No, this isn't a rant about English-only or bilingual workplaces -- it's a rant about corporate jargon sparked when I read an article by Laura Vanderkam, "Why you should cool it with the corporate jargon." I understand how internal jargon develops and why using acronyms can save time if everybody understands the code -- but [...]
How many ways can your customers communicate with you? Recently a friend of mine was evaluating two companies who were vying to provide a service to her church. One had a product with a pricing and service package that was clearly superior. But that salesperson would only communicate by phone -- he didn’t use email [...]
The recent situation with the Yahoo! list that had used excerpts from at least one of my books without permission or attribution has sparked a number of discussions about when it is and isn't okay to republish someone else's work without specific authorization. One person told me that he thought as long as he [...]
How many times have you received a voice mail message that rambled on, left out important information, or just didn’t make much sense? And on the other side of that, how many times have you place a call, reached someone’s voice mail, and left a message that you knew made you sound (let’s be gentle [...]
A substantial portion of my communication is done electronically through e-mail, texts, blogs, Twitter, websites, etc. It’s fast, convenient, efficient—but you know all that. Even so, since I was a small child, I have loved getting real mail: envelopes and packages delivered to me by the USPS. In the last year, the volume of [...]
One of the first questions I ask when beginning a new project is: Who is the reader? That's often the hardest question for the client to answer, but it’s essential if the product – whether it’s a book, an article, web copy, or whatever – is going to be effective. James Chartrand has put [...]
Like everybody, I hate spam. It annoys me that these low-lifes get to waste my time just because I have an e-mail address. Most of it I can spot and delete without reading, but every so often, I get tricked into opening one of those messages. What tricks me? Usually a good subject line. And [...]
A common challenge for employers is communicating information to workers, especially when your operation includes multiple shifts and staffers that don’t all have designated work stations. At a recent stop at the car wash, I saw a great solution. On the way into the building to pay, customers must walk past the restrooms. I couldn’t [...]
Technology companies are probably the worst—but not the only—offenders when it comes to spouting jargon that nobody else really understands. I’m not impressed when someone spews out a rapid-paced string of verbal confusion, and I don’t have time to try to sort it out. Like most writers, I'm bombarded daily with news releases and article [...]
Here's a blog post about writing mistakes that I want to share: Author Brian Clark is targeting bloggers in his post, 5 Common Mistakes That Make You Look Dumb, but he’s on the mark with these mistakes no matter what you’re writing or who it’s for. I especially chuckled when I read his closing note [...]
