The other day I posted on Linkedin about context sensitivity.
However we communicate with one another there is always, despite our best intentions and endeavours, the opportunity for mistakes to be made.
Always.
Truth be told the more messages, information, data and knowledge we try to channel the greater the complexity we create.
Our ability to make sense of it all is finite.
We are, one and all, amazing imperfect messy beings trying to do our best.
All I want for Christmas this year is for everyone to be a little bit more understanding.
Try to show some more patience and empathy towards one another.
Santa Claus (or Father Christmas, Père Noël or any of his other many names) has his own kind of magic to deal with crowded information channels, but even he double checks his naughty / nice list.
I can read and speak a very little bit of basic French, German, Norwegian and Latin. I know one word in Estonian. I’m only competent at writing in English.
Anyone who can speak, write or read any other language with any degree of fluency impresses me.
A lot.
Many English words and phrases have a habit of tripping us up when it comes to conveying their meaning.
Eg:
- ‘Sleigh’ versue ‘slay’
- ‘Mince pies’ versus ‘mince pie’
- Snowed in’ versus ‘snowed under”
The list goes on and, yes, it is a bit naughty.
Ho. Ho. Ho.
There’s a much paraphrased quote oft misattributed to the late, great author Sir Terry Pratchett by James D. Nicholl about the English language.
It goes a little something like this:
“We don’t just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.”
Communication through any means has the power to unite and delight or divide and confound folk.
Organisational leaders often desire to maximise the throughput of processes for reasons of productivity and effiiency.
This includes processes used to manage the capture, storage and transmission of data, information and knowledge… but all too often the symptoms of reaching (or breaching) capacity is the creation of the very errors we are trying to avoid.
Like waistlines at this time of year errors have a habit of spreading more widely than perhaps we would like.
This season let’s give one another the gift of allowing process stakeholders the time to draft, proofread, check contextual sensitivity and otherwise catch errors before they go out the door.
Let’s also share the gift of helping one another to both process and understand our intent.
So be good for communication goodness’ sake.
