Be curious, not judgmental

I’m late to "Ted Lasso." My lateness mostly results from not wanting to pay to subscribe to yet another streaming service to add to my television viewing options.

Matthew Gilbert, the television critic for The Boston Globe, has advised me and others to avail ourselves of free trials, binge on a series or two, and then cancel before being charged. There’s nothing unethical about Gilbert’s advice, but having to remember to cancel after the allotted time seemed too much trouble.

My mindset changed recently after the woman I’d eat bees for convinced me that $6.99 a month was far less than what we’d pay to go to the movies. We signed up and just finished watching the first season of "Ted Lasso."

I promise not to provide any significant spoilers, but let’s get out of the way that Walt Whitman never wrote the words “be curious, not judgmental,” as the lead character claims. Facts matter, but more important to this column is what the show has to offer.

I know little about British football (our soccer) and the Premier League. I had no idea if the teams on the show are fictionalized versions of real teams, nor how relegation works (or that it was even a thing). But I do know that some of the behavior reflects how I’d like it to be true, on or off of the pitch.

Ted Lasso’s character is the moral center of the show. He is supportive, understanding, patient, inspirational and forgiving to a fault. Sometimes he presents as goofy with just a tad too many dad jokes in his arsenal, which I’ve learned is the name of a real British football team.

But what makes the show more than a simple sitcom built around the mishaps of a bumpkin tossed in a foreign environment is that the writers, and actor Jason Sudeikis, give us a fully formed human being. He has doubts. He experiences personal trauma. He finds himself sidled with guilt on occasion. But he rarely loses his patience with anyone else in his orbit — though his humanity makes him do that on occasion as well.

I bring this up now because it seems too simple for us to cast blame on and be unforgiving of others, even when their transgressions are minor. It’s easier to dismiss someone altogether than to try to understand that whatever they might be going through might be far worse than we could imagine and could cause them to act in ways that have nothing to do with us and everything to do with their inability to manage their own pain.

It’s too easy for us to dismiss the ideas of others solely on the basis of their current station in work or life. What "Ted Lasso" gives us, albeit in a highly fictional setting, is a glimpse into an alternative worldview wherein we believe in the possibilities of others and ourselves, but not so much that we can’t shift our viewpoint when life necessitates.

Even if it’s fiction, even if a real Ted Lasso might be chewed up by those around him beyond any ability to function, it’s worth taking a moment to entertain the notion of a world in which patience and acceptance are embraced even when we strongly disagree with one another. Being curious without being judgmental indeed seems the right thing to do.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. 

Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2023 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Should customer be held responsible for something he didn't want?

In late January, a reader we’re calling Liam called his television cable provider to cancel his television service because it was far more expensive than the streaming service many friends and family were using. Liam wanted to keep his landline phone and internet service. The provider’s agent understood and told Liam he could shift to a promotional package for those services that included a free cellphone, which Liam declined.

Liam has never needed a cellphone and, he wrote me: “My wife of 50 years already had one.” The agent seemed “incredulous” since Liam had nothing to lose. Nevertheless, Liam continued to decline the offer because he suspected there might be a “catch.”

“His insistence that it would cost me nothing beyond a $10.71 startup fee convinced me it would be good to have in an emergency,” Liam wrote.

Two weeks later Liam and his wife were flabbergasted after reading an emailed statement from the provider that they owed $4 for the phone and would be billed that amount every month for the next two years, as well as a $30 monthly service charge starting the next January.

“We immediately called to say we wanted to return the phone, but were told that the two-week return period had passed,” wrote Liam.

“From an ethical standpoint, I agree with the company that I should pay for what I agreed to, but neither my money-savvy wife nor I remember ever having heard anything other than that the phone was free – over and over again,” Liam wrote.

