social-signal-and-tact git:20260910.c99be20A

Immutable. This exact content never changes and is served at /api/v1/blob/5626de3847e42baa.

---
name: social-signal-and-tact
description: "Turn awkward, overly formal, blunt, or AI-sounding messages to teachers, leaders, mentors, senior colleagues, partners, or acquaintances into short, natural, relationship-aware communication. Use for tactful praise, upward communication, progress updates, favors, reminders, apologies, disagreement, gift and courtesy messages, proxy greetings, holiday wishes, or warm friend-like chat. The skill can use sandwich framing, specific credit, ask-for-advice, face-saving language, staged chat turns, and subtle emotional value while avoiding fake familiarity, fabricated shared history, pressure, gift-value signaling, formulaic parallelism, low-importance framing, or empty flattery."
license: MIT
metadata:
  author: Joy T <101039451+FAIRY123456789@users.noreply.github.com>
  tags:
    - communication
    - tone
    - relationships
---

# Social Signal and Tact

Read the relationship before writing the sentence.

## Core idea

Good “人情世故” is the ability to understand what the other person cares about, protect both sides' face, make appreciation concrete, and let the real request or sentiment arrive with the right emotional temperature.

For chat, read the interaction as a sequence of turns, not only as one finished paragraph. Sometimes the most natural message is shorter because part of the context should wait until the other person responds.

## Workflow

1. Identify the relationship: teacher, leader, mentor, senior colleague, partner, acquaintance, or real friend.
2. Infer the immediate social goal: report progress, ask for help, praise, thank, remind, repair awkwardness, disagree, give a gift, pass on greetings, send a holiday wish, or make a request.
3. Separate **observable facts** from interpretation. Praise should attach to something real: a decision, useful feedback, a result, a way of thinking, a resource, or a concrete effect on the user.
4. Estimate relational distance and channel. A WeChat message to a familiar teacher should not read like an official email.
5. Identify the other person's likely priority: progress, respect, control, efficiency, recognition, low-risk execution, being understood, or receiving a gesture without social pressure.
6. Choose one pattern from `references/message-patterns.md`. Use multiple techniques only when the message still feels natural.
7. Decide whether the content belongs in one send or several chat turns. If the situation contains both immediate logistics and relational explanation, lead with the immediate fact, then add the relationship context in a second message or after a natural reply. Avoid front-loading delivery details, apology, family context, product explanation, and well-wishes into one dense block.
8. For gifts or courtesy visits, describe enough to make the gesture understandable, then stop. State the source, timing, local or seasonal quality, or caring intention when relevant. Do not sell the gift through price, brand prestige, rankings, exaggerated scarcity, or medical claims.
9. Match the weight of the apology to the actual situation. For a minor absence or missed visit, phrases such as `有些过意不去` and `让我代他向您问好` are often proportionate. Reserve `请您见谅` or stronger apology language for situations that genuinely require repair.
10. Make senior-facing closing language invitational rather than directive. Prefer `您回办公室后可以尝尝呀，希望您吃着喜欢` over commands such as `记得拿一下` when the context is a gift.
11. For gratitude or holiday wishes, use one or two small real memories when available. A remembered sentence, a ride after an event, a piece of advice, a moment of encouragement, or a specific act of support can carry more emotional weight than broad praise. Keep the memory brief and subordinate to the current feeling; do not turn the message into a biography or chronology.
12. Never frame a senior, mentor, or benefactor as someone who only came to mind because of the occasion. Avoid phrases such as `很久没联系了，正好借教师节向您问个好`, `顺便跟您问候一下`, or `刚好想到您`. These can imply low salience or opportunistic contact. Enter the message from the relationship itself: direct blessing, gratitude, a real memory, or a current update.
13. Keep each send short by default. In chat, one compact paragraph often works better than a structured memo, and two well-timed messages can work better than one overloaded paragraph.
14. Remove AI markers: generic praise, repeated thanks, over-explaining background, emotional overstatement, bureaucratic transitions, three-stage mini-essays, slogan-like endings, and mechanical parallel structures such as repeated `把A，把B`, `做好A，走稳B`, or other balanced two-part closures that sound generated rather than spoken.
15. Prefer one natural action or intention over ornamental parallelism. If `我也会继续努力把事情做好` already completes the meaning, stop there. Do not add a second abstract phrase only for rhythm.
16. Make the other person easy to respond to. Requests should be clear and low-friction, with room for timing or refusal when appropriate.
17. Run the final “would a real person send this?” test. Also ask: “Would this wording accidentally make the other person feel unimportant?”, “Would a real person say this exact ending?”, and “Would a real person send all of this at once?”

## Tone controls

The user may ask for one of these:

- `克制礼貌`
- `熟一点但不冒犯`
- `自然拍一下马屁`
- `汇报中顺手归功`
- `请教式`
- `轻松朋友感`
- `有分寸地反对`
- `送礼/代问候`
- `节日感谢`

Friend-like naturalness is allowed when the wording fits the real relationship. Fabricated intimacy is not.

## Integrity guardrail

Do not invent shared memories, private closeness, endorsements, affection, or facts. Do not coach deception that materially misrepresents the user's relationship or situation. For supplements, health products, or wellness gifts, avoid unsupported efficacy claims and status claims; keep the message focused on care and the actual gift.