Interpersonal Communication Nightmare

My dear friend Howie, the late Professor of Communication had a dilemma. It was in the 70’s (as best as I can remember) and the Department Chairman had a secretary with an evil personality. She simply didn’t seem to like people, at least not Howie. It seemed to him that other people also didn’t like her, but she was efficient, and part of the University system, and basically you had to get along with her. What she did was important to his well being, but no matter how hard he seemed to try, it wasn’t working. She at best ignored his presence.


As a Professor of Interpersonal Communication, it was up to him to devise a way to reach this woman and make her “interpersonal”. He sat and drew out a plan, and did it in a professional way, and developed a campaign.

In a step by step fashion he worked on this woman. Not unlike one of those books, “How to Pick Up a Woman”, he devised for himself a method to make someone like you. His goal at first was not to win a date with the aforementioned secretary, but to win her over as a friend and make his life simpler. However, his academic hat came out and he realized that this was good research material. So, he began to document his step by step approach to winning her friendship.

Over time, it worked. He really was very happy, and he and the secretary enjoyed their time together and he had the opportunity to get on the Department Chairman’s schedule when needed etc. He wrote up the research and submitted it to a very prestigious journal and it was accepted. And so, a year after he started, his article was about to come out explaining how to interpersonally seduce (not literally) an obnoxious secretary and make her like you.

The moment of truth had arrived! He had to tell the secretary what he had done, because she would see it and hear about it for sure. After all, he wrote the article under his own name and had to live with it.

He went in and tried to explain this to his new, “best friend”.

And now, the Department Chairman had a secretary with an evil personality. She simply didn’t seem to like people, especially not Howie. It seemed to him that other people also didn’t like her, but she was efficient, and part of the University system, and basically you had to get along with her. What she did was important to his well being, but no matter how hard he seemed to try, it wasn’t working. She at best ignored his presence and now, she was his sworn enemy.