Ask Culture vs. Guess Culture: the basics
About 10 years ago Andrea Donderi wrote a MetaFilter reply that, somehow, has not turned into a best-selling self-help book: Ask Culture vs Guess Culture. (Here’s the original link, please be aware that the rest of the page may not make appropriate work reading. What’s the middle ground between FU and Welcome?)
To quote:
“In some families, you grow up with the expectation that it’s OK to ask for anything at all, but you gotta realize you might get no for an answer. This is Ask Culture.
In Guess Culture, you avoid putting a request into words unless you’re pretty sure the answer will be yes. Guess Culture depends on a tight net of shared expectations. A key skill is putting out delicate feelers. If you do this with enough subtlety, you won’t even have to make the request directly; you’ll get an offer.”
Guess culture is more about knowing the other person, not being presumptuous or taking others for granted.
A terrific example of guess culture SLPs may know is on the CASL 2 (I think.) Grandmother announces it’s cold in here, what do you do? (The correct answer, as I recall, is bringing her a blanket or something.) My own grandmother, very much a guess culture person, would have asked me if I was cold, which was supposed to tell me that she was cold, that she needed a blanket, and that I was the person who should get it for her. If it wasn’t too much trouble.
The asker in me found this passive-aggressive and strange. Was this her generation? A lack of self-worth? She thought she didn’t deserve to be warm? Just a flat-out pragmatic failure on my part? Was I too selfish? If I wasn’t so selfish would I have known what she meant? Why take this labyrinthian approach instead of asking?
Ask Culture and Guess Culture for the SLP
An SLP workplace can be challenging whether you subscribe to ask culture or to guess culture. A lot of us work in large bureaucracies (schools, hospitals, skilled nursing). Whether you’re an asker or a guesser, things get complicated.
Sometimes asking is way too much trouble. Yes, I could send two emails and fill out a form to request that thing that costs $5, then get it in a few weeks, or I could just buy my own right now. Yes, I’m pretty comfortable in ask culture–but I’m also impatient.
Guessing on the other hand–guessing seems safe. Hoping our supervisors will notice untenable treatment areas. Dreaming of the parent who will say “How DARE they treat my child in a closet under the stairs! I demand his SLP have an office immediately, or you’ll be hearing from my lawyer!” Thinking “I’ll just buy this small thing, and this one, and this one, and this one.”
(Some thoughts on how a similar idea relates to gender among teachers is in a great post here: https://sethnichols.wordpress.com/2018/05/17/why-teachers-are-walking-out/)
Asking comes at the risk of looking presumptuous or tactless. Worse, it can look like favoritism when you get things others don’t. “Umm… I asked?” is not the most convincing answer to “How did you get this thing everyone else was told they can’t have?”
As part of ask culture, it doesn’t occur to me that asking, for many people is a BIG DEAL. They feel vulnerable and uncomfortable and wouldn’t be asking if it wasn’t important. As a tool for shifting my perspective and considering others’ feelings, I’ve found this useful.
Books could be written on this, so I’d best stop myself now and maybe revisit it later. What do you think? Comment below or find us on facebook by searching SLBeeps.
Joy
June 16, 2018I will say: I did not know until I started my CF that asking for materials (and exams… and office space) was such a huge part of our jobs. I’m team “I’ll buy it myself if it’s only $5” but I’ve advocated for exams and more expensive materials in the past and won. Self advocacy doesn’t come naturally to me, it it’s a skill that can be learned.
Also, what a lot of SLPs don’t realize is that you can advocate until you’re blue in the face but at the end of the day, admin is going to do what they want. It’s not always you, it’s them.
SLPSummer
June 16, 2018Yes to all of that, Joy! Self-advocacy is a big part of our jobs, and one few of us are well prepared for. And yes, sometimes it’s definitely them. There are a lot of big and small things leading to us not getting what we need, it’s for sure a complicated issue.
Mary P
June 16, 2018As I have become a more experienced SLP, I have come to realize others won’t value my profession if I don’t. If I need supplies, space, respect I request it from the administration.
Val
June 17, 2018In my personal life, I am very much a guesser. When it comes to my patients and my rehab department I am constantly an asker! Employers continue to raise the bar and I’m happy to meet it but they have to supply the materials. And advocating for my patients’ individual needs comes easily to me! Asking for help for myself when my ankle is broken, though, is still hard.