carry out a role, this is all judgement and is needed to see how capable an individual is. It is in many cases a necessity.

A good judge of character has the ability to advance the process through to a number of other traits, one of those being trust. This may then lead to friendships as well, as you can see this is the natural progression of your life, this entire process needs to occur to develop social interaction and relationships.

Don’t say you don’t judge, you do. You just need to look back over the day to see your style of judgement. If it’s bad – make a change.

Have a peaceful day.

You’ve got 7 seconds….apparently

What’s the first impression you want to give people?

Well, if you are trying to impress, apparently you only have 7 seconds to do it according to those wise old owls at LinkedIn:

Within seven seconds of meeting someone, a person will conclude if you are confident or weak, interested or aloof, friend or foe – based solely off your body language. Obviously, that’s going to directly affect your ability to get leadership buy-in, close a sale or just make a friend.

LinkedIn

I’d like to first off have someone think I’m friendly, confident and approachable however I’m the first to admit I’m not always successful. The thing is the other person you meet is probably using those 7 seconds to do the same to you, and it’s stalemate from then on. I meet an awful lot of over confident people, sometimes it can be a cover to hide shortfalls in their abilities, sometimes they are just damned frightened of the situation and feel out of their depth.

I think I’m good at sensing these issues and I hope I’m good at getting them to have confidence in me to help them on their way. It’s a big old world out there and I’ve tripped up and embarrassed my self on more occasions than I care to remember. if I can save someone who is starting off on their life journey from making the same mistakes I have, then everyone is on a winner.

I think the first impressions I’d like to therefore give are that I am approachable and helpful.