What You Said Might Not Be What He Heard!
On the MSN just before the school term began,
Andy: Hey Trina what breadth module are you taking this coming semester?
Trina: ^$%@#!&*
Andy: What a coincidence! I am taking ^$%@#!&* as well! We will see each other in class then!
Trina: That's great! See you around then.
At the first ^$%@#!&* lecture, the students were told that they would be required to form groups of 3-5 people for projects. Trina had taken this module together with some of her friends and they naturally decided to form a group. However, for some reason, Andy felt that Trina should join his group instead and so he approached her. Trina kindly declined (more than once in fact) and told him that she had already agreed to join her friends. Not wanting to give up, Andy decided to take the matter into his own hands.
One fine day when Trina was not with her friends,
Andy: Hey guys, Trina might not be joining your group! She had asked me to take this module with her before school started and we need a girl to be on our group to have different perspectives. Therefore, she should really join my group instead!
Trina's friends were utterly confused and told her to sort things out with Andy as soon as possible. Upon hearing the incident, Trina got really furious and decided to make things clear to Andy.
Trina: Sorry Andy, I cannot do the project with you!
Andy: What?! But you were the one who................
The scenario above is a real situation which happened to a friend of mine. No matter how I look at it, the guy was largely at fault for having made the assumption (based on the MSN conversation they had) that Trina was "asking" him to take the module with her. And to make things worse, he even approached Trina's friends and said those stuff behind her back. To Andy, he probably felt that Trina "betrayed" him because she refused to join his project group. However, it is very mind-boggling how he arrived at the conclusion that Trina was asking him to take the module with her in the first place. To Trina, she was probably feeling amused and annoyed at the same time (in fact she was)! She tried to be tactful in declining Andy's kind offers but he could not get the hint and the whole miscommunication escalated to another level which ultimately involved Trina's friends. Although her friends were confused, they did not take Andy's words as they were and instead, asked Trina to settle the problem herself which was probably the best solution. Of course the story did not have a happy ending...
So, here are the questions: How should Andy have approached this issue and how should Trina have responded to his first offer had she wanted to prevent what happened after that? And now that things have turned ugly, what can the both of them do to salvage the friendship?
P.S. ASSUME = Making An ASS Out of U and ME (So always remember, don't assume!)
Andy: Hey Trina what breadth module are you taking this coming semester?
Trina: ^$%@#!&*
Andy: What a coincidence! I am taking ^$%@#!&* as well! We will see each other in class then!
Trina: That's great! See you around then.
At the first ^$%@#!&* lecture, the students were told that they would be required to form groups of 3-5 people for projects. Trina had taken this module together with some of her friends and they naturally decided to form a group. However, for some reason, Andy felt that Trina should join his group instead and so he approached her. Trina kindly declined (more than once in fact) and told him that she had already agreed to join her friends. Not wanting to give up, Andy decided to take the matter into his own hands.
One fine day when Trina was not with her friends,
Andy: Hey guys, Trina might not be joining your group! She had asked me to take this module with her before school started and we need a girl to be on our group to have different perspectives. Therefore, she should really join my group instead!
Trina's friends were utterly confused and told her to sort things out with Andy as soon as possible. Upon hearing the incident, Trina got really furious and decided to make things clear to Andy.
Trina: Sorry Andy, I cannot do the project with you!
Andy: What?! But you were the one who................
The scenario above is a real situation which happened to a friend of mine. No matter how I look at it, the guy was largely at fault for having made the assumption (based on the MSN conversation they had) that Trina was "asking" him to take the module with her. And to make things worse, he even approached Trina's friends and said those stuff behind her back. To Andy, he probably felt that Trina "betrayed" him because she refused to join his project group. However, it is very mind-boggling how he arrived at the conclusion that Trina was asking him to take the module with her in the first place. To Trina, she was probably feeling amused and annoyed at the same time (in fact she was)! She tried to be tactful in declining Andy's kind offers but he could not get the hint and the whole miscommunication escalated to another level which ultimately involved Trina's friends. Although her friends were confused, they did not take Andy's words as they were and instead, asked Trina to settle the problem herself which was probably the best solution. Of course the story did not have a happy ending...
So, here are the questions: How should Andy have approached this issue and how should Trina have responded to his first offer had she wanted to prevent what happened after that? And now that things have turned ugly, what can the both of them do to salvage the friendship?
P.S. ASSUME = Making An ASS Out of U and ME (So always remember, don't assume!)
posted by Lyon at
8:57 AM
5 Comments:
Hi Lyon,
I share the same thoughts as you! Andy is not being considerate and i should say that he is quite selfish.
Firstly, if i were Andy, i will not assume Trina wants to partner with me in the project. Are they best friends in the first place? If they are, its understandable how Andy can misunderstand Trina. However, since Trina has already rejected him SEVERAL times, he should not bother her anymore regarding this matter.If its unintentional on the part of Andy to talk to Trina's friends, i think he should apologize to Trina and not say :What?! But you were the one who..
What should Trina do when Andy approached her for the first time? Hmm... Maybe she should make it clear that she already had a group formed and let him know that the decision was before she told him she's taking the module?
Now that things have progressed to this stage, I guess they would have to practice the "out of sight, out of mind" theory? Or, a better alternative is to take the same module again and be in the same group!
August 31, 2008 at 2:30 AM
Hi pei rong,
Trina and Andy are just normal friends and the problem is they only formed their groups after the first lecture and that's why Trina could not possibly tell Andy that earlier on. And I don't think that Andy approached her friends unintentionally because he did not even know them in the first place.
I feel that Andy should take the initiative to approach Trina and apologise for the whole incident to end this whole saga (:
August 31, 2008 at 6:47 AM
Hi Lyon,
Could it be that Andy thinks that he and Trina are good friends? But even if Andy think so, then the more he should not be doing this. Probably Andy's group did not have enough members and hence he was desperate? If that is the case, I feel that he should either inform the lecturer or to post on ivle to look for group members, since Trina had rejected him a few times.
I agree with pei rong that Trina should make it clear that she already had a group formed. Probably Trina could also tell Andy that they have already started on the project?
September 1, 2008 at 2:48 AM
Thanks for the well described scenario!
The only thing I might have done differently is to have articulated the "problem" from the perspective of one person (Trina) and asked a single question: If you were Trina, how would you handle this?
September 6, 2008 at 11:02 PM
Dear Brad,
Yes I agree that will definitely make the question more focused! But I was quite interested to find out what will people do to clear up the mess if they were in Andrew's situation and that's why I posted too many questions.
I will take note to ensure my future posts are more focused!
September 6, 2008 at 11:22 PM
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