The Etiquette Edge

I was inspired by a book that was written some years ago about workplace rudeness and how it has an effect on the bottom line because people are disengaged, people are unhappy, and they isolate themselves from one another. And it just seemed to me that perhaps we have the wrong idea about what courtesy is. In some cases we've developed an attitude that courtesy is somehow subservience and that, if you give way to someone, if you are courteous to someone, you're putting yourself in a one-down position. And I felt like that was misinformation, that courtesy can actually be a competitive advantage - you can stand out in the crowd amongst seven billion people in a good way, rather than being noticed for the wrong reasons - and I just felt that people could use a little bit of guidance about these issues and to be comfortable in knowing why they were important.

Rachel Salaman: And your book was first published in 2005, wasn't it.

Beverly Langford: That's correct.

Rachel Salaman: The second edition is out this year. What's changed in the intervening period?

Beverly Langford: Well, of course, social media and the arrival of the smartphone, which is no longer just a telephone. It's become a way of life, and the way that everyone can connect instantly with just about anybody on the planet changed the way that we need to think about how we communicate with each other, how we interact with each other, and the consequences of doing it badly.

One of the things about social media is that it doesn't go away. Someone said it's like, if you want to get rid of something, it's almost like trying to put toothpaste back in a tube. You may delete it but it's never completely gone and many times we do things in haste because it's so easy for us to do it that way that it can have long-term negative consequences.

And I just felt like that, along with the fact that a lot of etiquette rules have changed or modified. Etiquette should not be a set of stuffy rules that are just there because they're there. Etiquette should be functional, it should be common sense, and it should be just a way that we show respect to each other.

Rachel Salaman: Now, your book starts with a quiz, which is 20 questions about how to behave in different situations and only a couple of the questions had more than one right answer, I noticed. So how strictly should we see good manners as behavior that's either right or wrong?

Beverly Langford: I think it's very situational and, further, I think it has to do with your relationship with the person. For example, you can be much more informal with a person with whom you have a history, with whom you have a longstanding relationship, and you don't have to be quite as formal and follow the rules quite as carefully.

I know one of the things that sometimes people will say, "Well, how should you start an email? Should you use a salutation as though it were a letter? Should you use a complimentary close in a signature?" That all really depends on the person on the other end of that email. Do you know that person? Is this the first time you've emailed that individual? And just use your good judgment about how to start that relationship.

I always say err a little bit on the side of formality because you can always loosen up. If you start off too informally, it's hard then to retreat and become more formal.

Rachel Salaman: It's the gray areas that are hardest to navigate of, course. You talk about boundaries at work and how they've changed over the years as work environments have become more casual. How difficult is it for people to figure out where those boundaries are?

Beverly Langford: There's one chapter in the book that I talk about that we may need to return to reticence, that people tend to tell each other way too much about their personal lives.

One of the ways you can figure the boundaries is, first of all, you've got to decide what boundaries you want to set. Some people are much more open than others. Some people are much more comfortable talking about fairly intimate and personal subjects and others aren't. And you first of all have to decide how comfortable are you in either giving and receiving information. Or are you a person who is easily interruptible? Do you not mind if someone pops into your cubicle and says, "Hi, I need to ask you about this," or are you somebody who wants a more structured day? And then you communicate that with people in a lot of ways.

On the other side, if you're trying to figure out what other people's boundaries may be, it's a very good idea to become good at observing the nonverbal communication from someone. When you start to tell people things, do they begin to get a little bit uneasy? Can you look at their faces, at their body language? Maybe they're not comfortable with that. Or, if they seem to be very receptive, then you may feel okay, it's alright, this is a person where the boundaries can be a little more relaxed than with someone else.

So, one size does not fit all and it's really being a savvy communicator, being someone who understands that there are cultural differences, there are people who are just naturally more reserved. And if you're a very outgoing person, you've got to respect that, and vice versa.

Rachel Salaman: We talked a bit about how technology is changing the norms of interaction. Can we talk a bit more about the etiquette of using smartphones now? What's your guidance on this?

Beverly Langford: Certainly, we've become very accustomed to smartphones but there are certain things that we ought to realize - that our smartphone should be a way to connect us with people, not divide us or separate us. Have you ever noticed when you get in an elevator, everyone grabs his or her smartphone and starts checking emails or checking Facebook or whatever, as though this is their only opportunity to do it. And, in my opinion, it's just a way for us not to have to interact with each other, not to have to make eye contact. The same thing in a meeting. If you're in a meeting and people are constantly scrolling up and down their smartphone, it's quite obvious that they're not fully engaged in the meeting.

So it's important to know when you use it and when you put it aside. I was in a meeting with a young woman the day before yesterday when she had it on the table where we were having coffee, but she turned it face down and, during the whole conversation, she didn't look at it at all.

