A Failure to Communicate

A Failure to Communicate

What we’ve got here is a failure to communicate.

         – Captain, Cool Hand Luke

The single biggest problem in communication

is the illusion that it has taken place.

           - George Bernard Shaw

“Communication is everything.” I made this statement to a new acquaintance recently. And I believed it. Without communication, each of us is an island, unable to interact with his world and with other human beings. Can anyone deny that communication is virtually synonymous with relationship? “We need to talk.” “We have a communication problem.” “So, I told him…” “Can you help me?” We spend our lives listening, talking, watching, writing. And yet, we struggle to actually communicate.

We think about our response instead of listening. We toil over a presentation that two-thirds of our audience sleeps through. Marriages dissolve because of a lack of communication. Innumerable negotiations fail because neither side can’t break through to the other.

This problem is not new. It is part of the human condition. God certainly recognized it:

 “You will be ever seeing but never perceiving,

ever hearing but never understanding.” 

         – Isaiah 6:9

So, can anything be done about this? Sure. We all know the answer. Pay attention. Be in the present. Share from the heart. Easy, right? I'm no counselor, and I won’t attempt to offer answers to people in difficult relationships. Except to say, as counselors and therapists have said to me in the past, “You already know the answer.” Don’t you hate that? They’re right, of course.

Academics and theorists have tried to tackle the problem of the barriers to communication. They’ve identified them: time, space, noise, semantics, culture and language, attitudes, perception, comprehension, emotion. And selection of medium. This last one is a particular problem today, with the plethora of media we have to choose from. But we can miss the boat completely by trying to broadcast something that needs to be presented more intimately. Or using video to share something more appropriately done in writing. Etc.

If you have something important to communicate, it is always good to go back to the basics of communication. What is your message? Who is your audience? What do you want them to do or think as a result of your message? THEN, you can think about the medium to use. So many start with video or social media or a website first, and then answer the basic questions. Oops! Marshall McLuhan said “the medium is the message.” But he meant something else (fodder for a future blog!). The medium is important, but the message is the focus. 

It’s not an effective message if no one perceives it. It’s not a good story if no one understands it. If you have an important message to deliver, take it back to the basics. You already know the right answer.