I had just concluded the ESS programme in Kuantan this evening. While waiting for my old college friend, Shamsul Ismail - a successful petrol station operator in Kuantan - to meet me at my hotel room, I thought why not I write something for the benefit of my new friends at KPC. And I'll write in the form of a story...
Shortly after the close of World War I, Dale Carnegie learned an invaluable lesson one night in London. He was attending a banquet given in honour of Sir Ross Smith. During the dinner, the man sitting next to him told a humorous story which hinged a famour quotation from Shakespeare. The man mentioned that the quotation was from the Bible. He was wrong. Dale Carnegie knew that. He knew it positively. There couldn't be the slightest doubt about it. And so, to get a feeling of importance and display his superiority of knowledge, he offered his unsolicited and unwelcome opinion.
And of course, the storyteller stuck to his guns. "What?" he thundered at Dale Carnegie. "From Shakespeare? Impossible! Absurd! That quotation was from the Bible, and I knew it with not one scintilla of doubt!"
The storyteller was sitting on Dale's right and Frank Gammond, Dale's old friend, was on his left. Frank had devoted years to the study of Shakespeare. So Dale Carnegie and the storyteller agreed to submit the question to him. Frank listened, kicked Dale under the table, and then he said, "Dale, you are qrong. The gentleman is right. It is from the Bible."
Dale couldn't wait to get Frank alone. On their way home that night, Dale said to him, "Frank, you knew that quotation was from Shakespeare."
"Yes, of course," he replied. "Hamlet, act five, scene two. But Dale, we were guests at a festive occasion. Why prove to a man he is wrong? Is that going to make him like you? Why not let him save his face?He didn't ask for your opinion. He didn't want it. Why argue with him?"
Morale of the story: No one likes to be criticized.
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