Dear Ken:

You didn’t understand what the senior was telling you not necessarily because it takes you longer than it takes others to process information, or to digest what he was saying, but because he really was talking too fast.

Often supervisors, co workers, do not want to help, so they do talk fast and say as little as possible. It can be a passive-aggressive behavior. The aggressive, direct behavior would be telling you: I don’t want to help you so don’t ask me again!

The passive aggressive, indirect behavior is communicating to you something like this (not with these words, of course): I am going to speak so fast and so unclear, that you will not understand what I said and so, you will not ask me again for help. But you can’t tell me or anyone that I wasn’t helpful, because I did answer you. If you complain about not understanding what I said, I will claim that you are too slow!

anita

Hi Ken,

Just keep asking questions. No one gets fired for doing that because you are doing your job. Think of it that way.