Liam is right that we should pay for things we agree to pay for, but it’s clear there was a miscommunication here between the agent and Liam – and his wife, who was listening in to the call. If the agent deliberately misled Liam after he first told him he didn’t want the phone and then followed up by trying to ensure it was free, that is shameful and unethical. (I suspect that deliberate deception also crosses legal lines.)

Liam wonders whether people have an ethical obligation to pay for things even though, like him, they were “schmoozed into making a commitment.” While schmoozing isn’t typically illegal, it can lead to misunderstandings, as it did in Liam’s case. While the company might have been able to dig in and hold Liam responsible, I believe the right thing for the company was to cancel the obligation after Liam received his first bill showing the cost he hadn’t anticipated since he believed he was told there would be no cost to the phone. Initially holding him to a two-week return policy when Liam had no reason to suspect he was being charged for something he understood to be free may be legal but it smacks of being unfair.

While Liam’s initial appeal went nowhere, he wrote to someone “higher up” who eventually agreed to render the phone useless and make an adjustment to future bills. But that higher-up felt the need to tell Liam that after listening to recordings of his conversation with the agent, he determined that while the agent told Liam the “service” was free for a year, he never said the phone itself was free. Nevertheless, the company did the right thing by canceling the obligation, and Liam should feel no obligation to pay up for something he never wanted in the first place.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. 

Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2023 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.

Should reader be honest in unsolicited mail request?

Is it OK to use a gift offered to you in a direct mail campaign to do something if you have no intention of ever doing that thing?

Organizations regularly will mail potential donors appeal letters with a small gift as an encouragement to donate or take some other action. A nonprofit organization might, for example, send customized address labels or an inexpensive tote bag along with a letter requesting a donation.

In the distant past, some organizations would include a nickel or quarter along with the solicitation, though a query from a reader we’re calling Danica suggests that such incentives may have jumped in value.

Last November, Danica purchased a new car. In late February, she received a letter from a research company asking her to go online and respond to a survey about the new car she had purchased. A $1 bill was enclosed with the solicitation as a show of gratitude for taking the time to complete the online survey. In addition, the letter also indicated that she would be entered into a sweepstakes with others who completed the survey to win $100,000. The letter made clear that the “online survey should be completed by the primary driver” of the new vehicle.

Danica had two questions she didn’t find answered by responses to the frequently asked questions printed on the back of the letter she received. Rather than use the email provided on the letter to ask her questions, she decided to ask me.

Danica’s first question was whether it would be OK if she used the $1 even if she had no intention of taking the online survey. Given there was no mechanism provided to return the $1 bill if she didn’t take the survey and that Danica hadn’t requested the solicitation, I see no reason Danica should feel any guilt about using that $1 regardless of whether she completed the survey. If the company only wanted to pay $1 to those completing the survey, the right thing would have been to send the money after a survey had been completed.

The same is true of other gifts offered as a token of appreciation regardless of whether the recipient did what the sender requested of them. Better, I believe, to use those tote bags than to add them to a landfill.

The second question is whether she as the primary driver is really obligated to be the one to fill out the survey. If she plans to complete the survey, the honest and right thing would be to honor that request. If there are specific questions about the vehicle or the driving experience and Danica wants to consult with others who also drive it, that’s fair game. But if she indicates on the survey that she is the primary driver, then that should be the truth.

Danica didn’t lie to receive the $1 bill. She also shouldn’t lie to be entered into the $100,000 sweepstakes by misrepresenting herself on the survey. Not lying is generally the right thing to do.

Jeffrey L. Seglin, author of "The Simple Art of Business Etiquette: How to Rise to the Top by Playing Nice," is a senior lecturer in public policy and director of the communications program at Harvard's Kennedy School. He is also the administrator of www.jeffreyseglin.com, a blog focused on ethical issues. 

Do you have ethical questions that you need to have answered? Send them to jeffreyseglin@gmail.com. 

Follow him on Twitter @jseglin

(c) 2023 JEFFREY L. SEGLIN. Distributed by TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY, LLC.