Have you ever met someone or know someone who is what some call a "know it all"? IOW, you ask them a question, they answer, but when you start telling them your feelings about the question, they don't want to listen. Had a Director/Supervisor at my last job who was just that way. I really liked the guy for the experience he had, but most of the time he didn't want to listen to my side of the topic. Bottom Line........he demanded to be right about everything, work related or not. He threatened to fire me a couple of times, because I started telling him my side/feelings of what we were discussing. He really acted like he simply wanted me to sit there, say nothing except "ok" indicating he was totally right about the discussion. We have a friend who is the same way when I call him about a problem we may have with our boat or something else. The guy, who is a little older than me, definitely acts like a "know it all" and really gets upset when I don't like or take his advice 100%. He told me this AM that he is better with boat mechanics than our boat mechanic, who is considered, and has the certificates to prove it, a Master Boat Mechanic. Been going to this mechanic since 2009 and he definitely knows our boat. So, do you know someone who loves a one-way discussion and doesn't want to hear someone disagree with them?
I don't think I was so obnoxious about it, but for most of my life it has been important to me that I win the argument. In large part, I think it was an exercise in language and persuasion skills, but even when I realized partway in that I was wrong, I was still motivated to advance my argument, and was especially pleased when I could win the argument despite knowing that I was wrong. There were also plenty of times that I went into the argument knowing that I was wrong, just for the fun of having it. I still do that sometimes. In fact, if you pay attention, you might notice that I do that here from time to time. It's not really winning an argument, though, when you use your position of authority to intimidate someone on the other side of it. That's just sort of obnoxious, and even sad. A one-way discussion is not a discussion.
Some people are good listeners Cody and some are as you describe I like a 2 way conversation - if I don't get it, I fall asleep
Me...I call them out...then move on. @Cody Fousnaugh your best bet...do not ask his advice on anything and tell him very little
If someone talks over me and doesn't listen to my point of view in a 2 way conversation..I just walk away!! They can talk to themselves as far as I'm concerned. However if someone clearly know better than me on a subject I'll gladly just listen .
Simply put, I am confused. If I have someone whom I prefer going to in order to seek instruction, that is the person I use on a continual basis. I will not waste my time nor anyone else's especially if I am not going to heed their advice anyway. There is a man who has been working with me for the past couple of months who continually asks me how to do things. For a while, I would tell him and leave him alone to follow instructions but more often than not, he would decide to do things his way and wind up taking more time to finish the project or mess it up beyond belief. The other day I sort of snubbed him by telling him that he doesn't need any guidance from me because he doesn't listen to it anyway. I further told him that asking me questions is a waste of my time, downright aggravating and in some cases insulting. I not only tell him HOW to do things but WHY I wish them to be done that way. (a policy I hold in all situations) In most cases I would have already fired him but alas, the disaster of a house we're renovating belongs to him. I am never afraid to say, "I don't know or simply dunno" but when I am right and know I am right and someone wishes to argue a point or ignore my stance I am also not afraid to tell someone not to bother me any longer and again, waste what little time I have on this earth and to seek knowledge from someone else.
Sorta like me. When I works, I works hard, when I plays I plays hard and when I thinks, I falls asleep.
The friend does know a lot about different things, but just didn't want to listen to what I had to say. I ask him if he had a dual-battery set-up on any of his boats (he has more than one power boat) and he said "yes". Thing is, his batteries are in the boat in a different location than ours, but does have a dual-battery switch like ours. But, what he couldn't tell me is how his switch is connected to the batteries. But, since the location of his batteries are different than our location, he really couldn't answer my question. Then we started discussing marine batteries and their function in a boat. His thinking about this was very different than what I had been told by our boat mechanic and that I had read. He didn't like hearing what I had read nor what our mechanic had told us. He told me "I'm better than your mechanic". Him saying that sparked the disagreement and he started getting very frustrated with me when I was defending our boat mechanic. Bottom LIne is: I really, really have to THINK before asking him certain questions.
I'm going through this situation with a family presently, my sister. Boy I am so thankful now that my Johnny listens to me and knows how to lose an argument or concede in a discussion.
It is definitely not a moot point to say that we are all guilty of not listening. Barring any ocular difficulties, we all hear but many times are not necessarily listening to what is going on around us much less someone who is trying to talk to us. The often comic driven circumstance of a husband reading his newspaper over coffee in the morning whilst the wife is attempting to engage in some type of conversation is a good example. Multiple ah's, uh-huh's, with no form of understanding does not a conversation make especially because the husband only heard his wife but did not really listen. Listening, not just hearing, is one of three devices for learning and sadly one that we all miss out on from time to time. The ladies are actually more adept at listening than men are but still, no one is guiltless of the faux pas. In a debate or even a casual conversation, the good listener will be processing incoming information whilst at the same time formulate a good answer but the hearer will be formulating an answer without having full knowledge of what has been said or written. Sometimes it isn't a matter of "I am always right" but a matter of not processing what has actually transpired in a previous part of the conversation. Now, in regard to the self centered narcissist, there is possibly no hope for them because they are pretty much stuck on stupid with stinkin' thinkin' and truthfully need to be avoided just to keep from wishing something to drop on their heads from on high. Learning to listen and even really read, in context and with coherence, is something that has to be practiced and moreover for some, need to be learned from square one and then practiced.
There have been times when I have been given advice that I didn't ask for and, although the advice may well have been sound, I wanted to do it my way, largely because there is no way that I could be convinced that my way wasn't better until I had tried it and failed. To be sure, sometimes I would fail but sometimes my way really was better, or just as good. When I moved to California, I took a job with a fiberglass boat company, which is something I had been doing for a few years in Michigan. They hired me because I had experience as a chopper operator, and my previous company was very pleased with my work. The moment I started spraying the chop, they had me stop, telling me that I didn't know what I was doing, going on to berate me for saying I had experience in something I didn't know anything about. Then they assigned to perform a roller task, which is an entry-level job that anyone can do. Other than using a slightly different form, which was the way I had learned to do the job, my chop would have been every bit as good as that of the guy they had, if not better, which they would have seen had they let me finish. It was their job, so I would have done it their way, had they bothered to tell me how they wanted it done. But they were convinced that there only was one right way to do it, and if I didn't do it that way, I didn't know what I was doing. That was frustrating, so I quit.
On my last job, with same supervisor/director, each time I'd ask him something about an inventory cycle count, whereas I had to show him my cycle count Excel spreadsheet, he would inevitably ask me to get up from my desk, he would sit down and change the cell and font size of my spreadsheet. When he'd make a spreadsheet, he always made it in small cells and print, that he liked. He would change mine to what he liked. After he left my office, I'd change the cell and font size back to larger, so I could read it. I'd forget that I'd changed the cell and font size and he'd ask me why I changed it back and I'd tell him "so I can read it without squinting". My explanation didn't cut it and he'd change it back and I'd change it back after he left. If he would've made sure the people doing the cycle counts were doing them correctly, I wouldn't have had to ask him anything about them. Unfortunately, the three employees, that were my co-workers, were drivers for the department and didn't like doing cycle counts. They actually told me that. Of course, he wasn't the type of person to LISTEN to some people, including me, about a few problems in the department. He was in-charge of the department, meaning, to him, that he was always right on anything concerning the department.
It seems like you could have copied the spreadsheet, changed the font on the copy, and let the boss deal with the copy, although you would either have to copy frequently or update both copies--that would have been a pain.