Have you ever sat waiting for someone to turn up, only for them to arrive ridiculously late? Thirty minutes turn into an hour, and they didn’t even call.
This person told you they don’t value your time.
Being able to read people is crucial in personal and business relationships. Once you’ve weeded out the obvious psychos, the devil is in the details.
It’s the little things that matter. Most people miss them because they don’t know what to look for. Let’s get stuck in.
1. Punctuality.
If a person is flaky and unreliable, they don’t respect your time and don’t follow through on what they say.
You’re only as good as your word. To succeed at anything, people need to trust you. They need to know you value them. Wasting their afternoon puts you in a bad light that they’re unlikely to forgive.
You must show you deserve it as soon as you’re given any responsibility. If you keep letting friends down, the phone calls dry up.
If you keep letting your boss down, you’ll never get promoted.
People will respect you if you keep your word.
2. Attentiveness.
Being attentive demonstrates empathy and kindness. It makes people trust you.
The best way to be attentive to others is through “active listening.”
I used to volunteer as a Samaritan, which meant I took calls from people who were either suicidal or at their wit’s end in some other way. My training was focused on how to listen.
You might find the idea of being trained to listen weird. Don’t we all listen all day, every day?
No.
Active listening requires giving the speaker your full attention, understanding what they’re saying, responding intelligently, and reflecting on what was said.
This starts with paying attention. Realize that nonverbal communication speaks volumes.
.Start by making good eye contact.
.Put aside your thoughts.
.Stop rehearsing what you want to say when they finish talking.
.Stop being distracted by side conversations.
.Pay attention to the speaker’s body language.
. Reflect on what’s been said using paraphrasing — “It sounds like you’re saying” is a great opener.
Summarize the speaker’s comments at appropriate intervals.
3. Honesty.
Small acts of honesty reveal a person’s integrity.
Start gravitating towards people that admit their mistakes and are honest about their feelings. You don’t have time for emotional games.
I know someone who found a lost bag. They went to great lengths to find the owner. When they did, he was delighted to donate to the finder’s favorite charity.
A month later, my acquaintance bumped into the bag owner again. He told them he discovered a purse on the ground while shopping, found the owner, and returned it.
The lesson: One small act of kindness and honesty ripples outwards, making life better for everyone.
To assess whether someone’s honest, look at how they keep secrets. Honest people won’t reveal what you told them, even if doing so would benefit them.
Does someone in authority own up to mistakes instead of lying to protect their reputation?
An honest person speaks up when it’s the right thing to do, even if it leads to confrontation.
4. Cleanliness.
A person’s cleanliness reveals their level of discipline and respect for others and themselves.
Observe how clean and tidy someone keeps their space — their room, house, or office. An organized environment makes someone look responsible and considerate.
A messy space might indicate someone is busy and has little time to clean. Maybe they have too much stuff, or they have young children.
Such a person may also have low self-esteem or a mental health problem, making them tired and careless.
If your head is a mess, this will reflect in your external world and vice versa. You want to mix with people who take pride in their appearance and surroundings.
5. How they treat those beneath them in social status.
Most people can fake being nice, showing compassion, and taking an interest in someone when they’re sucking up to them. But how does someone act toward people when there are no consequences?
Look at how someone acts towards service staff.
I’m lucky enough to go to restaurants once a week. I recognize the hard and thankless job service staff have and treat them with respect because it doesn’t occur to me to treat them differently. We should treat everyone with respect until they prove unworthy.
Everyone doesn’t share my philosophy. A lack of “please” and “thank you” is surprisingly common, as is having kids smear food everywhere without trying to clean it up and complaining about minor things aggressively.
Final thoughts
Success in business, relationships, and life is routed in networking — building relationships.
Mix with the wrong people, and it’s a recipe for disaster.
The problem is selfish, jealous, hateful people don’t come with warning signs. Often they are adept at masking their authentic selves.
So we have to become experts at people-watching. We must be attentive enough to look below the surface and look for clues.
When you master people-watching, the small things that give away a person’s true character stand out like neon signs. With practice, it’ll become second nature.
Go somewhere like a coffee shop and get in the habit of observing. Your reward is in surrounding yourself with people who love and respect you.
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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.
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From The Good Men Project on Medium
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Photo credit: Image from Lexica Aperture AI
