Smiles and Names—Find the Creepy Line and Don’t Cross It
We’re moving into the goofiest of all of Carnegie’s principles this week: “Remember that a person’s name is, to that person, the sweetest and most important sound in any language.”
Even the principle is expressed in a goofy way that isn’t remotely true! Lots of people don’t like their names. And it’s not that they would rather be called something else, but the repetition of their name… It’s not doing much for them.
As with last week’s principle (“Smile”), the key here is to find the creepy line and not cross it.
An example: You are walking down the street and smiling. Great! No problems.
But you keep walking and decide to make eye contact with everyone who comes your away, all while keeping that big, dopey grin. Sorry, you’ve just crossed the creepy line!
Another example: You are checking out at the grocery store and notice the clerk’s name-tag identifies her as “Shirley.” After you finish paying, you reply to her well-wishes by saying, “Thank you, Shirley. I hope you have a nice evening!” That’s nice, as you treated her as an individual rather than a person who will soon be replaced by a robot.
But before that, you repeated her name a half dozen times. “Hi, Shirley. Nice to see you, Shirley. Wow, Shirley, you Shir are good at scanning those groceries I’m purchasing. Shirley, you’ve made this shopping trip a painless one. Thanks again, Shirley!” Once again, you’ve Shirley crossed that creepy line.
Reading between the lines of these two principles, I think we come to some meta-principles.
Meta-principle 1: Find ways to make yourself and others happy.
Meta-principle 2: Treat people as individuals in all settings.
I’m going to try to use other people’s names more at work this week, but I’m also going to be mindful of that creepy line. I want to individuate not isolate, and being creepy only accomplishes the latter.
