I attended a seminar last night on Power Partners and networking, and after 90 minutes of the leader encouraging us to listen more, ask more questions, and build relationships, I was talking with an acquaintance I hadn’t seen in a while. Right in the middle of our conversation, another attendee at the seminar walked right up to my friend, and without even asking for permission or even acknowledging my presence, interrupts our conversation and starts talking to my friend as if I wasn’t even standing there! It was like I was invisible and she had the right to just start talking to him while I was in mid-sentence. After my initial shock wore off, here’s the sequence of things that went through my head: 1) I can’t believe this is happening, maybe she just wants to say hi (which was not the case, she talked on and on with him for over 3 minutes); 2) I should give her a piece of my mind and tell her how rude she is, especially given what we just learned; 3) why isn’t my friend saying something, stopping her and getting back to talking to me?; 4) I just let them go on and on until she finally finished, said goodbye to him but never so much as even looked at me. My wife is always telling me I’m too pushy and brusque, so did I do the right thing by remaining quiet and letting her be rude? Or should I have made a scene and reprimanded her then and there by pointing out how rude she was being? What would you have done? Let me know, and let me know if I have your permission to share your answer with my other readers (without, of course, mentioning your name). I’m wondering if the general deterioration in basic manners in our society is indicative of a larger problem. What do you think?
