language | Ian M Rountree

Language Problems – From Verbs to Nouns

May 23, 2011 by Ian Leave a Comment

“England and America are two countries divided by a common language.”

George Bernard Shaw

One of the biggest confusions people can have in communication is using the same words, but meaning different things.

I don’t mean homonyms, stereotype, or any other typifying agent. I’m not talking about the pronunciation of tomato or potato either. I’m talking about literal speech, interpretation, and where it all falls down between people.

We see this kind of improperly filtered language problem all the time with conversation. Whether we’re speaking or listening, we miss bits where they’re important.

If you ask how I’m doing, and I respond with “I’m fine.” – what do you think I mean? Do I really mean I’m doing well, or am I perhaps masking a bigger problem that I’d rather not discuss?

If I tell you things are hectic or ridiculous at work, does that mean I’m struggling with my job, or that I’m in my glory as an organizer and producer?

It’s not just interpersonal communication either – language affects how we do business. [Read more…]

The Power of Observation

July 28, 2010 by Nic Wirtz 6 Comments

This is a guest post from the brilliant Nic Wirtz – if you’re not familiar with Nic, you’re missing out.

If you have ever tried to learn a foreign language you will know the frustration of reaching a level of comprehension where what you understand is greater than what you can say.

After five years experience of both French and German it was one of those cruel twists of fate that at 17 I decided Spanish was a step too far and being trilingual was sufficient. Trilingual being defined as getting good exam marks but having the grand total of two weeks’ worth of in-country experience. Clearly my crystal ball was out of order that day as 13 years later I found myself on a Spanish-speaking island, engaged to a thankfully bilingual native Spanish speaker. Hindsight’s smug, contemptuous wave reinforced thoughts that the decision to ditch Spanish was not the greatest I’d made.

In a position where the normal skills you possess were fairly useless, base instinct and observation proved a fine alternative.

It seems oxymoronic that a passive skill like observation can have power. We are constantly bombarded by demands for activity. Social media enthusiasts are keen on “ENGAGEMENT”, chanting it like a deranged, but social media aware, Dalek. Engagement is the key to success, everyone from an individual through small businesses to multinationals should be engaging people to progress. The ENGAGEMENTdb report claims that engagement is directly linked to financial success.

Taking a step back and creating time to reflect is akin to dropping out and leading an alternative lifestyle and this is where proponents of engagement miss out. Where is the analysis? Where is the relaxation time where we are at our most creative? Where is the chance to reflect on a problem rather than outsourcing it to our network?

We learn more when we our taken out of our comfort zone than when we are enmeshed in it. The computer screen for many of us is our comfort zone, perhaps to the extent of creating different off/online personas in some. I am happy to describe myself as a homebody but leaving England and living in a foreign land has been the biggest confidence boost I’ve experienced.

Actual living, not location independence living with weeks here and there, generally at a tourist trap, but actually living. Seeing the day-to-day struggles of a country where 56% of the population live in poverty and 17% on less than a dollar a day. Observing basic life where getting to the next day is a triumph in itself is humbling.

Doing business in a foreign land is a race to understand culture, language, history and more. The empowerment occurs when you don’t have a fancy command of a language, all the latest electronic toys and whatever business trend is all the rage. Observation is empowerment, when you and your gut is the only thing you can rely on.

Having spent five years with a gradually increasing command of Spanish, I’m happy to report that I rely much more on my observation and instincts than I do what people are saying to me. Although there have been moves to debunk the 93% of communication is non-verbal myth, the myth originated from a UCLA study that said up to 93% of communication effectiveness is determined by non-verbal cues. Another study concluded that non-verbal communication was closer to 55%.

How often do you test that theory?

Why are we so hooked up on what people say or write? Adults train themselves for years on how to lie verbally, whether it is in business, to their spouses or to their kids.

Observing gives many advantages to those that do it well. A better understanding of our relationships, improved decision-making skills, problem solving and problem awareness. Arguably the greatest skill to have in any customer service business is the ability to listen. From listening we can find the best ways to help and influence our clients. If you see your role as a blogger or manager as a facilitator or knowledge steward, observing is imperative. Collaboration is another keyword in progressive business and if this is to continue, an observer is necessary to collate and dispense shared knowledge.

