Does making a Request lead to somewhere you might not otherwise have gone? According to a piece in my local weekend paper it certainly does.
Faced with the enemy at the gate, creditors who are about to force a company into bankruptcy, the owner of the company held a conversation with an old friend. The friend said, “Don’t worry, pal. Your creditors want you to succeed as much as you do. They want to get paid. So you have something in common.” Several months later the friend and near bankrupt spoke again, only to find the business was booming.
You see, with his back against the wall the business owner made a request of his creditors. For the sake of all of them, he asked them to help him find the business—and they did. if he had not asked, at least one company would have gone to the wall.
Yet there is more to this story. The friend who was simply trying to be helpful triggered a Listening without knowing it. It is a good example of the responsibility we take each time we say something even though many times we can’t fully understand what that responsibility is.