Not woolly - just not finished...

This week, The Economist's Bartleby column took aim at 'woolly' corporate communications for using words like 'innovative' and 'collaboration'. Matt Guarente argues that's missing the point...

The article (needs a subscription) rails against the unmediated use of words that have been over-repeated, and ill-used, to the point of having no value at all as signifiers. Words like 'flexibility', 'purpose' and 'sustainability', the article suggest, exist in candidate's CVs, "spray from managers' mouths", and "coat consultants' websites".

That's me told.

But hang on.

All these words, and many dozens of thousands in the English language, can not be struck off from an acceptable business lexicon simply because they are being over-used (and often to paper over cracks in corporate thinking or operational execution).

I see two problems that leaders (and Bartleby) may want to consider. First, these words are a kind of shorthand. Typically, a lot of people have sweated over the expressions of ideas in which these words exist. Between them, when they say 'collaboration', they know exactly what they mean and what they had to boil down to get to that word. Too bad for everyone else - we didn't see your working-out.

Like jargon and acronyms, these are sins of compression. The result is that no given audience is able to decode these words with consistent and dependable meanings. Individuals leave the communication thinking different things - which we see as a failed communication.

And that brings us to the second problem. When I hear business leaders using these words, I explain (as patiently as I can) that no-one is reaching for their pens thinking 'wow, they are innovative/collaborative/have a purpose!'.

No pupils dilate. No pulse quickens.

It's the next thing they say that will do those things: the bit that starts off 'let me explain why I say that...'. And here's where it gets good, when leaders are able to show you the big idea, which may in fact be banal or undifferentiated, and make it relatable, vivid, compelling, memorable.

And it's the story (or the insight, or the fact, or the intel) delivers the message. Not the message itself.

Because as all good communicators know in 2022, it's Time to Kill the Message(r).

If you'd like to have a discussion about communicating more effectively with the audiences that matter most to you, please drop us a line.