So it's a matter of realizing that it sends an unspoken message when you seem so engaged in what's going on in the phone that what's going on face-to-face is not as important.

Rachel Salaman: So would you say, then, that there were some situations where it was appropriate to, for example, check your Facebook during business hours in a business context?

Beverly Langford: I think that probably is fine. It depends on if you're in your private office, certainly, or if you're in a situation where you feel that you are going to need to check something. Then it's wise to set expectations. You can let people know, "Look, I'm expecting this extremely important message. I've been waiting for it all day so, periodically, I'm going to need to look at my phone and see if that message has arrived." So, as long as you let people know that you are still acknowledging them, you're still being respectful of them, then most people are going to be very lenient about your using your smartphone.

So, certainly, I find that there are exceptions to just about everything. Every situation is in a way unique, and it's the people who are able to judge those situations for their uniqueness that usually make the best impression.

Rachel Salaman: So related to that, texting, sending text messages, what are some right ways to use that? Because that is a very new form of communication, isn't it.

Beverly Langford: It is, but it's very convenient. You may not be able to reach someone on the phone. That person may be in a meeting and may not be able to answer the phone. Text messages are excellent vehicles for sending short information: I'm running late, I'll be there in 15 minutes. Those kinds of messages work extremely well with text, but it's probably not the best way of sending an extended message.

So I would make sure that I figure out what message fits the medium and, if it's a message that works well via text, then by all means text is a great way to communicate non-intrusively and as opposed to, certainly, the telephone or even email because someone may not be checking email at the time. So I'm a big believer in using text.

However, having said that, I know that some people use text because they don't want to interact directly with the other person and that includes talking with that person on the phone.

Rachel Salaman: So, again, it's a case of really asking yourself why you're using it and the answer might be it is the best way to communicate this message, and then that's absolutely fine.

Beverly Langford: Exactly.

Rachel Salaman: Now, you mentioned email a little earlier and, obviously, it's a very widely used form of communication in business. What are your top tips for good manners and, indeed, what are some bad-manner traps that we should avoid?

Beverly Langford: Obviously, again, depending on the message, email is a great tool for conveying information, for explaining things, for detailing some information that wouldn't work well in a text. Unless you're an extremely good writer, it is not the best way to deliver sensitive information, although I realize companies do it all the time. But it's not the best way to deliver information that would be easy for the person to misinterpret, that has some ambiguity to it - and we don't always realize that we are being ambiguous - and something that's going to upset the person.

So I would be very careful about the nature of the email. Further, be cautious about using the reply to all feature. In my opinion, there are some times it's necessary but most of the time it's just annoying. One thing I find equally annoying is when someone sends me an email and copies several people on the email, including higher-ups, as though to say, "I want to make sure they know that I sent you this email, so if you don't respond you'll get in trouble." It's almost an intimidating kind of use of the copy feature on email, so I would be very careful about that.

Another tip that I would use is going back to the sensitivity of messages. If you're not really sure about whether an email is going to work well, put it in your draft folder for a few minutes or a few hours and go back and look at it later. I use that draft folder all the time to decide, "Is this really the best way to send this message?" Sometimes I'll go and edit it a little bit, sometimes I won't send it at all, sometimes I'll say, "It's fine, I'll send it." So it's just a good way because you certainly can't get it back once you hit send and it's a good way to have a little bit of a failsafe method.

Some people won't read long emails. They won't read an email that's longer than a screen. So keep that in mind.

And one last tip is always have an explanatory subject line. And, if the thread goes back and forth, you may need to change the subject line as the topic may shift or modify.

Rachel Salaman: In your section on etiquette for business travelers, you quote someone who said you should treat everyone as though you were going to have to spend the rest of your life with that person in a very small room, which seems very good advice in general, not just for travelers.

Beverly Langford: I wish I could remember who that was, but I just read it somewhere and I thought that was such an interesting take on the topic.

Rachel Salaman: It's great! So, with that in mind as a starting point, what is some of your best advice for people traveling for business?

Beverly Langford: Business traveling is not glamorous. People who think it's glamorous don't do it, and it's certainly stressful and it's physically tiring. And everybody is a little bit threadbare, particularly if the flights don't work out or things are delayed or it's overcrowded, and it's just a matter of really thinking about the needs of the other person.

If you're traveling with children, make sure that your children are not being annoying to other people. If you are traveling with a computer or a heavy carry-on, be very careful that you don't bump people as you go down the aisle. Be courteous to the people who are trying to help you travel, whether it's at the place where you rent a car or the ticket agent or the boarding official. Whatever it is, these are people who are working very hard to facilitate your trip and often people end up being rude to the only people who can actually help them when they're in a bind.

