Tell Me About It: Terse person has tips for coworkers

While I'm away, readers give the advice.

On working with someone who is terse, verging on rude, and intimidating:

I may be that abrupt person. While I continue to work at this, there are folks who would argue I'm intimidating and can be very short on the phone.

Those folks tend to fall into certain groups. When they call, they say things like, "I think maybe I need ..."; "Let's see here, I think those notes are somewhere ... "; or just generally haven't made up their minds about what they need. My favorite are those who call and want to meet with you but haven't looked at or even opened their own calendars to see when they are available.

Suggestions that they call back, that I call back, that we talk after the immediate deadline is over, etc., fall on deaf ears.

With that acknowledgment upfront, I suggest that people who fear a rude colleague might get a better result if they (a) are organized and concise about what they need; (b) ask if there is a better time to talk (one individual calls regularly 30-40 minutes before a known deadline; when I suggest calling at another time, she says, "Oh no, this will only take a minute" - and her minute is always at least 10); (c) listen carefully and move on once the question has already been answered; or (d) don't treat it as a personal chat. Don't open the call with "So, how are you ..." or have "ending remarks."

Oh, and call in the morning. Often we of few syllables manage to maintain our patience for the first five or 10 rudderless calls of the day. It's call No. 11 that puts us over the top.

Yeah, I know. I'm working on it ...