I asked for the deadline in writing

Someone stopped by my desk on Thursday and said the report was needed "early next week." I said sure. Then I sat there for a minute trying to decide whether that meant Monday morning or Wednesday, and realised I was about to spend a weekend solving that question instead of asking it. So I sent one line: just to confirm — Monday 9am, or is Wednesday fine? He wrote back in four minutes. Wednesday. Four minutes. I would have burned two evenings. What bothers me is not the two evenings. It is that asking felt rude. Somewhere I picked up the idea that a good employee decodes rather than asks, and that needing a date spelled out is a small admission you cannot read the room. I do not believe that when I say it out loud. I believed it enough to almost lose a weekend. I am going to keep a note of every time I guess at something I could have asked. Not to fix it yet. Just to see how often it happens.

Closing noteClosed

Two weeks of counting. Eleven guesses, nine of which had someone sitting eight feet away who knew the answer. The other two were genuinely mine to work out. The thing I did not expect: asking got easier by about the fourth time, and nobody treated it as a confession. One person said thanks for checking. That is the whole penalty I had been avoiding. Closing this, but leaving the door open. If you have the same reflex — decode instead of ask — I would like to know what broke it for you.

After the closing note

This thinking is closed. The author left the door open — if you have read this far, you can still say something.

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