So just thinking about other people and the fact that they have feelings, that they get a lot of abuse in many cases, is a good way to think about how you conduct yourself as a business traveler.

Rachel Salaman: One chapter in your book is titled, "Refuse to Schmooze and You Lose," which is all about how socializing plays into business success. What are your key points here and where does that leave introverts?

Beverly Langford: You know, that's a very great question because people who are introverted sometimes feel that they're at a disadvantage at these networking events, where you've got this huge crowd and everyone is handing out business cards and making small talk, and, of course, the people who are more extroverted seem to be a lot more comfortable in those situations.

But there are a lot of ways to network that don't involve that classic situation that we always think about when we think about networking or schmoozing. Certainly people who are more introverted can use email. You can send an email to someone and say, "I very much enjoyed meeting you last evening at the event. You spoke about being interested in such and such, and I saw this article that I thought you might like." So sending things in writing can be a way that people who are more introverted can connect.

Another great skill that introverts have is that they are usually excellent listeners and, so, one of the things that I always suggest, because I coach some people from time to time and this issue of I don't like to network comes up quite often - in fact I'm working with a gentleman right now on that topic - and I always suggest that you go with some good questions in mind. Read the daily newspaper. Think about topics that may be interesting. Try to avoid explosive topics, as certainly there are many of those around. When you don't have the time to really create a meaningful dialog with someone and have some questions at hand, then just step back and let people talk about themselves, which they usually love to do.

So, there are ways that you don't have to be the big backslapper or handshaker or someone who is the life of the party in order to be very effective in those situations.

Rachel Salaman: And, in fact, the importance of listening in general runs through your book. Can you give us a few more tips about how all of us can be better listeners, whether we're introverted or extroverted?

Beverly Langford: Exactly. Well, first of all and I'll tell you, I always tell people that most of the mistakes I talk about in the book I've made at one time or another. And listening is not necessarily easy, particularly in the Western world. Parts of the world are much better at listening than in North America, for example, where it's almost as though the person who is talking has the power.

And so we have to first decide that listening is important. We have to learn to want to listen and it takes, in a lot of cases, more energy than talking. You hear someone saying, "I'm going to go to the meeting, but I'm not going to participate. I'm just going to listen." Well, if you're really listening, you're going to be participating perhaps at a higher level than those people who are doing a lot of the talking.

So you have to figure out what it's going to take for you to be an effective listener, and one thing is to try to remove as many distractions as possible. In a work situation, for example, if someone comes into your office and wants to talk to you about something, in my opinion it's perfectly okay to say, "Mary, I'd love to talk to you about this. I'm on a deadline right now. If you can give me 15 minutes then we can get together and I'll be prepared to listen to you carefully." Well, most people would be flattered by that, that someone cares enough that they're not going to sit there and half listen to them while they're still watching their computer screen. So trying to remove those distractions. If someone comes into your office and you have a small table, get out from behind your desk and go sit down at the table with that person so you can look at them face-to-face and really pay attention to them.

Know what your hot buttons are so that, if you know that if a person says something in a certain way or brings up a certain topic that you react to a bit emotionally, then just be prepared for that and just make up your mind that you're going to push through that and you're not going to let that shut down your ability to listen to that person.

Then another thing to keep in mind is to listen for facts and feelings. I think I say in the book that you listen at four levels: you listen physically with your ears; you need to listen with your eyes because what's going on with the person's non-verbals is extremely critical; you listen with your mind in that you're processing the information; but you also need to listen with your heart or, as some people would say, with your gut. How is this feeling? What message am I getting overall? Is the person frustrated? Is the person in despair? What is going on with this message beyond just what the words are saying? When you learn to do that, you're going to be an exceptional listener.

Rachel Salaman: Layouts of offices have changed a lot in the last few decades, which brings with it its own set of considerations. So could you talk us through some dos and don'ts that apply to shared workspace?

Beverly Langford: There are a lot of different kinds of shared workspace. There are the cubicles - the cube farm, as people sometimes call them - and then there is the strictly open office where there aren't even cubes, it's just desk after desk after desk. And, as much as possible, you need to be aware that that desk or that space is still someone's office. Albeit a very easily observed space, it's still their space.

The same things apply as if you were coming into someone's office that had walls and a door. When you walk up to someone's desk, ask them if they've got a moment - is this a good time - just as though they were in a private office. If you see that someone is obviously deeply involved in something, working on something on the computer, or looking very stressed, then you may want to put that off for a few moments. Do a reality check yourself. Do you have an unusually loud voice when you're on the phone? Do you have anything on your desk or on the wall of your cubicle that might be offensive or troubling to other people?