Two of the most passive skills we have are incredibly important to our continued success. Coincidentally one benefit of passive skills that most bloggers practice regularly is an observational one – recognizing and emulating successful behaviour. The influence that the high profile bloggers have rubs off on others, so in our rush to engage we are also absorbing

Has my reliance on observation been a success? Perhaps personally more than business-wise, although that is coming now social media is filtering out of the North America/Asia/European bastions. More and more business are asking what is this Twitter or Facebook thing and how can it help us? Currently I am aiding a UNESCO city of culture in its attempt to re-establish itself as a tourist destination. This has been a detour from my past experiences but a fascinating opportunity for highlighting social media.

In future, if it gets to a stage where I am going to have to take a more active part in meetings, I will be using a colleague to just sit in on them. No participation, little if any note taking, just observing.

Now over to you. Is your business actively promoting passive skills? What success stories have you had from doing so?

Image by cvander.

If you have read this post and still want to connect with Nic, he’s currently camped out on Twitter @nicwirtz.

What Does That Mean, Exactly?

January 20, 2010 by Ian 7 Comments

I have a problem with buzzwords.

Can you name the last five buzzwords you heard? What about the last ten? Don’t worry about the order, just try to come up with something recent, some term you’ve run across, that really didn’t seem to stand for anything, but was intended as a broad generalization of a concept, and applied to a very simple, elemental ideal.

I’ll help. Here are some: Rights. Reform. Liberty. Justice. Freedom.

We’re used to seeing ideas like blogging, the social web, networking, entrepreneurship come up in the discussion of overarching, nebulously defined ideals, but the trouble is that so much of our society is predicated on these vague shorthand terms. I wonder sometimes if buzzwords in general are part of the problem, or not. How are we supposed to communicate in general if we can’t communicate these ideals in the specific?

The whole point of language, especially codification and good lexicography, is to make sure that communication is reliable, understandable and universal. Dialects and slang aside, raw core ideals should be easy to transmit in short bursts, to make conversation breathable. But throwing in buzz, or any kind of highly emotional lingo, ruins a part of this because, like it or not, no two people speak the same language. As much as we convince ourselves we all speak (for example) proper English, it’s a crock.

I’ve got a better vocabulary than a lot of people I know. This can come in handy, as I spend a decent amount of my time being a translator. Working in the core has drawbacks – immigration rates and cheap housing mean that the down town area, at least of Winnipeg, is saturated by people who speak English – this supposedly common language – to varying levels of success. Having strong command of the language lets me do my job effectively whether the people I’m speaking to own the technical command or not. But every so often, I run into trouble translating, and it’s usually because of the wide adoption of buzzwords.

We don’t all use the same ones.

Perfect example: patch cords. What does that mean, exactly? You wouldn’t believe the number of times in a month someone asks me for a patch cord, then gets incensed when I ask what kind they mean. You know, a patch cord! For hooking up a TV! This isn’t a buzzword for me. I work with a lot of kinds of cords: coaxial cable, analog RCA, S-Video, component video, DVI, HDMI – and that’s just the video cables that fall under this category. If you want audio, there’s also RCA, but then we get into things like quarter inch mono and stereo, eighth inch for the same, digital coaxial, optical cable. See where this is going? In one eight foot section of my shop, we’ve got easily twenty different kinds of cords that all fall under the broad description of “patch cord.” Don’t yell at me because you can’t bring yourself to specify.

Don’t yell at the system because it can’t either.

If we get so confused over one term relating to two dozen kinds of AV cabling, imagine what someone from outside our sphere thinks when they start hearing terms like health care reform, universal justice or rights and freedoms. Often, these words either mean nothing at all, or can mean so many different things that even with context the lack of specificity is damaging to communication. It gets worse when we bring up the broad ideals, but don’t concieve for ourselves what possible specifics we might mean.

Our culture – the entire western hemisphere, everywhere from western Europe to Canada, the USA – produces buzzwords at an alarming rate!

I’m still waiting for someone to explain the job qualifications of a Director of Community. Or a Social Networks Manager. On the surface, it seems like such a simple ideal – but like any good category, it has to leave room for details that haven’t been conceived of when the buzzword is created. Which is part of the problem, I suppose. Specificity is great, but exact language requires a lot more time than most people have these days. It’s worrisome that our language has begun to so accurately accommodate the velocity of our society.

As someone wise is reported to have said, there is more to life than increasing its pace.

I’d encourage you to be more careful of why you use buzz along with your words. The shotgun approach to conversation doesn’t serve everyone as well as it does stereotypical politicians. Some of us have to back up our statements with fact.

Photo by HVargas.