The biggest complaints that people make about the open offices are noise and smells. Either people are too loud and you're forced to listen to sometimes intimate conversations, or people wear too much cologne or aftershave, or in break rooms people fire up the microwave and cook something that may not smell exceedingly good to everybody else. So those are interestingly the two biggest complaints about the open office.

Rachel Salaman: Noise is a tricky one because if you need to make a phone call and you're aware that you will be disturbing your colleagues and there isn't another meeting room for you to go to to make your phone call, what's the best way to deal with a situation like that?

Beverly Langford: Again, I'm a big believer in setting expectations and so, if you've got colleagues close by, you might say to them, "I'm going to be on a conference call and sometimes the connections aren't great and I may have to speak a little more loudly than I usually do. And I apologize if it's a distraction but it will only last for a certain period of time." So just giving people a heads up. First of all, that lets them know that it's going to happen. But secondly, it lets them know that you are aware of them and their feelings and the fact that it may be a little bit of an inconvenience to them.

So I'm a big believer in setting expectations. I also, though, believe that companies have an obligation. If a company chooses to create an open workspace, that company has an obligation to set some guidelines. It shouldn't always be up to the employee to have to do the policing. If a colleague is too loud or this person is doing that, the company and the HR department, if possible, should monitor those kinds of issues and make sure that everyone is, to a certain extent, playing by the same rules.

You mentioned meeting rooms and, in my opinion, if companies are going to have open space, the architecture ought to include some private rooms where people can take conference calls, can have conversations that they don't want everyone to hear.

Rachel Salaman: How appropriate is it for managers to dictate behavior? For example, should they get involved with how much strong perfume a team member wears if it bothers the co-worker?

Beverly Langford: You used the word dictate and I'm not sure it would be dictating, but it could be a conversation that certainly you would have in private. You wouldn't want to embarrass anyone. And a lot of people are allergic to perfumes, as you know, and it might be if the manager doesn't feel comfortable talking to the employee then perhaps someone from HR might, if the person who is being offended by the perfume is not comfortable speaking to the employee.

The way I would position that, though, is the consequences and just the importance of being able to function as a team, understanding that, certainly, when you function in a group, you may not be able to do things individually quite the way that you would like to do them and to the extent that you would like to do them. But there's always that tension between the rights of the individual and the rights of the group. And, in my opinion, if you explain it effectively and come at it very compassionately, not you've done anything wrong but here is a way that you can help, most people are going to respond. And if that person does not respond effectively, if that person gets very adversarial about it, then that tells you something about that employee and attitudes about other things as well.

Rachel Salaman: You offer advice on a variety of tricky workplace situations and you say that keeping quiet is often not the best way forward when something is bothering you. What are some of your golden rules for complaining?

Beverly Langford: You don't want to come across as a whiner. You don't want to be someone who is always complaining about something. So it's a matter of picking your battles and, if something mildly irritates you, then you may want to let it go. But if it is an ongoing situation and you feel that it is not only troubling you but troubling other people, then you may decide how you want to position it.

One way - it's like giving any kind of feedback - you want to be descriptive rather than judgmental. So you want to just describe what's happening and then you can talk about how what's happening is affecting you in a negative way. One of the other things I would suggest if you're complaining about something - let's say you're complaining to your manager about some sort of conditions that are going on in the office - it's a good idea to have a solution in mind. It may not be the solution that the person ends up implementing, but at least it means that you're not just someone who does nothing but point out problems. You're someone who actually looks at how you might solve them.

So it's the attitude with which you complain and it's the professional way that you go about it that can make the difference in the way that you come across. It also can increase the chances that your complaint will get heard and something will be done about it.

Rachel Salaman: We've covered a lot in this discussion. What for you are the top takeaways for managers who want to gain an etiquette edge in their business life?

Beverly Langford: The main thing is that courtesy never goes out of style and that it really can be a competitive edge in a rather rude world, that you can come across as being a person who cares about others, who is interested in what's going on in their lives and wants the best for them.

Now, people always ask me if you're courteous, particularly women will say, "If I'm courteous, if I'm nice, people are going to walk all over me." Well, in my opinion, you can be courteous and confident at the same time. And if you think about it, when you're courteous, you're somewhat in control. If you step back and let that person go ahead, if you open the door for the person, if you pick up something that that individual has dropped, you are really controlling the situation. And if your body language says that I'm very comfortable with who I am and I'm comfortable in being able to be an asset or a help to you, then there is nothing about that that's going to put you in a one-down position.

Rachel Salaman: Beverly Langford, thanks very much for joining us today.

Beverly Langford: It's been a pleasure. Thank you very much.

Rachel Salaman: The name of Beverly's book again is, "The Etiquette Edge: Modern Manners for Business Success."

I'll be back in a few weeks with another Expert Interview. Until then, goodbye.